I reviewed the late authors first book, Molecules of Emotion back in 2017, and this follow up has been sitting on my shelf for quite some time, before getting my attention.
It was worth waiting for! It is a book that bridges science and what may loosely be called “new age” well-being, and it does so well.
The author was a Psychopharmacologist whose professional career was largely around the molecular basis of emotion in our body – what happens and a physiological basis when we feel? This book takes that further – what does this mean in our daily life, and how does it tie into more esoteric concepts around wisdom, energy and spirit? The late author addresses these points in a novel, but effective way, by charting the very course of emotions and difficulties that came up whilst she was writing the book, and simultaneous difficulties and tensions in her professional careerer, and how these may be understood from a perspective of science and spirit. This could be at best a difficult way of writing, at worst clumsy, but along with her co-author Nancy Marriot, she pulls it off well, and the book presents a coherent and grounded work, reconciling the two polarities of science and spirit well.
Is everything she says correct? Maybe, maybe not, some of the spiritual concepts are beyond anything other than empirical personal proof, but it can’t be denied that we benefit from reconciling the polarities of scientific discovery and empirical wisdom, and the late author has made a useful contribution to this.
When writing these reviews I often ask myself what did I learn from the book? Difficult, as its a narrative of the authors own journey, but certainly there was a useful refresher here of some things I’ve covered before in my own studies and exploration, and the writing was helpful to me in both refreshing my outlook, bringing concepts together and giving me some new perspectives to think on,
Its not a text book, but an exploration of the boundaries between science and spirit, and worth a read if you are interested in that area.
