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Reviews
Care of the Soul: A Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life by Thomas Moore
pcrooke25's review against another edition
5.0
This book brings the reader to a deeper place in the self, but within the context of everyday life. Very good.
mariannemersereau's review against another edition
5.0
Every single sentence of this book is so beautifully crafted! I loved it! A must-read for all soul lovers!
1969sl's review against another edition
4.0
The very first book I have read in 2012 (in fact,I was reading it during New Year's Evening) was "Care of the Soul" by Thomas Moore. No,it's not Thomas Moore that got beheaded on orders by Henry VIII but the new one. I wanted this book for some time already, since it as always mentioned in the same breath with my one of my all-time favorite psychology writers James Hillman - apparently they know each other very well and Moore often mentioned Hillman as his mentor. Finally I found this book when I browsed second-hand bookshop in Amsterdam and was very happy to finally put my hands on it - however,its close to Hillman but not as thunder-and-lightning for me : there are some interesting ideas thrown in there,mostly about accepting one's life without making a big fuss about changing something - Moore comes across as gentle and wise man who likes to reflect and prefers to think & meditate than to make drastic changes - I liked some ideas,like that our profession chooses us as much as we choose our profession and that depression is perhaps welcome as it forces a person to stand back and reflect. For almost everything Moore suggest thinking about it and reflecting on it - here the problem lies because most of us live our lives in a hurry and often we have hardly time to rest,not to mention reflect. My working life right now is such frantic 7 days a week rush that I have hard time finding time to keep hygiene & laundry in order,not to mention sitting back and reflecting on the day behind me.After midnight, I have just enough energy to smoke a cigarette and fall in a coma,than next morning all over again. I perfectly understand Moore and liked some of the things he writes about , still this book needs to be re-read some other time when I am in different frame of mind. If nothing else,it reminded me what a life I live & that I have no time to meditate on it.
birdmum's review against another edition
5.0
Meaningful and profound. The anti-self help book that encourages you to just accept yourself as your are, and accept that there is both light and dark in people and life.
massaglia's review against another edition
4.0
I read this book close to when it was originally published in 1992. Although I didn’t remember much of the particular details, I remember the ‘spirit’ or vibe of work. This time around with significant experience (and years) behind me, I found myself connecting to specific aspects of Moore’s book. And, although much of the content regarding the connection of the soul and mythology is interesting, I gravitated to the focus on the soul and work - the soul and creativity - soul and spirituality and soul and sacred arts of life. I'm looking at writing about spirituality, (soul?) social justice in the context of career development education. Here are some of the bulleted notes of interest that jotted down.
* Keats - medicine and soul - “soul-making” (Endymion) - “negative capability”
* Need to explore the work of James Hillman - "The Soul's Code: In Search of Character and Calling"
* We are crafting ourselves
* Take a peek at alchemy and opus imagination
Notes from reading it in May 2023
Look up doctors and diseases in music or musicians
curing musical diseases
Look up Keats and the Soul medicine
Medicine as an art
Examine disease as poetry
Spiritual and soul - difference?
From Chat:
In "Care of the Soul," Thomas Moore distinguishes the soul from the spiritual by emphasizing that the soul is inherently connected to the material world and human experience. It is the essence of our individuality, emotions, and passions. In contrast, the spiritual is often associated with transcendent or religious realms, focusing on divine or universal aspects beyond the material world. Moore emphasizes the importance of honoring and cultivating the soul's needs and desires within the context of everyday life.
Soul and work
Alchemy and opus imagination
We are crafting ourselves.
What if we thought of the soul as in the world?
Work and purpose
Career counseling
Thomas Moore was advised to do the work of a priest by a chemist, and it took him a while to figure that out. He studied religion in the arts.
Soul, Spirituality, and Religion
Spirituality doesn’t have to be about religion - Spiritual via Spirituality could be about one’s philosophy of life.
Chapter - Soul and Spirituality
Definition of spirituality – Spirituality is essential for humans
"Speculation" and the master's thesis example soul
Some points in the book. Discuss dreams. I don’t tend to remember my dreams but I had one last night. It seemed like I was at a retreat and one of the facilitators came over to me and asked me pointed what I thought were the benefits of getting old. I remember answering Wisdom was one, but he pressed me to get more ideas. Also, he pressed me to expand on what wisdom meant.
Refers to Keats soul making - specifically in the poem Endymion. Also, recommended by Hillman.
