Este libro es una bendición para aquellos quienes están dispuestos a recuperar sus vidas. La traducción del original al español es excelente. Se omiten algunos elementos de la obra original que ayudan al iniciado. El Dr Ornish, además de mostrar un amplio conocimiento sobre la enfermedad cardiaca y como curarla, motiva a la decisión del cambio en el estilo de vida en forma clara y comprensible para logos en la materia. Su prosa resulta amena y sencilla.

Dr. Rachel Remen's "Kitchen Table Wisdom" is a significant contribution to personal and societal well-being. Her stories recapture an important source of wisdom and simplicity. Dr. Remen stresses the importance of communication to individual and community health with a comfortable style and without sermon. Stories That Heal leaves a candle in the window for millions of isolated, lonely people. It gives the reader hope for healing an ailing society and it accomplishes this with ease and sincerity. This book is a must read - repeatedly.

I first read this book when it was given to me as a gift and again more recently as I went through a difficult time in my life. Both times I was struck by the true stories, beautifuly and simply related, that demonstrate over and over our own capacity to improve our lives and the lives of those around us. Dr. Remen's medical credentials combined with her own history as a patient give her a deep understanding of healing and disease from both sides. I would recommend this book especially to anyone who is suffering from a physical or emotional illness. But even more so, I recommend it to the doctors out there who realize that your patients are more than just a compilation of symptoms and who are looking for a better way to relate to them.

This beautiful, touching and life- altering book is without doubt one of the best books I've read. Dr.Remen captured my mind, heart and soul from the very first page. The stories she tells about herself, her patients, her family and friends are told with amazing honesty, beauty and grace. This book is about Life with all its different facets, phases and seasons. As a physician, reading this book has made a lot of impact on how I view my role and how I communicate with my patients. I now think of myself not as a "doctor" but as a healer, and know that there is much more to my work than diagnosing diseases and prescribing medicines. I read this book many times, and every time I laugh and I cry and I am inspired and touched. This book is truly one of a kind; it is worth a million stars!!

This is a book that deals with the varied issues that arguments for vegetarianism are concerned with: health, animal rights, environmental damage, and John Robbins also includes a section on genetic engineering.

Though he makes a lot of important points (with which I agree), I was extremely annoyed with the tone of the book. I felt like I was reading some spiritual self-help book. Though this may be the author's style and may also attract an audience, it was a little too dumbed down for comfort.

Still, Robbins has spent much time on his meticulous research (even if some of his sources are biased), and there are many arguments in here whether valid or not, that you might want to think about when you decide what to eat. Small actions like buying food at a grocery store or restaurant really do matter, and the possible consequences of your decisions might shock you.

FOOD REVOLUTION will surely make vegetarians feel good about what they do, provide them with some arguments for anti-vegetarians, and will probably change the way some readers eat. But there's really nothing new here that you can't read in other books. I think Erik Marcus' VEGAN: THE NEW ETHICS OF EATING is better at discussing the reasons why people choose to eat plant-based diets, and Virginia Messina's VEGETARIAN WAY is indispensable for understanding the nutritional aspects of vegetarian diets. And these books don't try so painfully hard to pull at your heartstrings.

A little too much love in the writing, which I wish wasn't so, because I think it'll lose Joe and Jane Sixpack (i.e. most of my friends) -- but LOTS of facts, an insane amount of research, and excellent writing to tie it all together.

A die-hard carnivore would need more than this book to be convinced that vegetarianism is a wise decision. One of John McDougall's or Dean Ornish's books perhaps. But it's still persuasive. The Food Revolution puts the argument for environmentally-motivated vegetarianism into scientific and common-sense contexts, something that sorely needs doing. The animal rights context just doesn't do much to persuade people who already know their hamburger comes from a cow, and still want to eat it. After this book they might better understand the implications of that decision.

