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Afterlife: A psychiatrist exploring life beyond death
Many in the scientific community shun life after death, considering such experiences impossible. Marcel Westerlund is the exception.
The Swedish psychiatrist, not only uses hypnotherapy to treat people's mental illnesses—he uses it to explore their afterlives as well. Despite being a highly controversial approach, his use of hypnotherapy results in some fascinating stories...and is even integrated directly into the sciences.
Travel back with a patient as she recounts being a Queen of Egypt. Discover how a man finds his own grave, finally allowing him to connect with his spiritual existence and find healing. Read account after account of people who come to grips with their past lives, and use these experiences to find happiness in this life.
Pills may curb depression, but Westerlund discovers that delving into people's past lives provides a healing force that he could never accomplish through regular medicine. He talks candidly about his job as a healer, as well as the importance of the spirit in mental recovery.
Journey into the soul and learn, not only about the existence of past lives, but the science behind it.
382 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 4, 2015
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
July 7, 2026
A friend was reading this book, and after a conversation about it, I decided to read it as well so that we could discuss it. I did so mostly out of curiosity and didn't expect the book to resonate with my own experiences. As a result, I still haven't fully integrated the book's insights with my own experiences.
I underwent fairly intensive hypnotherapy for two years when I was 17–19. In the beginning, I considered myself an atheist and had no belief in anything whatsoever, yet the visions I saw changed my life - just as they did for the people in the book. More than a decade later, I still don't understand everything I saw, and this book confused me further, but it also strengthened me. At the time, I didn't discuss the therapy with a single other person and, looking back, it seems like quite a remarkable thing to go through on your own when you're a teenager and have enough to deal with as it is. In a way, I wish I'd had this book back then, because it contains so much experience, knowledge, and shared feelings (the latter is neatly summarised in one of my favourite sentences in the book: "We struggle and desperately try to comprehend our own existence, caught as we are between the alienation of existential separation and the promise of spiritual unity.").
I found the book fascinating and appreciated not only the opportunity to follow Marcel's experiences as a psychiatrist, but also the personal dimension he brings to the subject. The way he, for example, describes it when he makes mistakes and ask things that's not strictly professional or how he's human on a fairly uncharted territory made me feel like he's someone who's watching his own ego and I respect that.
The final part of the book went a bit over my head (partly because I don't have the necessary background in quantum physics, but also because I don't need an explanation of how it could be possible as I already know that it is). A great book, and above all: a brave book. Considering how profoundly this form of therapy helps people, it's quite astonishing that it isn't more widely practiced.
I underwent fairly intensive hypnotherapy for two years when I was 17–19. In the beginning, I considered myself an atheist and had no belief in anything whatsoever, yet the visions I saw changed my life - just as they did for the people in the book. More than a decade later, I still don't understand everything I saw, and this book confused me further, but it also strengthened me. At the time, I didn't discuss the therapy with a single other person and, looking back, it seems like quite a remarkable thing to go through on your own when you're a teenager and have enough to deal with as it is. In a way, I wish I'd had this book back then, because it contains so much experience, knowledge, and shared feelings (the latter is neatly summarised in one of my favourite sentences in the book: "We struggle and desperately try to comprehend our own existence, caught as we are between the alienation of existential separation and the promise of spiritual unity.").
I found the book fascinating and appreciated not only the opportunity to follow Marcel's experiences as a psychiatrist, but also the personal dimension he brings to the subject. The way he, for example, describes it when he makes mistakes and ask things that's not strictly professional or how he's human on a fairly uncharted territory made me feel like he's someone who's watching his own ego and I respect that.
The final part of the book went a bit over my head (partly because I don't have the necessary background in quantum physics, but also because I don't need an explanation of how it could be possible as I already know that it is). A great book, and above all: a brave book. Considering how profoundly this form of therapy helps people, it's quite astonishing that it isn't more widely practiced.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review