The Temple Experience: Passage to Healing and Holiness

by Wendy Ulrich

When you're used to instant Internet answers, it can take practice and patience to recognize the multiple meanings in sacred temple ordinances. Perfect for new and longtime temple worshipers alike, this priceless volume is guaranteed to help you use the temple experience and its rich symbolism to find healing and hope that will let you see yourself more truthfully, then seek God more trustingly.

Genres: Lds, Nonfiction, Religion, Church, Inspirational, Self Help, Christian

272 pages, Hardcover

First published August 14, 2012

About the author

Wendy Ulrich, Ph.D., was a psychologist in private practice for over fifteen years in Michigan before joining her husband to serve when he was called as president of the Canada Montreal Mission in 2002. They now live in Alpine, Utah, where she founded Sixteen Stones Center for Growth, LLC, offering seminar retreats on forgiveness, abundant life, loss, spirituality, and personal growth (visit www.sixteenstones.net). She is the mother of three adult children, a former ward and stake Relief Society president, and a former president of the Association of Mormon Counselors and Psychotherapists. She is the author of Forgiving Ourselves and Weakness Is Not Sin.


from http://deseretbook.com/auth/18560/Wen...

Reviews

[Brent Wilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm a big fan of Wendy Ulrich - have followed her work since hearing an impressive FAIR talk. I love her honesty and her owning up to the complexity of faith.

For a number of reasons (including spiritual and ecclesiastical abuse experienced by family members and loved ones) I've not returned to the temple in 20 years. Last few years I've felt a yearning to return, fueled by my own evolving faith and personal needs, but also my reading of Margaret Barker, a Methodist researcher with amazing insights about temple theology.

I read Wendy's temple book as devotional reading with my wife. We'd curl up together and take turns reading paragraphs. Some points were very moving for us. By book's end I had completed a decision process to return to the temple. My recommend is now all signed and ready - we're just looking now for the time to get down there!

Thank you Wendy for your thoughtful and steady faith, and for looking deeply at things that so many of us take for granted!

[Jennifer Hughes · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the few books I give a wholehearted 5 stars to. I have read the whole thing through once and several chapters a few times each. I am currently rereading it slowly and doing the journaling exercises.

Wendy Ulrich has a unique and insightful way of looking at the temple and its symbols, ceremonies, and meanings. It truly is the best book I've read on the topic. The interesting thing is, I don't know that everyone would "get" this book. She takes a very different approach than you will get from a general authority.

Wendy Ulrich uses her personal journey and insights and her counselor's toolkit to help the reader ask himself the questions that will enhance individual understanding. In order to avoid speaking of specifics of temple ceremonies inappropriately, she uses different techniques, like dream symbology, to help the reader think through the temple experience and connect the dots for himself, as it were. I can completely understand how that might be confusing or off-putting to a few readers. But it really worked for me.

I found that her writing is rich and multi-layered, and although I am a fast reader I have to slow way down to read this. I especially appreciated Ulrich's insights into understanding the temple as a house of healing, including a chapter on healing from abuse. I feel as I read that I am sitting with an older and wiser friend and confidant who gently guides my perspective to examine things in a new way, under a new lens. This book has been a wonderful tool for me that continues to inform my personal temple worship.

[Melissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a long journey kind of book. This is an LDS book about learning and growing closer to God. It took me a long time to finish and felt more like schooling. I loved it and learned so much.

[Lora · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is going on the shelf I consider the most important books of my life. It applies therapeutic principles to temple understanding for people who have experienced profane experiences in what are supposed to be sacred experiences- marriage, temple attendance, etc.
It's also a good book for those preparing to go through the temple. Ulrich discusses the principles encountered within the temple without transgressing the sacred boundaries we respect for temple works in general.
Personally, if I had read this before my first visit to the temple, many years ago, I may not have grasped what I was reading. But after I came out of the temple, I would have had a resource for enlightenment.

[Jelina · Rating 4 out of 5]

There were parts that were unnecessarily wordy and parts I had to re-read to figure out what she was trying to say. BUT there were amazing parts that really opened my understanding of certain principles - especially on forgiveness. Insight I hadn’t thought of in that way before and it made so much sense. Definitely worth the time to read.