As for biotechnology and genetically engineered agriculture, there's some scary stuff in here. This book will cast a permanent shadow of doubt over the mind of even the most dedicated biotech fan. You can't be hit with arguments as good as this without doing a double-take. I'm a computer guy so technology (admittedly a very different branch) is my bread and butter, but I know the first thing we techie types should be aware of is our own limitations, and I know how often we aren't. If you think Europeans are overreacting to genetic engineering, you need to read this book.

Webster's Collegiate Dictionary defines revolution as a fundamental change in the way of thinking about something. The title for John Robbins new book is very aptly named. This book will change not only the way you think about food -- it will change the way you eat.

Twenty chapters, with over nine-hundred footnotes, track the studies and statements of top researchers from around the world as they respond to the public relation claims of the meat and dairy industry. When we see the industry claims refuted, time and again by the best minds in the diet and environmental community, we start to see why there is a revolution going on.

I cannot count the number of times I have been asked to provide the study that supports the facts I use. The Food Revolution provides a convenient method of proving issues that the majority of Americans have never realized to be true. It is not what we know that is the problem; it is what we know that isn't so, that is the problem.

The Food Revolution will shine light on those "facts" that industry hopes you won't believe. Interesting facts such as: half of all the fish caught in the world are fed to livestock or that 2.5 acres of crop land can produce enough vegetables for twenty people, enough grain for fifteen people, enough chicken for two people or enough beef for one. These revelations really make you stop and think about how we are using our resources.

Dr. Patricia Griffin, a government official, from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention states, "It is reasonable that if a consumer undercooks a hamburger that their three-year-old dies?"

Placing the total responsibility on the shoulders of the consumers for food safety explains why USDA would accept test results indicating that 89% of hamburger tested containing E.coli 0157:H7 to be accepted as normal. This bacterium is known to kill young children.

If your main interest is the environment, The Food Revolution has something for you. For instance cattlemen claim that global warming evidence is inconclusive while at the same time forty -nine Nobel Prize winners, in a letter to the President, stated that it is the most serious environmental threat of the 21st century. We must educate ourselves and as the Prizewinners state, " Only by taking action now can we insure that future generations will not be put at risk."

John's first book, Diet for A New America, changed the way many folks were eating. The Food Revolution will give those who are still eating the standard American diet documented facts about their junk food addiction while there is time for a change.

John Robbins has written a book that can save more people from an early death than were saved by the use of penicillin. Do yourself a favor and read, The Food Revolution and pass it on to someone you love before it's too late.

Dr. Judith Orloff's GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING is truly a gift to the world. I recommend that everyone take the time to read this book. She has taken a huge risk in writing about her intuitive gifts. But, even more she is trying to teach all of us practical ways to tap into our intuition on a daily basis. That we all have the answers to difficult questions inside of us, if we take the time to listen to our inner voices. I have come to realize that we don't learn to do this overnight. It is a gradual thing that takes a great deal of practice. I had the privilege attending Dr. Orloff's workshop at the Kripalu Yoga Center in Lenox, Massachusetts. It was an amazing experience! I left the workshop with more than I could have ever imagined. I believe this book should be read by everyone in the health care profession. What a great gift for our patients! I am in the nursing profession and had found myself going numb and just going through the motions at work. We were and still are short staffed at the hospital where I am employed. Which is a nationwide problem. I feel like I've gained my compassion back after attending the workshop and reading INTUITIVE HEALING. I've also learned that being compassionate and listening to my intuition actually helps with time management at work. It seems we are always racing against the clock, but bringing positive energy into each patient's room and taking the time to listen really helps the patients heal or at least feel more peaceful. Something else I learned from Dr. Orloff's book is the story of Kuan Yin, the goddess of compassion in China. Dr. Orloff states that she wears a green jade pendant of Kuan Yin for protection and to open her heart. I noticed the pendant at the workshop, but was too shy to ask what it was. I later received the answer while reading the book. I was so moved by the story of Kuan Yin that I purchased a Kuan Yin pendant also. The pendant is always resting against my heart reminding me to be compassionate with myself and others. Take the time to read this book. You won't regret it!

