Geen schrijfboek per se, maar wel een onmisbaar boek over menselijke drijfveren en het belang van mededogen - voor anderen én jezelf.

Bonne initiation aux oeuvre de Thomas Moore. Tout ce qu'il écrit est un baume pour l'âme. ( )

Ook al vind ik het niet verschrikkelijk goed geschreven - want soms vaag, met niet helemaal scherpe zinnen, soms te weinig structuur, redenering niet uitgekristalliseerd, teveel herhaling ook - toch blijft het me boeien. Zijn belangrijkste punt is, geloof ik: schrik niet terug voor nare emoties en pijnlijke verhoudingen. Ben ermee bezig, voel je gevoelens, peins erover, draai het om en om in je verbeelding, vergelijk het met beelden uit de kunst en mythologie, creëer er plek voor, in gesprekken of in je dagboek of alleen maar in je hoofd. Op die manier kun je de "schaduw"-kanten van jezelf en je leven en je omgeving incorporeren. Doe je dat niet, dan protesteren de donkere plekken in jezelf. Ze willen aandacht, desnoods als naar symptoom. Moore gebruikt steeds het woord "ziel". Hij laat nogal in het midden wat hij er precies mee bedoelt. Gebruikt er ook geen synoniemen of omschrijvingen voor; het moet blijkbaar maar voor zichzelf spreken. Ik denk dat hij met "ziel" bedoelt: een doorleefde omgang met alle aspecten van je ervaringswereld, waardoor je innerlijk "bewerkt terrein" wordt. Het idee is dat je vertrouwd raakt met alle aspecten ervan, er niet meer voor terugschrikt. En ook, dat je innerlijk "hechter" wordt, dat je als het ware meer cultuur aanbrengt rondom de rauwe emoties. De rauwheid is makkelijker te verdagen als ze in verhalen en beelden, die een interne logica hebben, wordt ingebed. Ik denk dat hij zoiets bedoelt.

Funny that this looks like a good read right now...can't figure why. I have had this book for several years and it always looked too mystical, like it would be quite impossible to relate to. Now, I have copied three pages of quote already and I am still in chapter one. It promises to look through the Renaissance window a lot, and refer to mythology, but still, I am rather enamored with it at this point. It makes me feel calm. Does that make sense.? ( )

This book is near and dear to my heart, as it was my first entree into the world of symbolic/mythic/archetypal thinking about the psyche and soul. It changed my life forever and made the whole world make more sense. ( )

A blend of spirituality and self-help, focusing less on the quest for salvation and more on the care of the soul in the here and now.

I read this book during my adult college days and it has become the focus or beginning point for me studying today's new spirituality. We are so far removed from the natural rhythm and the basics of life/living that we forget to just Be and remember what is truly vital and real to our experiences as human beings.
Thomas Moore is a deep, reverant person and his writings allow us to see the sacredness in our everyday beingg and give us the incentive to try and allow the sacred to emerge and be honored as it does so. ( )

from the back cover:
Care of the Soul offers a new way of thinking about daily life - its problems and its creative opportunities. It offers a therapeutic programme bringing the soul and spirituality back into your life, and helps you to look more deeply into emotional problems and sense sacredness in ordinary things - real friends, satisfying conversation, fulfilling work, and experiences that stay in the memory and touch the heart.
"Thomas Moore draws on his own life as a therapist practising 'care of the soul', his studies of the world's religions, his teaching of Jungian psychology and art therapy, and his work in music and art to create this inspirational guide that examines the connections between spirituality and the problems of individuals and society."

I discovered Thomas Moore’s book Care of the Soul (Harper Collins, 1992) at about the time in my life when I was approaching old age, beginning to see life as a whole, not as a series of separate events. I read Moore’s book twice and have been browsing in it off and on for several years. But if you ask me to summarize the book, to outline its contents, to make a list of the most important points it makes, I would have difficulty doing so. Care of the Soul seems to me to float along, to say the same things over and over again in different ways, in different words. I’m not even sure I could define “soul” as Moore uses the term, for to “define” is to set limits, to draw a circle around something, setting it off from the rest of our experience. But “soul” resists borders. It is a circle like the sun, casting out rays in all directions that warm and enlighten.

