A Book Review: Living From Your Soul by Jeffrey Douglass

Enlightenment, insight, “living in the moment”, and quest for inner peace are all words we have thought or heard. They are all concepts we want to achieve but often fail to make any progress toward. Living From Your Soul explains in practical steps how to make the progress we so desire.

When I first picked up Living From Your Soul, I must admit, I was a bit skeptical. After all, how many books about the path to enlightenment have we invested in during the past, only to realize that the only thing being enlightened is the author’s and publisher’s bank accounts? I thought I would be reading the same old junk psychobabble that is all too often published. And then I really became even more skeptical when I noted the author’s very liberal use of capitalization of words he feels are important. At first, I found this practice distracting and very nearly put the book down. I’m very glad I didn’t!

As I read more, the slightly annoying capitalization habits of the author became overshadowed by the very practical and pertinent content of this book. The focus of the book is removing the ego from the forefront of the Western mind and placing spiritual principles first. It is all about taking care of ourselves by taking care of others and the world around us. It is about gaining peace through positive actions rather than contemplating our navels (nothing against meditation practices intended).

Living From Your Soul is not a book biased toward any religious belief. It is, however, perfect for the Bible-believing Christian but just as perfect for anyone of any other belief system or even no belief system. Spirituality is about the inner contact with God as we understand Him (or her) or with the cosmic and universal forces, and these are the principles behind Douglass’ work. Anyone will relate to the search for divinity and contact with the sacred. For those who have faith, it will reinforce the practice of that faith. For those who do not have conventional faith practices, the value in quality of life changes can be just as great.

Many books that try to explain how to become more spiritual do so in a vague, umbrella-like overview and the reader has to try to figure out how the ideas apply to them in their very real, very busy, very modern lives. No so with Living From Your Soul! The first few chapters do deal with these concepts and explain how Douglass came to discover how to live from the soul, but this is followed by chapters such as “Coming from Your Soul in Relationships”, “Helping One Another from Your Soul”, “Bringing Your Soul to Work”, “Coming from Your Soul in Marriage and Partnership”, just to name a few. Yes, these chapters explain how to live from your soul in these very real-life situations in very real and easy to understand terms. No psychobabble, no buzz words, no mumbo-jumbo. Just clear instructions of how to reach into your inner self and bring forth your soul, placing it above the ego, which in Western culture tends to be all to prevalent and pushy.

Douglass in now way implies that there are not other techniques we can incorporate into our lives along with the techniques and principles outlined in Living From Your Soul which can improve our lives and our contact with the spiritual. In fact, he founded “Living from Your Soul”, which is a team of professionals providing services such as yoga, massage, meditation, ayurvedic medicine, soul coaching and business consulting.

Jeffrey Douglass is perhaps the most uniquely qualified person to develop a work as revealing as this one. With 32 years experience as a licensed psychotherapist, he has long been integrating spirituality and psychology into his practice. He also is a Senior Executive Coach and consultant for the Reina Trust Building Institute in Stowe, Vermont.

I simply can not express how important this new work, Living From Your Soul, by Jeffrey Douglass can be to the searching reader. It is a book I will turn to again and again during times of trouble, doubt, or confusion to help focus myself once again on the true path to enlightenment as I understand and live it. While your path to enlightenment may be different from mine, you will find the value in this work just as rewarding to read. It is a perfect gift for someone questing to find their inner soul, for anyone involved in spirituality, and even for someone who simply wants to change the quality of their lives and become more centered and accepted by others.

Living From Your Soul is published by SPS Publications. It is available in trade paperback format and contains 125 pages. Don’t miss reading even a single one of these pages.

To Learn More or Order at Amazon.com > Living from Your Soul