What I love about INTUITIVE HEALING is that it addresses what so many of us have lost: common sense. Though the book is about intuition-which sounds like such an esoteric topic-it really is about taking action, about being directly engaged in the healing of our problems; it's about using our innate intuition-an ancient wisdom-to deal with a wide range of health issues. Dr. Orloff shows us how to listen to our bodies, to look for instinctive signs and signals, to see more deeply into what is going wrong-and what is going right-in our lives. In an era when traditional medicine and hospital settings can be so bewildering and overwhelming, Dr. Orloff's book provides a guide through the labyrinth. I loved her lovely, passionate, earthy words; I loved the stories she tells to illustrate how others have used their intuitive ability to heal. This book is a must for anyone who doesn't want to be a passive observer in their own well-being; this is a book for anyone who desires to be a participant.

GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING
By Dr. Judith Orloff, Dean Ornish

In GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING, Dr. Judith Orloff portrays intuition as a normal, human capacity -- a powerful source of wisdom that anyone and everyone can and should develop. As a practicing psychiatrist and intuitive, she calls us to realize the power of being in touch with the body's innate, natural intelligence. She encourages us to learn how to understand its language and interpret its signals -- whether in the form of dreams, illnesses, premonitions, or what we might simply call "gut feeling." By developing sensitivity to our body and listening to its messages, we are able to be aware of imbalances and illnesses as they arise. We can receive inner guidance as to how they may be treated and healed. GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING offers sensitive, intelligent, practical guidance and wisdom as to how we can nurture and develop these innate abilities.

Based on her own life experiences, Dr. Orloff offers a series of steps to help others get in touch with their own innate, healing capacities. This enables them to use intuition as a powerful tool in facing life's inevitable challenges. The aim is to restore wholeness of being -- harmony and balance in every aspect and on every level of our lives - whether physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, or sexual. For that, we need to free ourselves from limited, preconceived notions about healing. We need to develop the self-confidence to know that we can connect with our body's intelligence and heal ourselves. We need to learn to listen to our body and read its signals. Learning how to sense subtle energies, listening to our inner voice and asking for its guidance, and learning the language of our dreams are further steps in this process. The techniques offered in GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING help clear blockages of energy. They open us to the fullness, joy, passion, and creative energy of life.

Dr. Orloff sees illness as an opportunity for growth and transformation, not a self-inflicted form of punishment. It is a way to open up the heart. She believes that in intuitive healing, love is the most powerful healing force. Compassion for ourself is essential. In a treasure chest of stories and narratives about her own life and those of her patients, Dr. Orloff illustrates with profound clarity and insight how every illness has its own integrity and its own language. When we listen with caring attention, sensitivity, and compassion, the illness can speak to us. It can tell us how it may heal. The answer to the disease is contained in the disease itself. We need to learn how to understand its language. GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING shows us the way.

Death can be a powerful form of intuitive healing. With her rare combination of immense sensitivity, vulnerability, and inner strength, Dr. Orloff shares her stories of being with each of her parents when they died. She served as the devoted caretaker of her father - a medical practitioner and anesthesiologist -- as the layers of his identity and dignity were stripped away, one by one, by the ravages of Parkinson's Disease. She witnessed how that terrible, degenerative process opened within him deeper levels of understanding and invoked a transformation of being. Her story offers a powerful vision of hope. It illustrates how intuitive healing frees us from the grip of our fears. It affirms our deepest truth. Intuitive healing gives us the wisdom, courage, and strength to learn from every experience in life - dark or light - and to grow and be transformed by it.

Dr. Orloff gives examples of the power of dreams to guide and illumine our lives and steps that we may realize that power. By asking ourselves a question before retiring at night and writing down our dream the following morning, we can communicate with our inner selves. We can receive guidance from our dreams as to how to approach and avoid pitfalls in life. We can receive illumination as to what is a proper course of action among various choices presented before us. The possibilities are endless.

