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megwynne's review against another edition
5.0
Took me nearly a year to finish this book and I can safely say it has changed the way I think about a lot of things, or more likely has reaffirmed some things I already think. It’s one I am sure I will be coming back to through the many seasons of my life
katherinegunning's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
5.0
madeleinegeorge's review against another edition
3.0
For a poet who wrote a full-length book, it clips along at a pretty nice pace.
I found Anam Cara a delightful and pleasing book, full of wisdom, definitely, but also brimming with delight and love and gratitude for the human experience. Most of what he posits I largely agree with: presence and patience and generosity are the greatest and deepest gifts we can give to one another, to be truly seen and understood by another is a rare and divine blessing, that even after mistakes and gracelessness and hurt we possess enough forgiveness to reach for each other again-- and be found. O'Donohue's wisdom sprouts from, and orbits around, the Celtic idea of the anam cara (literally: soul friend), that one (or one of a few) beings with whom you are entirely at home, who sees and understands a truly grounded version of yourself outside of any constructed social facade. It's a concept that goes beyond the highly satirized 'soulmate' trope, or the Americanized 'love at first sight' that is so often seen in movies and books and popular culture. It's a deeper idea of familiarization and gravitation; he explains it as two souls molded from the same clay of the earth, separated by great distances and processes, only to come back together in complete recognition and ease. Less of an instant love or lust, certainly not a 'you and no one else' but an: oh. it's you. after all this time. it's going to be you.
O'Donohue beautifully paints the portrait of this merging and the light, understanding, self-love, and access to the divine that those kinds of relationships can inspire.
However. Call me a cynic, but I think there are some critical perspectives he fails to address that cast a shadow of criticism over my entire reading of the book. While I think he has the perfect amount of faith in God, the comfort of the Trinity etc etc, I think he has entirely too much faith in mankind to treat each other with more gentleness. For example, I think he fails to understand the power of fear. He underestimates our weakness to the safe promises and seduction of transience, of ephemerality, of all the promise and patterns of break-neck and wide-spread modern life that are antithetical to the kind of slow, grounded, unfathomably deep kinds of Peace and Love that O'Donohue explicates. Another thing I think he conveniently skips over is the protective side of fear; yes, it is often a controlling and miserable force, but it is also a reasonable response to pain, and can therefore be the healthiest defense against circumstance. It is a luxury to let things go, and a privilege I think he doesn't adequately address.
But I'd like to see the world, and the ways we relate to it, in the kind of light that he does.
And, begrudgingly, perhaps I am moving that way after all.
Essentials:
“The anam cara was a person to whom you could reveal the hidden intimacies of your life. When you had one, your relationship cut across all convention and category. You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the friend of your soul.”
“When love awakens in your life, in the night of your heart, it is like the dawn breaking within you.”
“Love begins with paying attention to others, with an act of gracious self-forgetting.”
“The anam-cara experience opens up a friendship that is not wounded or limited by separation or distance. […] Because they have broken through the barriers of persona and egoism to the soul level, the unity of their souls is not easily severed.”
“Understanding nourishes belonging. When you really feel understood, you feel free to release yourself into the trust and shelter of the other person’s soul. […] Love alone is literate in the world of origin; it can decipher identity and destiny.”
“You can perish in a famine of your own making.”
“For too long, we have believed that the divine is outside us. This belief has strained our longing disastrously.”
“Our words are too thin to echo experience; they are too weak to bring the inner mystery of things to real expression. In our rapid and externalized world, language has become ghostlike, abbreviated to code and label. Words that would mirror the soul carry the loam of substance and the shadow of the divine.”
“Your beloved and your friends were once strangers. Somehow at a particular time, they came from the distance toward your life. Their arrival seemed so accidental and contingent. Now your life is unimaginable without them.”
“Behind Celtic poetry and prayer is the sense that the words have emerged from a deep, reverential silence. This perspective of solitude and silence purifies the intense encounter of two people in the anam cara experience.”
“All perception requires clearance. If things are too close to you, you cannot see them. Frequently this is why we value so little the people who are really close to us. We are unable to step back and behold them with the sense of wonder, critique, and appreciation they deserve. Nor do we behold ourselves either, because we are too close to the rush of our lives.”
“There is no force I know that can so quickly destroy the happiness and tranquility of life: fear. […] Sometimes through our fear of being true to ourselves, we sidestep our destiny and end up hungry and impoverished in a famine of our own making.”