[Annie Bentley Waddoups · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you’re a member of my faith (LDS/Mormon), I highly recommend this book to elevate & deepen your individual temple experience. Ulrich brings her experience as a psychologist to weave together threads of therapy/healing and LDS theology & symbolism in remarkable ways. It’s changed my understanding and worship in important ways.

If you’re not a member of my faith but curious about Mormon temples or theology (or, even, generational healing through a faith lens), this could be an interesting read for you, too, in the same way reading about Jewish midrash, Jesuit practices of finding God in all things, Buddhist equanimity, and learning about other belief systems have enriched my spiritual life.

[Maren Dennis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was incredible! So insightful and brilliant and beautiful. It was a book about the temple, but it included so much more. I learned a lot about how to be a better person, how to improve my relationships with God, other people, and myself. It gave me such an interesting view into the gospel as a whole. I absolutely loved it. I own it on Kindle, and I could have highlighted the whole book.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This brand new book by my dear friend, Wendy Ulrich, is amazing in its breadth, scope and insight. Wendy has written this book over the past 20 years and I - and many others - have shared so many conversations that she crystallizes into applications of meaningful temple metaphors. This book will absolutely enrich your experience of the temple...and give you encouragement and insight that will enrich your life. I cannot recommend it highly enough! Take your time with it and enjoy and benefit from every single page!

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me months to read this book because it seemed like every paragraph included a thought to savor, and I didn't want to rush past anything. I couldn't mark the great passages because I would have had to mark almost everything. This is the best book about one's individual temple experience I have read, and was so thought-provoking, with nothing inappropriate concerning this sacred topic. I will be reading it again soon to try to incorporate its ideas into my mind and spirit more thoroughly. Many thanks to the author for her excellent insights.

[Lynn Camomile · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a remarkable book. It insightfully blends principles of psychology, personal healing, and spirituality. The ideas will help readers heal and find peace with the Divine. It introduces novices to the principles of temple worship and it gives devotees more food for thought. It is a book that can help you better make sense of the difficulties which inevitably arise. Wendy is a great speaker, but an even better writer.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

So many great insights in this book.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

Amazing insights by Ulrich into broadening one's mind about understanding the rituals and ordinances practiced in the Latter-day Saint temple.

As a psychologist, Ulrich gives an account of how the temple practices and ordinances can be both a deeply personal and spiritual experience, if we let them be. Even though she is a psychologist (and while she does give examples of her patients growth) she often gives examples of her own, which is humanizing and helps you relate to her. She also asserts that the temple ordinances are catalysts for great change in one's mindset, spiritual and temporal growth and offers practial steps at the end of each chapter to help the reader start on the road to achieve such changes.

I rented this book but will have to buy it to start marking it up and start the exercises Ulrich provided at the end of each chapter. I hope to keep coming back to the book as I learn and grow.

My one and only criticism of the book is that I felt some parts overly repetitive, yet that pales in comparison to what can be gained by reading this book.

[Kim Dennis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Admittedly, there were places in this book that I thought her take was -- interesting -- and as a therapist, she took a fairly extreme view in some of the instances she talked about when it came to healing. However, overall, I LOVED this book. It wasn't quite what I was expecting. She talked about the temple, but not quite the way I thought she would. However, I often found myself writing notes on what I'd read. I loved the fact that at the end of the chapters, she provided some practical applications for what she'd talked about. There were some things she suggested thinking about in the temple that made me really sad that the temple isn't open right now. I would love to take some of the things to ponder in with me. I will have to review parts of the book when I can go to the temple again.

[Emily Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

The purpose of this book is to extend the knowledge of the temple experience to newcomers and old timers. I started reading this before I was endowed and helped me prepare my self to know what I could do with the new covenants I would be making as well as how I could use the access to the house of the lord in my life. I continued to read and finished the book after I was endowed and know that this book is honest and fulfills its purpose of bringing us home. “This ‘getting home’ is a process of becoming, of being shaped into the home we seek.” Wendy Ulrich does a good job at assisting readers on their straight and narrow journey by providing further knowledge of the holiness one can retrieve from temple attendance.

[April · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am very disappointed with this book. The real name should be "How Psychology Pertains to the Temple"! I didn't learn anything new about the temple experience, just how to psychoanalyze everything! If you are looking for a shrink, this book might be for you. If you really want to improve yourself and gain 'further light and knowledge' I would recommend 'The Second Comforter' by Denver C. Snuffer Jr, or 'The Triumph of Zion: Our Personal Quest for the New Jerusalem' by John M. Pontius. In either book you will learn more about the temple than in this book.

