Ageless Body, Timeless Mind by Deepak Chopra

[Bijay Raut]

Ageless Body, Timeless Mind: The Quantum Alternative to Growing Old

From Publishers Weekly Chopra ( Quantum Healing ) is one of our perennial gurus, appealing to millions but offering them a suspect brew of panacea and escapism. The message of his new book? "We are not victims of aging, sickness, and death. These are part of the scenery, not of the seer, who is immune to any form of change. This seer is the spirit, the expression of eternal being." The basis for his belief, Chopra argues, is quantum physics and the work of such scientists as Heisenberg, Bohr and Einstein, with whose help Chopra proposes to tell us how to stave off the inevitable changes brought on by mortality and the passing of years. He advises us on how to "defeat entropy," to "believe" enough to offer palpable resistance to processes of physical alteration, and to "reinterpret your body" such that renewal will come of it. He himself believes in "a land where no one is old," and where "we create our bodies as we create the experience of our world." He is also a proponent of "the science of longevity," and cites research by doctors (sometimes nameless) to back himself up when expounding upon it. But alert readers will finish the book with unsettling questions, the result of a book that is rife with inspirational conviction but at times thin on substance.
Amazon.com Customer Reviews:
A must read for anyone with a chronic or life threatening illness, November 22, 2008 By Holly K. Klein (Kansas City) - As a psychotherapist, I have recommended and loaned out this cassette many times. This reading will give a patient a template for moving through the most difficult battle they can face, their own physical health and life threatening diagnosis. The positiveness Dr. Chopra talks about within the reading will assist anyone to move through the experience. I highly recommend it and after lending it to my clients, they went and purchased their own copy to play it over and over. That says something, doesn't it? Holly K. Klein LSCSW/LCSW
Kudos to Chopra for a Courageous Thesis, October 1, 2008 By Pavel Somov, Ph.D., Author of Eating the Mome... (Pittsburgh, PA, USA) Chopra's "Ageless Body, Timeless Mind" is a truly courageous thesis. How well he manages to argue it is a different matter... After all, Chopra dared to take on the most fundamental axiom of humankind - that of mortality! Page 53: "Inside everyone lies the hidden conviction "I must age, which operates so powerfully on us that our bodies conform to it." Citing the Indian sage, Shankara, he continues: "People grow old and die because they see others grow old and die." Chopra summarizes: the inevitability of aging is an artifact of cultural conditioning. This is the problem that he sets out to solve. A gutsy proposition! Kudos to Chopra for this early 1990s effort. What's the relevance of the timeline? The early 90s were the time that the quantum physics was riding the high of its popularization. Chopra's arguments - taken in their scientifically historical context - are an eloquent intertwine of the Quantum Physics and the Buddhist doctrine of Sunyata (emptiness). He mounts an eloquent, encyclopedic-in-its-breadth argument, in a clear and engaging matter. In my reading of this argument, he redefines mind as a distributed neuronal network - mind isn't just brain, it is wherever the nerves are, and thus no province of body is potentially outside of the central command of mindful intention and awareness. He posits that whatever is withing the field of awareness is within conscious control and proposes a curriculum of awareness-building. What a valiant, triumphant, daring dissertation on the mind-over-body possibilities! The courage of this effort is in self-exposure: Chopra now has to become the Houdini that escapes time... What a mandate! Regardless of what you think of Chopra's thesis at a glance, I encourage you to read the book. It's a great overview of mind-body research, of the interplay of physics/immunity/psychology, an inspiring big-picture, a poignant exploration of our entrappment in our cultural conditioning (even if age happens to be an exception to it). The book has many a great line. "The effect of conditioning is always the same: choice becomes restricted." "To stimulate one cell is to stimulate all." "What is outside our awareness cannot be controlled." "Any appearance of separation is only the product of the limitation of our senses." "The dance is forever and the dance is you." Medicine, psychology, poetry, epistemology, East-West synthesis! Nice invigorating read but don't cancel your health insurance just yet. Pavel Somov, Ph.D. Author of "Eating the Moment: 141 Mindful Practices to Overcome Overeating One Meal at a Time" (New Harbinger, Nov. 2008) Source:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0517882124/ref=s9_sims_gw_s2_p14_i...