“I am here. You are there. Even the person that you are closest to is still a separate world from you. That is the poignancy of love.”
I found Anam Cara a delightful and pleasing book, full of wisdom, definitely, but also brimming with delight and love and gratitude for the human experience. Most of what he posits I largely agree with: presence and patience and generosity are the greatest and deepest gifts we can give to one another, to be truly seen and understood by another is a rare and divine blessing, that even after mistakes and gracelessness and hurt we possess enough forgiveness to reach for each other again-- and be found. O'Donohue's wisdom sprouts from, and orbits around, the Celtic idea of the anam cara (literally: soul friend), that one (or one of a few) beings with whom you are entirely at home, who sees and understands a truly grounded version of yourself outside of any constructed social facade. It's a concept that goes beyond the highly satirized 'soulmate' trope, or the Americanized 'love at first sight' that is so often seen in movies and books and popular culture. It's a deeper idea of familiarization and gravitation; he explains it as two souls molded from the same clay of the earth, separated by great distances and processes, only to come back together in complete recognition and ease. Less of an instant love or lust, certainly not a 'you and no one else' but an: oh. it's you. after all this time. it's going to be you.
O'Donohue beautifully paints the portrait of this merging and the light, understanding, self-love, and access to the divine that those kinds of relationships can inspire.
However. Call me a cynic, but I think there are some critical perspectives he fails to address that cast a shadow of criticism over my entire reading of the book. While I think he has the perfect amount of faith in God, the comfort of the Trinity etc etc, I think he has entirely too much faith in mankind to treat each other with more gentleness. For example, I think he fails to understand the power of fear. He underestimates our weakness to the safe promises and seduction of transience, of ephemerality, of all the promise and patterns of break-neck and wide-spread modern life that are antithetical to the kind of slow, grounded, unfathomably deep kinds of Peace and Love that O'Donohue explicates. Another thing I think he conveniently skips over is the protective side of fear; yes, it is often a controlling and miserable force, but it is also a reasonable response to pain, and can therefore be the healthiest defense against circumstance. It is a luxury to let things go, and a privilege I think he doesn't adequately address.
But I'd like to see the world, and the ways we relate to it, in the kind of light that he does.
And, begrudgingly, perhaps I am moving that way after all.
Essentials:
“The anam cara was a person to whom you could reveal the hidden intimacies of your life. When you had one, your relationship cut across all convention and category. You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the friend of your soul.”
“When love awakens in your life, in the night of your heart, it is like the dawn breaking within you.”
“Love begins with paying attention to others, with an act of gracious self-forgetting.”
“The anam-cara experience opens up a friendship that is not wounded or limited by separation or distance. […] Because they have broken through the barriers of persona and egoism to the soul level, the unity of their souls is not easily severed.”
“Understanding nourishes belonging. When you really feel understood, you feel free to release yourself into the trust and shelter of the other person’s soul. […] Love alone is literate in the world of origin; it can decipher identity and destiny.”
“You can perish in a famine of your own making.”
“For too long, we have believed that the divine is outside us. This belief has strained our longing disastrously.”
“Our words are too thin to echo experience; they are too weak to bring the inner mystery of things to real expression. In our rapid and externalized world, language has become ghostlike, abbreviated to code and label. Words that would mirror the soul carry the loam of substance and the shadow of the divine.”
“Your beloved and your friends were once strangers. Somehow at a particular time, they came from the distance toward your life. Their arrival seemed so accidental and contingent. Now your life is unimaginable without them.”
“Behind Celtic poetry and prayer is the sense that the words have emerged from a deep, reverential silence. This perspective of solitude and silence purifies the intense encounter of two people in the anam cara experience.”
“All perception requires clearance. If things are too close to you, you cannot see them. Frequently this is why we value so little the people who are really close to us. We are unable to step back and behold them with the sense of wonder, critique, and appreciation they deserve. Nor do we behold ourselves either, because we are too close to the rush of our lives.”
“There is no force I know that can so quickly destroy the happiness and tranquility of life: fear. […] Sometimes through our fear of being true to ourselves, we sidestep our destiny and end up hungry and impoverished in a famine of our own making.”
“I am here. You are there. Even the person that you are closest to is still a separate world from you. That is the poignancy of love.”
wilde_read's review against another edition
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
5.0
Although it's been years since I listened to this book, I remember loving it very much!
bearunderthecypresses's review against another edition
Not sure why, but I expected more myths, fairies, and stories and less god stuff.