Wisdom of the Ages: A Modern Master Brings Eternal Truth - Hardcover

Dyer, Dr. Wayne W.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060192313 ISBN 13: 9780060192310

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1998

Synopsis

The author of the best-seller, Manifest Your Destiny, illuminates the meaning and original context of the most important poems, writings, and phrases of history's greatest minds, and shows readers how to apply them to their lives. Tour.

About this title

Review:

Wisdom of the Ages reads like a Wayne Dyer workshop on "What the Masters can Teach You". His ambition is to offer the wisdom taught by the world's "great teachers" (such as Buddha, Jesus, Confucius, Michelangelo and Emily Dickinson) and then provide an easy-to-digest interpretation for modern readers. He uses a format of briefly quoted passages (about a page or less) from 60 famous teachers, thus the "60 Days to Enlightenment" claim in the title. After each quote, Dyer offers his own three-page essay on how this "teaching" can be applied to contemporary life. He finishes with a list of exercises that put the master's advice to use. Finally, he gives each passage a heading such as "Soulcentre" for a quote from Herman Melville's Moby Dick, or "Communication" for William Blake's poem "A Poison Tree". While his tone is always reverent, Dyer's interpretations occasionally sound flat and obvious--as if he is dumbing down for his audience, rather than elevating readers to a higher consciousness, or at least a higher education. This is a shame, because when Dyer writes from the eloquent and enthusiastic voice that earned him his huge popularity (there certainly are glimpses in this book), one see why so many consider him a "master teacher" in his own right. --Gail Hudson

From the Author:

Applying eternal wisdom in to your daily life
This is the most important book I have published in my entire career. I experienced automatic writing as I worked on this collection of essays interpreting the words of some of the greatest teachers in my life. Not one of these sixty great masters died with their music still in them. They were all people of great passion. My method of completing these essays was to work for a twenty four hour period on each of these chapters. I would wake up very early in the morning and read for eight hours about the lives of the particular person I was writing about on that day. Then I would go for a long walk along the beach and contemplate what I had learned. In the afternoon I would read as much of their work as I could for another eight hours, immersing myself in their writings. After meditating for an hour I would look at a photograph, drawing or engraving of the teacher and I would literally make conscious contact by asking the question, "What would you like to say to those of us who are here on Earth today?" I would then listen and experience automatic writing. It was the most blissful, easy and rewearding experience of my writing career. The result is sixty interpretations of the wisdom of the ages and how you can apply this wisdom in your life, beginning today. The most unique thing about all of these masterful people is refliected in the folowing observation of mine.. Society seems to honor its living conformists and its dead trouble makers. Their message to you is reflected in all of these brief essays..."Don't you dare die with your music still in you."

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0060192313
• ISBN 13: 9780060192310
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 288