Alchemy
Look up Images of soul paths - spiritual paths
Here are some quotes:
“It is only through mystery and madness that the soul is revealed”
“We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible. To have real conversations with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.”
“It may help us, in those times of trouble, to remember that love is not only about relationship, it is also an affair of the soul.”
“When we relate to our bodies as having soul, we attend to their beauty, their poetry and their expressiveness. Our very habit of treating the body as a machine, whose muscles are like pulleys and its organs engines, forces its poetry underground, so that we experience the body as an instrument and see its poetics only in illness.”
“As the poets and painters of centuries have tried to tell us, art is not about the expression of talent or the making of pretty things. It is about the preservation and containment of soul. It is about arresting life and making it available for contemplation. Art captures the eternal in the everyday, and it is the eternal that feeds soul—the whole world in a grain of sand. Leonardo”
“Soul is to be found in the vicinity of taboo.”
“Usually, the main problem with life conundrums is that we don't bring to them enough imagination”
“Spirituality is seeded, germinates, sprouts and blossoms in the mundane. It is to be found and nurtured in the smallest of daily activities.”
“One effective “trick” in caring for the soul is to look with special attention and openness at what the individual rejects, and then to speak favorably for that rejected element.”
“Often care of the soul means not taking sides when there is a conflict at a deep level. It may be necessary to stretch the heart wide enough to embrace contradiction and paradox.”
“Many of the arts practiced at home are especially nourishing to the soul because they foster contemplation and demand a degree of artfulness, such as arranging flowers, cooking, and making repairs.”
“The word passion means basically “to be affected,” and passion is the essential energy of the soul. The poet Rilke describes this passive power in the imagery of the flower’s structure, when he calls it a “muscle of infinite reception.” We don’t often think of the capacity to be affected as strength and as the work of a powerful muscle, and yet for the soul, as for the flower, this is its toughest work and its main role in our lives.”
“... ongoing care for the soul rather than seek for a cure appreciates the mystery of human suffering and does not offer the illusion of a problem-free life."
We have to care for this suffering with extreme reverence so that in our fear and anger at the beast, we do not overlook the star.”
“Care of the soul begins with observance of how the soul manifests itself and how it operates. We can’t care for the soul unless we are familiar with its ways. Observance is a word from ritual and religion. It means to watch out for but also to keep and honor, as in the observance of a holiday.”
“There is nothing neutral about the soul. It is the seat and the source of life. Either we respond to what the soul presents in its fantasies and desires, or we suffer from this neglect of ourselves. The power of the soul can hurl a person into ecstasy or into depression. It can be creative or destructive, gentle or aggressive. Power incubates within the soul and then makes its influential move into life as the expression of soul. If there is no soulfulness, then there is no true power, and if there is no power, then there can be no true soulfulness. Sadomasochism”
“Soul-making is a journey that takes time, effort, skill, knowledge, intuition, and courage. It is helpful to know that all work with soul is process—alchemy, pilgrimage, and adventure—so that we don’t expert instant success or even any kind of finality. All goals and all endings are heuristic, important in their being imagined, but never literally fulfilled.”
“A gun is dangerous not only because it threatens our lives, but also because it concretizes and fetishizes our desire for power, keeping power both in sight and also removed from its soulful presence in our daily lives. The presence of the gun in our society is a threat, and we are its victims—a sign that our fetish is working against us.”
“Aging brings out the flavors of a personality. The individual emerges over time, the way fruit matures and ripens. In the Renaissance view, depression, aging, and individuality all go together: the sadness of growing old is part of becoming an individual. Melancholy thoughts carve out an interior space where wisdom can take up residence."
“Care of the soul may take the form of living in a fully embodied imagination, being an artist at home and at work. You don’t have to be a professional in order to bring art into the care of your soul; anyone can have an art studio at home, for instance.”
“Again, we can see the importance of imaginal practices such as journals, dream work, poetry, painting, and therapy aimed at exploring images in dream and life. These methods keep us actively engaged in the mythologies that are the stuff of our own lives."
“The word psychotherapy consists of two Greek words: psyche (soul) and therapy (care). By definition, psychotherapy is care of the soul. When you serve your soul, you are being therapeutic in this deep, Platonic sense.”
“Writers are taught to “write what you know about.” The same advice applies to the quest for the power of the soul: be good at what you’re good at. Many of us spend time and energy trying to be something that we are not. But this is a move against soul, because individuality rises out of the soul as water rises out of the depths of the earth. We are who we are because of the special mix that makes up our soul. In spite of its archetypal, universal contents, for each individual the soul is highly idiosyncratic. Power begins in knowing this special soul, which may be entirely different from our fantasies about who we are or who we want to be."
