Title: Why We Make Bad Choices: The God’s Labyrinth of Good and Evil Encountering the Self
Author: Maria Liviero
Genre: Self-Help, Spirituality
Book Blurb:
This book explores our sense of self and the source of the unhealthy behaviours and thinking patterns that cause us to make bad choices through the symbolic themes and characters of Genesis 1–3.
The journey towards understanding ourselves is undertaken by a character called Eve, who enters a parallel universe between Genesis and the present day only to discover the dark side of human nature that stems from God, and where she learns how to deal with the resulting false self.
This is a self-help book for anyone interested in investigating the depths of the human self and exploring how a false self can manifest itself causing us to make unhealthy choices. It will take you on a journey where you will encounter both the good and evil that exists within all of us, a journey first introduced in the creation story of Genesis.
My Review:
The book attempts to be a bridge between the worlds of Bible study and psychology. Structured in a workable format. Each chapter has a set of self-help questions you can answer to see how well you are grasping the chapter.
While the use of Jungian philosophy is an interesting approach, there is a caution here. To better fully grasp that aspect, it would be better for people to have at least a cursory grasp of Jung. My six weeks of undergrad psych didn't seem to do the trick.
A questionable basis for fact is to put too much emphasis on the work of someone who has 'won' an Erratic Boulder award twice. If there was a clear definition of who ‘Eve’ represents, the book would be a lot more relatable.
While this is an admirable approach, it may not work. It is largely unlikely that a dedicated person who studies the Bible will be open to the myriad psych concepts. In the same way, a psych maven will not be open to the lengthy discourse about Genesis.
More likely to appeal to people with a very strong understanding of psychology. People of strong religious belief may have trouble grasping the concepts presented. Verbose and often vague, the book lacks a certain clarity. At times the self-help questions are almost too complicated for simple understanding.
My Rating: 4.25 stars
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Author Biography:
I am a psychotherapist by training with a MSc in addictive behaviour, and Dip in psychotherapy. Having started my doctorate at the University of Aberdeen I decided it was not for me and left to write this book that had been in the planning for five years. In my experience, the dark side of human nature is equally or even greater importance - without being conscious of our shadow we continue to live in discord with ourselves and others.
Social Media Links:
@MariaLiviero1
Reviewed by: Mr. N