Care of the Soul is the book it is because it speaks to soul rather than to mind.

"The intellect wants a summary meaning—all well and good for the purposeful nature of the mind. But the soul craves depth of reflection, many layers of meaning, nuances without end, references and allusions and prefigurations. All these enrich the texture of an image or story and please the soul by giving it much food for rumination." [p235]

That’s exactly what Moore gives us in his book: “food for rumination.” The major part of his text is given over to little stories, anecdotes from his own experience and, especially, from others whom he has known and counseled. Given almost as much focus is its retelling and exploration of myths and legends, emphasizing their relevance to our own inner lives. But as I read the book and underlined passages that I knew I might like to return to in browsing, what I discovered is that, at heart, Care of the Soul is aphoristic. These short, pithy passages are the “food for rumination.” They are not quite as succinct and cryptic as Solomon’s proverbs, but they do provide that kind of starting point for thinking. “Wisdom,” Moore concludes, “is the marriage of intellect’s longing for truth and soul’s acceptance of the labyrinthine nature of the human condition.” So Care of the Soul has been a useful collection of aphorisms to me, articulating my own thoughts in words that I underlined and that I return to over and over again.

Even the phrase itself has multiple meanings: “care of the soul” refers primarily to our tending that part of our nature identified as soul, but it can also mean letting that part of our nature take care of us—our mind, body, heart, spirit. In his introduction, Moore gets us started with the first of many “definitions,” or rather characterizations, of the word soul: “Tradition teaches us that soul lies midway between understanding and unconsciousness, and that its instrument is neither the mind nor the body, but imagination. I understand therapy, as nothing more than bringing imagination to areas that are devoid of it . . . . Fulfilling work, rewarding relationships, personal power, and relief from symptoms are all gifts of the soul.”

Chapter headings promise that the book will address the “soulfulness” of suffering, family and childhood, love, self-love or narcissism, jealousy and envy, power, depression, the body’s illnesses, work, money, and religion. But the recurrent theme in each one of them is simply “bring imagination to areas that are [usually] devoid of it.” Just one aphorism from each of several chapters will give you a sense of what the book is like. Remember that each of these is developed with personal anecdotes , mythical allusions, and multiple restatements.

"Observing the soul, we keep an eye on its sheep, on whatever is wandering and grazing—the latest addiction, a striking dream, or a troubling mood."

"We care for the soul by acknowledging the place of eternal childhood."

"The healing of narcissism . . . is achieved by giving the ego what it needs—pleasure in accomplishment, acceptance, and some degree of recognition."

"We do not care for the soul by shrinking it down to reasonable size. . . . It is a door that opens out from human reason into divine mystery."

". . . the dead are as much a part of community as the living."

"Do we need to expose everything that is hidden? Do we need to understand all mysteries. . . . From the point of view of soul, it is just as important, maybe even more important, . . . to allow certain things to remain distant and buried . . . ."

". . . if full knowledge about the very base of our existence could be described as a circle, the best we can do is to arrive at a polygon—something short of sure knowledge."

"Poetry, whether in literature or in the body, is always demanding that we hold together what seems to belong apart."

"We are crafting ourselves—individuating, to use the Jungian term. Work is fundamental . . . because the whole point of life is the fabrication of soul."

". . . a box of special letters or other objects kept in the attic is a tabernacle, a container of holy things. . . . We can all create sacred books and boxes . . . ."

Aphorisms like these, underlined in the book, copied in my journal, quoted in a review like this one, kept in a “sacred box” remind me again and again to care for my soul and to sit by the pool of Bethsaida, awaiting that moment when my soul will take care of me.

From The Publisher:

Care of the Soul provides a path-breaking lifestyle handbook that shows how to add spirituality, depth, and meaning to modern-day life by nurturing the soul