“Growing old is one of the ways the soul nudges itself into attention to the spiritual aspect of life. The body’s changes teach us about fate, time, nature, mortality, and character. Aging forces us to decide what is important in life.”
“J. B. Jackson, a historian of landscapes, makes a crucial point about such things in his essay “The Necessity for Ruins.” Things in decay, he says, express a theology of birth, death, and redemption.”
“When soul is present, nature is alive.”
“Storytelling is an excellent way of caring for the soul. It helps us see the themes that circle in our lives, the deep themes that tell the myths we live.”
“Love is the means of entry and our guide. Love keeps us on the labyrinthine path. If we can honor love as it presents itself, taking shapes and directions we would never have predicted or desired, then we are on the way toward discovering the lower levels of soul, where meaning and value reveal themselves slowly and paradoxically.”
“Renaissance philosophers often said that it is the soul that makes us human. We can turn that idea round and note that it is when we are most human that we have greatest access to the soul.”
“We can return now to one of Plato’s expressions for care of the soul, techne tou biou, the craft of life. Care of the soul requires craft (techne)—skill, attention, and art. To live with a high degree of artfulness means to attend to the small things that keep the soul engaged in whatever we are doing, and it is the very heart of soul-making.”
* Keats - medicine and soul - “soul-making” (Endymion) - “negative capability”
* Need to explore the work of James Hillman - "The Soul's Code: In Search of Character and Calling"
* We are crafting ourselves
* Take a peek at alchemy and opus imagination
Notes from reading it in May 2023
Look up doctors and diseases in music or musicians
curing musical diseases
Look up Keats and the Soul medicine
Medicine as an art
Examine disease as poetry
Spiritual and soul - difference?
From Chat:
In "Care of the Soul," Thomas Moore distinguishes the soul from the spiritual by emphasizing that the soul is inherently connected to the material world and human experience. It is the essence of our individuality, emotions, and passions. In contrast, the spiritual is often associated with transcendent or religious realms, focusing on divine or universal aspects beyond the material world. Moore emphasizes the importance of honoring and cultivating the soul's needs and desires within the context of everyday life.
Soul and work
Alchemy and opus imagination
We are crafting ourselves.
What if we thought of the soul as in the world?
Work and purpose
Career counseling
Thomas Moore was advised to do the work of a priest by a chemist, and it took him a while to figure that out. He studied religion in the arts.
Soul, Spirituality, and Religion
Spirituality doesn’t have to be about religion - Spiritual via Spirituality could be about one’s philosophy of life.
Chapter - Soul and Spirituality
Definition of spirituality – Spirituality is essential for humans
"Speculation" and the master's thesis example soul
Some points in the book. Discuss dreams. I don’t tend to remember my dreams but I had one last night. It seemed like I was at a retreat and one of the facilitators came over to me and asked me pointed what I thought were the benefits of getting old. I remember answering Wisdom was one, but he pressed me to get more ideas. Also, he pressed me to expand on what wisdom meant.
Refers to Keats soul making - specifically in the poem Endymion. Also, recommended by Hillman.
Alchemy
Look up Images of soul paths - spiritual paths
Here are some quotes:
“It is only through mystery and madness that the soul is revealed”
“We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible. To have real conversations with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.”
“It may help us, in those times of trouble, to remember that love is not only about relationship, it is also an affair of the soul.”
“When we relate to our bodies as having soul, we attend to their beauty, their poetry and their expressiveness. Our very habit of treating the body as a machine, whose muscles are like pulleys and its organs engines, forces its poetry underground, so that we experience the body as an instrument and see its poetics only in illness.”
“As the poets and painters of centuries have tried to tell us, art is not about the expression of talent or the making of pretty things. It is about the preservation and containment of soul. It is about arresting life and making it available for contemplation. Art captures the eternal in the everyday, and it is the eternal that feeds soul—the whole world in a grain of sand. Leonardo”
“Soul is to be found in the vicinity of taboo.”
“Usually, the main problem with life conundrums is that we don't bring to them enough imagination”
“Spirituality is seeded, germinates, sprouts and blossoms in the mundane. It is to be found and nurtured in the smallest of daily activities.”
“One effective “trick” in caring for the soul is to look with special attention and openness at what the individual rejects, and then to speak favorably for that rejected element.”
“Often care of the soul means not taking sides when there is a conflict at a deep level. It may be necessary to stretch the heart wide enough to embrace contradiction and paradox.”
“Many of the arts practiced at home are especially nourishing to the soul because they foster contemplation and demand a degree of artfulness, such as arranging flowers, cooking, and making repairs.”
“The word passion means basically “to be affected,” and passion is the essential energy of the soul. The poet Rilke describes this passive power in the imagery of the flower’s structure, when he calls it a “muscle of infinite reception.” We don’t often think of the capacity to be affected as strength and as the work of a powerful muscle, and yet for the soul, as for the flower, this is its toughest work and its main role in our lives.”
“... ongoing care for the soul rather than seek for a cure appreciates the mystery of human suffering and does not offer the illusion of a problem-free life."
We have to care for this suffering with extreme reverence so that in our fear and anger at the beast, we do not overlook the star.”
“Care of the soul begins with observance of how the soul manifests itself and how it operates. We can’t care for the soul unless we are familiar with its ways. Observance is a word from ritual and religion. It means to watch out for but also to keep and honor, as in the observance of a holiday.”
“There is nothing neutral about the soul. It is the seat and the source of life. Either we respond to what the soul presents in its fantasies and desires, or we suffer from this neglect of ourselves. The power of the soul can hurl a person into ecstasy or into depression. It can be creative or destructive, gentle or aggressive. Power incubates within the soul and then makes its influential move into life as the expression of soul. If there is no soulfulness, then there is no true power, and if there is no power, then there can be no true soulfulness. Sadomasochism”
“Soul-making is a journey that takes time, effort, skill, knowledge, intuition, and courage. It is helpful to know that all work with soul is process—alchemy, pilgrimage, and adventure—so that we don’t expert instant success or even any kind of finality. All goals and all endings are heuristic, important in their being imagined, but never literally fulfilled.”
“A gun is dangerous not only because it threatens our lives, but also because it concretizes and fetishizes our desire for power, keeping power both in sight and also removed from its soulful presence in our daily lives. The presence of the gun in our society is a threat, and we are its victims—a sign that our fetish is working against us.”
“Aging brings out the flavors of a personality. The individual emerges over time, the way fruit matures and ripens. In the Renaissance view, depression, aging, and individuality all go together: the sadness of growing old is part of becoming an individual. Melancholy thoughts carve out an interior space where wisdom can take up residence."
“Care of the soul may take the form of living in a fully embodied imagination, being an artist at home and at work. You don’t have to be a professional in order to bring art into the care of your soul; anyone can have an art studio at home, for instance.”
“Again, we can see the importance of imaginal practices such as journals, dream work, poetry, painting, and therapy aimed at exploring images in dream and life. These methods keep us actively engaged in the mythologies that are the stuff of our own lives."
“The word psychotherapy consists of two Greek words: psyche (soul) and therapy (care). By definition, psychotherapy is care of the soul. When you serve your soul, you are being therapeutic in this deep, Platonic sense.”
“Writers are taught to “write what you know about.” The same advice applies to the quest for the power of the soul: be good at what you’re good at. Many of us spend time and energy trying to be something that we are not. But this is a move against soul, because individuality rises out of the soul as water rises out of the depths of the earth. We are who we are because of the special mix that makes up our soul. In spite of its archetypal, universal contents, for each individual the soul is highly idiosyncratic. Power begins in knowing this special soul, which may be entirely different from our fantasies about who we are or who we want to be."
“Growing old is one of the ways the soul nudges itself into attention to the spiritual aspect of life. The body’s changes teach us about fate, time, nature, mortality, and character. Aging forces us to decide what is important in life.”
“J. B. Jackson, a historian of landscapes, makes a crucial point about such things in his essay “The Necessity for Ruins.” Things in decay, he says, express a theology of birth, death, and redemption.”
“When soul is present, nature is alive.”
“Storytelling is an excellent way of caring for the soul. It helps us see the themes that circle in our lives, the deep themes that tell the myths we live.”
“Love is the means of entry and our guide. Love keeps us on the labyrinthine path. If we can honor love as it presents itself, taking shapes and directions we would never have predicted or desired, then we are on the way toward discovering the lower levels of soul, where meaning and value reveal themselves slowly and paradoxically.”
“Renaissance philosophers often said that it is the soul that makes us human. We can turn that idea round and note that it is when we are most human that we have greatest access to the soul.”