It is Dr. Orloff's observation that the tremendous power and potential of intuitive healing has been neglected and overlooked, if not denied, by modern medicine. It is her passion to use her position as a psychiatrist to change the complexion of modern medicine -- to restore its soul -- by giving social credibility to the powers of intuitive healing. Intuitive healing can complement modern medicine. Dr. Orloff offers valuable guidance as to how we may find a doctor who will work with us in using the tools of intuitive healing. By so doing, we are empowered as patients to accept greater responsibility for our lives and for our own healing. The physician is also empowered by being able to access the innate wisdom and intelligence of his patients. It is a win-win situation.

We live, today, in an age of astounding advances in science and technology. The emphasis is on creating increasingly sensitive and refined instruments to monitor, detect, and decode information in our lives and throughout the world. That approach is from the outside in. Dr. Judith Orloff offers us an approach from the inside out. She shows us the way in a series of clear and practical steps to refine and strengthen our innate ability to monitor, detect, and decode information offered by our inner self. As T. S. Elliot queried, "Where is the knowledge in information? And where is the wisdom in knowledge?" Dr. Judith Orloff's book, GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING, shows us the way to tap into our inner source of knowledge and wisdom. She offers a path toward wholeness and integration -- toward harmony with our inner and outer environment -- toward communion and communication with our inner selves and with the forces of nature. GUIDE TO INTUITIVE HEALING offers a healing balm to our hurting world. Dr. Orloff has offered a gift to humanity and to the whole of life.

I lowered my cholesterol from 290 to 246 after using the recipes in this book for 2 months. It has really helped me out tremendously, I just feel better. The recipes are quite tasty and easy to follow. My favorites so far are the black bean soup, the 2-bean enchiladas, and the Apple crisp. I like the fact that the recipes are separated by the seasons as it makes it easier to know where to look when I want to make something for a hot summer day, or cold winter day. I highly recommend this book if you need to change your eating habits to a more healthy option!

I'm a total beginner in the kitchen and I'm glad I found this book. It's so fully of clear, valuable information, that the recipes seem almost a bonus. The only problem I have is remembering everything I read and it's sometimes a little hard to locate it again. I'm not sure the organization by seasons is better than organization by meal or food type, such as soups, entrees,etc. or ingredients, i.e., beans, greens, etc. One thing, despite some of Dr. Ornish's provocative book titles, his integrity comes through and apparently his regime really works. Ask people like Bill Moyers who started following Ornish's program after severe heart problems.

This is my favorite cookbook which I use often. I have given it to friends as a gift and received raves. The program is a great way to live and eat.

After reading other health books and walking away without complete explainations I deceied to try one more. Boy, am I glad I did. This book explains and takes you step by step through so many different aspects of diet and health. While I thought some of the ideas were a bit too much there is no denying that just a little of this book can make a dramatic difference. Anyone looking for some good healthy reciepes this is a great place to start and learn some basics!

I picked up Food for Life because I wanted to learn a little bit more about nutrition. By the time I finished it I was well on my way to improving the quality of my life with a better diet. This book is filled with interesting about how changing what you eat can improve your health and preserve your youth!

If you could only have one book for diet related information, this is the one to have. My original purchase of the book was seven years ago when I needed help eating balanced meals while learning to become a vegetarian. This book has it all from nutritional needs for different stages of life, meal planning, great recipes and even fast food alternatives and special needs due to various illnesses. I recently purchased my second copy for a friend (so I could get mine back) and she has also found it to be a great reference guide.

The Healing Secrets of Food takes you on an extensive, self-exploring journey that reveals the core ingredients of optimal eating; what Kesten describes as "nutritional truths": feelings, mindfulness, appreciation, connection/love, socializing, and optimal foods.

I am a research scientist and my studies on lifestyle and health have been published in medical journals ranging from the Journal of the American Medical Association and The Lancet to Psychosomatic Medicine. Because of my work, I am quite knowledgeable about scientifically credible food and nutrition information, and in my opinion, the insights and advice in Kesten's book create an exemplary, worthy model of what nutritional science ought to be.

Of the many books and articles I have read about food, nutrition, and optimal eating, The Healing Secrets of Food is by far the most balanced, timely, and innovative. While remaining scientifically credible throughout, the author calls upon ancient food wisdom that has served humankind for millennia. Kesten has brilliantly synthesized nutrition insights from Western nutritional science, Eastern healing systems that include nutrition (such as traditional Chinese medicine), and what she calls "timeless food wisdom" from world religions and cultural traditions. By eliminating unimportant dietary details, the ideas that are most helpful stand out more clearly. Ultimately, what emerges is a complete, scientifically credible, detailed and practical nutrition program that has the power to heal body, mind, and soul...literally.

I found myself especially impressed by the way in which Kesten turned to credible Western research and studies to verify the healing power of the food and nutrtion secrets she reveals. Indeed, in the foreword, Dean Ornish, M.D., tells us that "it is rare to find someonw who can skillfully walk the tightrope between scientifically proven nutritional concepts and those that are more dificult to prove yet are often even more meaningful. In The Healing Secrets of Food, Deborah Kesten has done just that."

Ultimately, this is a book that can help you nourish every aspect of your being each time you eat. Unlike many food, nutrition, and diet books that are aimed at helping you find "the answer" for weight loss or feeling better, The Healing Secrets of Food shows you not only what to eat for health and well-being, but also how to eat for weight loss and optimal health. In this way, it provides a multi-dimensional, comprehensive eating style and way of life that can enhance your physical, emotional, spiritual, and social health every time you eat.

Many people will find Kesten's personal experiences with the healing secrets fascinating, and the tips at the end of each chapter, incredibly practical and useful. I certainly did. Much of the work is based on a successful seminar that the author has been teaching and researching over the years, so the practical suggestions have a lot of experience and substance behind them.

Whether you are grappling with weight issues, an eating disorder, or food-related ailments, such as high blood pressure, diabetes, certain kinds of cancer, or heart disease, The Healing Secrets of Food provides the insights you'll need to discover the best way for you, personally, to eat--based on your personal nutriton and health concerns and goals. This is because the book is a brilliant synthesis of scientifically proven nutrition wisdom, as well as spiritual, psychological, and social nutrition insights. In addition, the Personal Food Profile questionnaire at the end of the book is an excellent self-help tool for making dietary improvements, and I intend to adapt it to some of my own research studies.

In so many ways, The Healing Secrets of Food is a groundbreaking, well-written book--truly a good read--filled with dependable, timeless, practical information. Its wisdom will remain with you long after you read it. Highly recommended.

