What do you think?
Rate this book
Wise Mind, Open Mind: Finding Purpose and Meaning in Times of Crisis, Loss, and Change
Though it's nearly impossible to imagine, times of personal crisis and upheaval are opportunities for self-reinvention and heightened artistic expression. Whether you are healing from a severed relationship, experiencing a job loss, or coping with another traumatic life transition, you can renew your strength and find new passion and purpose after things fall apart. Wise Mind, Open Mind offers a powerful three-step mindfulness approach to help you navigate times of unwanted change, rediscover your inner well of creativity, and move forward with passion and purpose. This book combines techniques drawn from contemporary mind-body approaches, Buddhist psychology, mindfulness, creative thinking, and positive psychology to show you how to tap into your gifts and create a practical plan for personal transformation that will help you move through the challenges you face. You'll learn to overcome the five common hindrances that may be keeping you from true fulfillment and happiness. Finally, you'll be able to embrace your circumstances, utilizing them to create a renewed personal vision and welcome new possibilities and greater creativity into your life.
224 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2009
38 people are currently reading
207 people want to read
About the author
Ronald Alexander
1 book3 followersRonald A. Alexander, PhD, is the author of the new book, Core Creativity: The Mindful Way to Unlock Your Creative Self (Rowman & Littlefield, June 21, 2022), upon which this article is based. He is a creativity coach, consultant, and mind-body psychotherapist. He has a private psychotherapy and executive coaching practice in Santa Monica, California. He’s the executive director of the OpenMind® Training Program that offers personal and professional training programs in mindfulness-based therapies, transformational leadership and meditation. He is also the author of the highly acclaimed book, Wise Mind, Open Mind: Finding Purpose and Meaning in Times of Crisis, Loss, and Change (2008). Learn more at www.CoreCreativity.com.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
January 29, 2016
Warning: I have a cold and a case of medicine head at the moment, so this might not be the most coherent review I've ever written.
I wouldn't want to discourage anyone from reading this book. It definitely contains a lot of interesting ideas, and if you're new to Buddhism this is as good a place as any to learn a few things. In particular, I liked the cognitive-behavioral aspect of it: In layman's terms, the way we tend to think conditions our brains to default to those patterns of thinking, and the only way to change that is to actively work on changing our thinking. Very persuasive. One other insight has been exceedingly useful to me--the idea that if we are creating a lot of urgency and pressure around a situation that doesn't really require it, that's a sign that we should actually slow down and take more time to figure out what's going on. That's really true! Try it sometime.
Unfortunately, there was a lot about this book that didn't work for me. First and foremost: the writing. It was definitely competent, but... zzzzz. Some Buddhist thinkers have a real gift and flair for engaging writing, but unfortunately Ron Alexander is not one of them--which is the main reason this book took me almost a year to finish.
Then there's the fact that Alexander makes part of his living by going into corporate workplaces and teaching those folks how to incorporate his ideas into their office culture. Perfectly admirable, but Alexander always feels the need to mention that a lot of his clients are major Hollywood types making tons of money off superstar recording artists, etc. This, I felt, had the effect of shutting out the ordinary reader. Honestly, getting all impressed by these exterior measures of success is counter to what Buddhism should be about, at least in my opinion. So I wasn't crazy about that.
I also didn't like the highly detailed guided meditations he offered, many of which explained to you exactly what you were supposed to be feeling at any given moment. You're supposed to force yourself to feel these things? In my experience, meditation just doesn't work like that, and I don't like the idea that someone new to meditation might have a hard time with his suggestions and thus abandon practice altogether. That aspect of the book was a little weird, to be honest.
But what made me most uncomfortable was all the results he promised. If you take up Buddhist practice, according to Alexander, your life is just going to keep getting more and more awesome. He practically guarantees it! I'm not saying that wouldn't happen, just that it's not a good idea to be quite so results-oriented. I took up meditation to help me deal with some anxiety issues I was having, but paradoxically, I found that it didn't really work until I genuinely let go of the idea of getting any kind of result whatsoever. I just accepted that meditation and mindfulness were good things to be doing all on their own and stopped expecting anything else. If I had continued expecting all kinds of amazing things, I think my practice would have been crushed under the weight of those expectations and I would have given up long ago.
So I guess I take back what I said about this book being good for people who are new to Buddhist ideas. I don't know who it's good for. It's not a terrible book, but there are so many better ones on these topics that I can't really recommend this to anyone.
I wouldn't want to discourage anyone from reading this book. It definitely contains a lot of interesting ideas, and if you're new to Buddhism this is as good a place as any to learn a few things. In particular, I liked the cognitive-behavioral aspect of it: In layman's terms, the way we tend to think conditions our brains to default to those patterns of thinking, and the only way to change that is to actively work on changing our thinking. Very persuasive. One other insight has been exceedingly useful to me--the idea that if we are creating a lot of urgency and pressure around a situation that doesn't really require it, that's a sign that we should actually slow down and take more time to figure out what's going on. That's really true! Try it sometime.
Unfortunately, there was a lot about this book that didn't work for me. First and foremost: the writing. It was definitely competent, but... zzzzz. Some Buddhist thinkers have a real gift and flair for engaging writing, but unfortunately Ron Alexander is not one of them--which is the main reason this book took me almost a year to finish.
Then there's the fact that Alexander makes part of his living by going into corporate workplaces and teaching those folks how to incorporate his ideas into their office culture. Perfectly admirable, but Alexander always feels the need to mention that a lot of his clients are major Hollywood types making tons of money off superstar recording artists, etc. This, I felt, had the effect of shutting out the ordinary reader. Honestly, getting all impressed by these exterior measures of success is counter to what Buddhism should be about, at least in my opinion. So I wasn't crazy about that.
I also didn't like the highly detailed guided meditations he offered, many of which explained to you exactly what you were supposed to be feeling at any given moment. You're supposed to force yourself to feel these things? In my experience, meditation just doesn't work like that, and I don't like the idea that someone new to meditation might have a hard time with his suggestions and thus abandon practice altogether. That aspect of the book was a little weird, to be honest.
But what made me most uncomfortable was all the results he promised. If you take up Buddhist practice, according to Alexander, your life is just going to keep getting more and more awesome. He practically guarantees it! I'm not saying that wouldn't happen, just that it's not a good idea to be quite so results-oriented. I took up meditation to help me deal with some anxiety issues I was having, but paradoxically, I found that it didn't really work until I genuinely let go of the idea of getting any kind of result whatsoever. I just accepted that meditation and mindfulness were good things to be doing all on their own and stopped expecting anything else. If I had continued expecting all kinds of amazing things, I think my practice would have been crushed under the weight of those expectations and I would have given up long ago.
So I guess I take back what I said about this book being good for people who are new to Buddhist ideas. I don't know who it's good for. It's not a terrible book, but there are so many better ones on these topics that I can't really recommend this to anyone.
December 3, 2023
This is a great book with many delightful inspirational insights that I read for personal reasons.
September 10, 2014
Some very powerful concepts and ideas but not as great of a guide for meditation as I expected. Perhaps that expectation lead to my slight disappointment, since it was recommended as a great book for meditation. Still very powerful, just not what I was looking for at the time.
April 16, 2016
One of the best books I've found on finding meaning in life. I enjoyed how Alexander interwove meditations, philosophy, practical experience and personal insight into how to create a meaningful life.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews