A review by nvblue
The Mind of the Druid by Eric Graham Howe

4.0

Unless we become our own leaders, content to be what we are in process of becoming, we shall always be servitors and idolaters.

The Mind of the Druid is a compilation of a series of talks given by Dr. E Graham Howe towards the end of his life, being published in 1973. Dr. Howe was a psychotherapist who was born in 1897 and was active in chemotherapeutic circles between the 1920’s to the 70’s. Biographical details on him are rather scarce and I haven’t uncovered much about him definitively. What is clear from reading this series of lectures is that Dr. Howe was a man of considerable (albeit sometimes eccentric) wisdom. While it is impossible to fully judge a person’s character through the written word, Howe seems to me to have been a humble and personable man, more interested in life’s questions than with hubris.

The Mind of the Druid is a short recap to Howe’s very long career. “To be a Master in the art of living” is probably the summary of Howe’s message in this book. This is approached through a psychotherapeutic and sometimes metaphysical methodology as opposed the structure of a self-help book. So many different topics were covered in this book that I find it impossible to distill a short and concise list. For the purpose of clarity, the main theme of this book was relationship. Our relationship between different parts of ourselves, our relationship with consciousness, our relationship with others and our relationship with perception.

As far as Druids are concerned in this book, Howe uses Druidic teachings as an example of proper relationship between oneself, the external environment, and others. “The power which the Druids pursued in order to use it for their own specific ends was not the power to do good, which is the Christian ideal: but the power to live by it, effectively and successfully”.

One of the excellent things about Howe’s writing style that makes it easier for a layman to read is his rejection of psychotherapeutic jargon in favor of a more simplistic and relatable style. Apart from the chapters that dealt with the Oedipus complex, I found myself able to comprehend (at least marginally) what Howe’s points were.

Cure or Heal? Was the title of one of Howe’s early books, and he explores this theme in The Mind of the Druid as well. Specifically, in regards to depression, Howe believed that depression was a part of the natural process of healing and integrating experiences into the self. Rather than a disease to be cured and crushed it is an opportunity to experience the fullness of life that leads to healing. Howe rails against the tendency of doctors to view patients through the lens of a diagnosis rather than as an infinitely complex and unknowable person. He writes:

Within the continuum of emotional experience, it (healing) worked from inside, idea effecting energy effecting form, in proper psychosomatic sequence. But today the patient is set apart from his symptoms, and even his heart is a thing to be transplanted, externally from here to there. The doctor would rather be without the patient altogether, in order to control (and eliminate) his symptoms better. The patient is only an impediment, getting in the way of what needs to be done for his improvement. The doctor's drugs are "magical" indeed; as the advertisements of the chemist all proclaim, every day new drugs give more power to the doctor's therapeutic elbow. The Power is there to "smash" the wicked symptoms which, like evil spirits, have entered into the body and only need to be exploded out again, to be exterminated altogether and successfully. According to the advertisers, "more power, more brightness" is the order of the day.

I’m not sure how much of Howe’s thought is in line with psychotherapeutic thought, nor do I care. I walked away from this book seeing the world in a more colorful way, with more meaning and more possibilities.