Nutritionist/author Deborah Kesten invites the reader on an alchemical journey to discover The Healing Secrets of Food-a remarkable melding of cutting edge science with ancient food wisdom. She has blazed a path to vitalizing and refreshing new nutrition terrain-one that nourishes body, mind, and soul-even our social well-being.
As a nutritionist who has been teaching a similar paradigm of intuitive eating, integrative nutrition and spiritual healing, what I appreciate most about Kesten's approach is her ability to blend the science of nutrition with the art of eating from the heart. She has solid research into the ancient healing traditions involving food, as well as religious, cultural and social customs and rituals. The healing secrets of food have actually been practiced for centuries, even millennia. Our modern culture has simply lost focus, by turning our attention outward-to (ever-changing) data, popular belief, and appearances. Many people are ready to end their struggles with food, eating, their weight and figuring the nutritional math. They are ready for a new focus and direction: a journey home, a return to the heart. The Healing Secrets of Food offers the tools to create this change and the map to discover the answers within. Everyone's journey is different and it is their own-that is the beauty of it.
In a society so dependent on numbers to define what and how much we eat, The Healing Secrets of Food takes you to a place where numbers are meaningless, where the authenticity of foods and nutrition inhabit a different kind of value. We discover that the incredible advances in nutritional science have not translated into optimal eating and improved health for most of our population. Simply eating from a nutritional databank can leave one depleted of meaning and deaf to the intuitive wisdom from within, and that can lead to unhealthful and disordered eating. For instance, Kesten links the newly identified eating disorder, orthorexia (an obsessive fixation on eating the "right" food) to the emphasis on what she calls "eating by number"-weight watching, calorie counting and figuring grams of fat, protein or carbohydrates. In the Healing Secrets of Food, Deborah Kesten unveils a new paradigm. Here, you will find the "nutrients" missing from the food charts. Kesten points out that what is not so easily measured might be much more valuable to our health. If not numbers, where does the meaning or nutritional value come from?
Food is more than a "product"; it is a culmination and assimilation of vital life force energies, whether in animal or plant food, that have been nurtured by air, water, soil, and sun. Kesten demonstrates that when we eat--and take in the vital life force energy in food--from a place of appreciation, mindfulness, and connection (love), and we honor our social heritage as well as our feelings, we will choose the optimal foods for our own health that are capable of nourishing and healing all aspects of the self. Optimal eating is not something that we calculate and obsess about, rather it is something that we naturally know about and crave to experience.
Kesten doesn't tell the reader any one way to eat. Rather, she leads you to form your own conclusions based on your personal health and nutrition concerns. Incorporate the healing secrets and watch your health and well-being improve.
It is an inside out approach, the kind that really works because a shift is made from the deepest part of the self. Kesten reveals that by practicing these secrets, "we have the potential to heal our body, our emotions, our sense of spiritual connection, our social link to one another and communities, and potentially our world and planet." Food can heal on many levels. And the healing gifts of food are available to us each and every time we eat. Kesten beautifully illustrates that we can imbue our food with love-from the time we plan what to eat, through the shopping, preparing, cooking, serving, eating and even clean-up-and when we ingest that spiritually instilled food, we reap the benefits: better tasting food, feeling more connection, feeling more centered and at peace, and even a heightened ability to metabolize more nutrients.
From Kesten's wonderful personal experiences, her fluid and poetic writing style, and her culinary metaphors--such as flavoring your food with love, spicing it with meaning, or seasoning it with the sacred--I had the feeling that I was reading a time-tested heirloom recipe book for enhancing my physical, emotional, spiritual and social well-being. I am recommending this book to my clients, colleagues, friends and family, as it dishes up a timely, inspiring and transforming message palatable to all.
A truly wise and generous serving of delicious secrets that has the power to heal millions.
Highly rewarding, highly recommended!

This amazing, well-written book explores a subject that has for too long been overlooked: the multidimensional ways in which food influences all aspects of our health. From optimal eating strategies and the food-mood connection to imbuing food with spiritual meaning and social satisfaction--this pioneering book covers it all.

Author Deborah Kesten is a groundbreaking thinker who shares the latest evidence that builds a bridge between ancient food wisdom and modern, Western nutritional science. The end result: a bold new vision of the role of food and nutrition in our everyday life; a book that lays the foundation for a genuine East/West integration for both what and how to eat for optimal health.

I have this cookbook well stained with use! The soups, salads, entrees and yes the Carrotcake with cream cheese frosting, are wonderful! I would recommend this book to all no matter if they are vegan, not a vegan or have health issues. I have even incorperated many of the recipes into the meals of my still meat eating family, and yes, they love them also!

I will state that after I started following Ornish's program, I have lost over 20 pounds!

This cookbook is easy to read, easy to use, and has been the most important investment in my life!

This book has a lot more than just recipes. It backs up Ornish's previous "Eat More, Weigh Less" with very easy ways to implement his very-low-fat eating suggestions. I use the book every day and have given it to many friends. We're all eating more delicious food now!

True to the title, this book is full of everyday recipes. I'm not as strict a vegetarian as the book advocates, but I do like to eat light and still enjoy food. Many of the recipes in this book are so easy and speedy, I keep coming back to them for quick weeknight dinners. We like the Haystacks and the no-fat hummus, both a 15-minute deal. I also liked his suggestions for roasting vegetables for sauces instead of sauteing. It adds a nice depth of flavor without fat. This is not a complicated cookbook, but it is very tasty. It definitely fits into a busy person's long-range plan for eating healthfully.