“We can return now to one of Plato’s expressions for care of the soul, techne tou biou, the craft of life. Care of the soul requires craft (techne)—skill, attention, and art. To live with a high degree of artfulness means to attend to the small things that keep the soul engaged in whatever we are doing, and it is the very heart of soul-making.”
chrisannee's review against another edition
3.0
I was uncertain of the rating. I found the 1st third of the book to be quite well done and intriguing. The last half didn't appeal to me as much, but perhaps that is because his bias began to show. And because he reminded me of a conversation I didn't want to have and the person who made me have it anyway.
He's also a definite fan of Freud. I prefer ... not Freud most of the time. Not a favorite, but I will clearly acknowledge my bias.
He's also a definite fan of Freud. I prefer ... not Freud most of the time. Not a favorite, but I will clearly acknowledge my bias.
maiabgib's review against another edition
3.0
I must've missed something or just really wanted this to be a different book because this was not what I was expecting. Still interesting...but I would hardly call it a guide.
Basically, it's 200 pages of Thomas Moore explaining that pretty much every psychological (and physical) issue from depression to bulimia is a symptom of the soul. His advice is to refrain from moralizing these issues, our thoughts and feelings, etc. and to explore them instead. Which...yeah. I do think we've made too many things black or white, good or bad, broken and whole, and by instantly placing a thought or experience or feeling at one end of a spectrum, we shut out the opportunity to explore, learn, or further experience whatever it is.
But...I didn't need to read 9 chapters with the same argument running through them. While I appreciated the specifics related to the topic of each of those chapters - depression, love, jealousy, etc. - I don't think they added enough to make that slog worth it.
I also do have some concerns with Moore's approach to psychotherapy. The patient he discussed who had bulimia...I guess I just believe that sometimes "symptoms of the soul" do need to be cured. I don't think he treated that issue with the concern it requires. There seemed to be a general sense of "explore your soul and your dreams and the things you struggle with will take care of themselves." Which maybe that's fair? I don't know. There was just something about this belief that didn't sit right with me.
The last 100 pages were focused more on the need for spirituality/religion and to see and honor the soul in the world around us. No complaints with those chapters. Anything that encourages us to care more deeply about others, nature, etc. and tend to the sensitive parts of ourselves gets two thumbs and ten toes up from me.
I also found his exploration of mythology fascinating. You can truly learn so much from fiction...I wish we probed it more in the same way that the religious probe their holy texts.
Overall, not a bad read. Do I know how to care for my soul? Uh. Not really. Did I learn some interesting things about the soul that I could find a way to apply? Probably. A bit repetitive. Lot of Jung. Very meandering in terms of writing style. Not sure that you'd necessarily need to read all of it, but worth reading parts of it at the very least!
Basically, it's 200 pages of Thomas Moore explaining that pretty much every psychological (and physical) issue from depression to bulimia is a symptom of the soul. His advice is to refrain from moralizing these issues, our thoughts and feelings, etc. and to explore them instead. Which...yeah. I do think we've made too many things black or white, good or bad, broken and whole, and by instantly placing a thought or experience or feeling at one end of a spectrum, we shut out the opportunity to explore, learn, or further experience whatever it is.
But...I didn't need to read 9 chapters with the same argument running through them. While I appreciated the specifics related to the topic of each of those chapters - depression, love, jealousy, etc. - I don't think they added enough to make that slog worth it.
I also do have some concerns with Moore's approach to psychotherapy. The patient he discussed who had bulimia...I guess I just believe that sometimes "symptoms of the soul" do need to be cured. I don't think he treated that issue with the concern it requires. There seemed to be a general sense of "explore your soul and your dreams and the things you struggle with will take care of themselves." Which maybe that's fair? I don't know. There was just something about this belief that didn't sit right with me.
The last 100 pages were focused more on the need for spirituality/religion and to see and honor the soul in the world around us. No complaints with those chapters. Anything that encourages us to care more deeply about others, nature, etc. and tend to the sensitive parts of ourselves gets two thumbs and ten toes up from me.
I also found his exploration of mythology fascinating. You can truly learn so much from fiction...I wish we probed it more in the same way that the religious probe their holy texts.
Overall, not a bad read. Do I know how to care for my soul? Uh. Not really. Did I learn some interesting things about the soul that I could find a way to apply? Probably. A bit repetitive. Lot of Jung. Very meandering in terms of writing style. Not sure that you'd necessarily need to read all of it, but worth reading parts of it at the very least!
blueeyedvt's review against another edition
3.0
I really enjoyed this book for a second time. The wording and writing gets a bit heavy at times but overall the theme is inspiring and transformational.