[Lyndsey Thackston · Rating 1 out of 5]

I could not finish this book which is rare for me. For someone with a PHD her research was sloppy. Tons of claims and no evidence to support it not even empirical observations. Some of the connections were Bizarre and made no sense. For example, God creating animals has something to do with interpreting dreams??I asked myself several times throughout the book what in the world does this have to do with the temple and healing. I feel like the idea and this book had a lot of potential and maybe needed a stronger editor to streamline it a little bit.

[Kerrie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not what I thought it would be. Part of a book subscription. I challenge myself to read the main book that month. It's theme in May was the Temple. Wrong book to pick. Very little to do with the Temple, more of a template. This is a self help book. If honest I didn't take much in and my mind constantly wandered. Nothing wrong with the book just not what I was looking for. I now know what to expect when I see this Author's name again.

[Sharman Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of good insights and suggestions not just for spiritual growth, but also for emotional and physical health. She talks a lot about healthy relationships. All of it is related to the temple experience in interesting ways.

[Janalyn Biesinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

So many insights. I know this is going to make a difference in my Temple experiences.

[Luann · Rating 5 out of 5]

This took me almost a year to read and prayerfully study. It has made a life time impact on how I view the temple and my relationship to the temple.

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a beautiful and extremely influential book for me. Fantastic thinking about the temple and how it can heal us.

[Stacy Hochstettler · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. As a professional psychologist, the author gives a unique perspective on the experiences in the temple. I have underlined so many things that are very thought provoking and stirs my soul. I especially loved Chapter 3 titled "New Births" which not only discusses baptism and being born again spiritually, it also gives a new perspective on His atonement and has broadened my understanding of healing and the wounds I still carry. There are questions to consider and answer at the end of chapters. I particularly enjoyed answering the questions at the end of Chapter 5. This book is so good that I almost read it over again as soon as I finished it because I loved it so much.

[Wendy Osborn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wendy Ulrich is my favorite religious author. She mixes psychology, real life experiences, and real problems to make her books so interesting. Kind of like a mix of Brene Brown, John Gottman, and Bob Goff. This book was unique in that it breaks down levels of symbolism in the temple experience on a surface level, and on a deeper level with ourselves, spouses and children, single adults, extended family and between us and God. Didn’t realize how much I was missing out of the temple experience until she uncovered some of her unique thoughts and applications for each ordinance. I look forward to going back to the temple and learning more. Terrific book!

[Heather · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Temple Experience is a terrible book. As I read it, I alternately felt horribly sorry for the clients who go to the author (a therapist) and wondered if perhaps the author’s view of the world is terribly skewed to the point that she thinks absolutely everyone is extremely mentally unhealthy. Worse, though, many things she asserted throughout the book were not doctrinally correct. I absolutely cannot recommend this book to anyone.

[Kayli · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing and inspiring and as soon as I finished reading a chapter I could go back and re-read what I'd highlighted and feel like I still couldn't quite get to the bottom of everything that was there. I will absolutely read again. I love Wendy Ulrich. (But yes to the other reviews that explain that this is more a therapy book than a temple doctrine book exactly... better to go in knowing that.)

[Jenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

So many insights! I have marks on every page of this book. She has thought about the temple in a level that I don’t know if I ever could. I’m so thankful for her words and for helping me understand the temple more. I love the thought of a temple as a place of healing and holiness. This book has given me a lot to ponder.

[Mariah W · Rating 5 out of 5]

For my friends of my same faith, this is an excellent book. It explains the transformative power of the rituals and experiences in the temple. I loved the questions at the end of each chapter that helped me see where my understanding is lacking & where my beliefs can be strengthened. Highly recommend.

[Tanya · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book! I love Wendy’s explanations and thinking.
She wrote about the temple in ways I have never considered that kind of blew my mind: Adam and Eve, agency, the Creation, seeking God’s help, doing good, hope, and what she calls “object constancy” to name a few.
Beautifully written!

[Skylar Hatfield · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book took me three years to read. It is idea dense and text rich, but not easy to get through.

[Cheri · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book that is best read slowly, so that you can ponder what can help heal you. Wendy Ulrich has axeaybof opening your heart to think about ways to change and become better.