Had I read the reviews more critically, I would never have bought this book. From these reviews it is clear that Ms. Devi has popularized yoga, and in so doing, has trivialized yoga. Her earthy-crunchy, anecdotal babbling throughout the book makes this an excruciating read. I have never written a negative review of a book, but this book is an abomination.

Finally, a book on Yoga that is based in the spirit. And for real people. It has amazed me to see that some very simple practices could actually do what modern medicine was not able to do. The stories are imspiring as is the antidotal information. As a person recovering from a life threatening illness it has become my bible. I taught me compassion for myself and for others. I am looking forward to Devi's next book.

Nischala Joy Devi's, "The Healing Path of Yoga" is truly an inspiring and practical book which should be included in the library of anyone interested in self-healing. Devi presents ancient tantric yoga practices which are accesable to the average reader without being threatening. The book introduces eastern teachings in a very user-friendly manner. If you are new to the healing arts or a serious student of yoga, there will be something in it for you.

I do not simply believe that these techniques work, I KNOW that they work. When I was born the doctors and experts told my parents that I was not expected to live due to heart disease. I had my first open-heart surgery at the age of twelve. In 1992 I was introduced to the Dean Ornish Program to Reverse Heart Disease. This program literally changed my life. I have had an opportunity to meet Nischala Devi and practice yoga with her. She is truly an angel to me and what I find so wonderful about her book is that her gentle spirit comes across. Even if you are not interested in yoga, Nischala's personal stories are well worth the purchase price. I have gifted family members with this book and everyone has told me how much they have enjoyed reading it. In fact, my mother who thought that yoga was a religious cult, signed up for yoga classes after reading this book. I can't give this book a higher rating than that!

Before reading this book I was familiar with Dr. Ornish's work with diet and exercise reversing heart disease. From that exposure he came off as being slightly fanatical and rigid to me.

Well, was this book ever a surprise! Having done a lot of work on myself emotionally and spiritually a lot of the book was already known to me, but the way Dr. Ornish ties this all together with the scientific evidence blew me away, reinforcing a lot of what I had already suspected. In addition, in my personal life it has helped my spouse and I refocus ourselves into what is important in life. It is especially interesting because as an MD we would expect Dr. Ornish to take the stance that most of us have experienced with the medical profession i.e pushing the latest pills and technical wonders and leaving the emotions and spirituality to "others" (often with a sneer).

I highly recommend this book as it can jumpstart a lot if my case is any indication. It is funny, in the book Dr. Ornish quotes the old expression "when the student is ready, the teacher will appear". This book helped both my spouse and I recognize a teacher like that in our lives and I suspect it might help others see the teacher or teachers around themselves as well:)

Especially in these days of heartache and pain after 9/11 this book is a valuable tool into healing and hope as well.

I had read Dr. Ornish's books about diet and health, and found them to be very helpful. Then, I read this one. This is by far the most important book that he has written, because how we handle our relationships with others is more important to our health than even what we eat and how we exercise. A little of this information was familiar to me from reading the New York Times Science section, but most of it was not. Clearly the biggest disease of our modern culture is our estrangement from each other. For most of history, we lived with others in small, intimate groups. Now that the population is much larger, we live in large groups with no close relationships. Even our families are losing that intimacy. This book puts the priorities back where they should be. Having close relationships with others comes first. This book is a blessing to us all. Thank you, Dr. Ornish! This book would be a great gift to everyone you care about on Valentine's Day.

Dr. Ornish is best known for his research which showed the revolutionary result that diet and lifestyle changes
could lead to a reversal in the progression of heart disease. He has extended his body of work to highlight the
critical importance of social factors (relationships, community, friendship, support groups, lines of communication,
love) in both avoiding and recovering from life-threatening illness. He cites a large volume of scientific studies
which support his claims, and he divulges personal information about his own journey through life, shedding light
on his motivation and intentions. I highly recommend this book. It stands out in its class as unique and refreshingly
constructive.