“I am totally in awe! I just finished reading it. I'm on a high.”
“It is a gem. Thanks for the wisdom.”
“I had a blast reading it. I really took my time in reading every word of it and tried to keep as much of it in my day to day life as I could.”
“Inspiring reading”
“Nice powerful stuff!”
“I have thought of a few of the things you wrote about. They never made much sense to me. And, in no way, was I ever able to articulate them so well. Here, you have done both. Made sense and communicated well.”
“I'd like to print it out and cut out certain very pertinent points to post all over my house.”
“Challenges the reader to think, but also readable in a relatively short time.”
“I have selected the insights captured in this little book to share with you for only one purpose: that one or more of them may empower you to see things differently from how you may have seen them before.…"
"I am particularly fond of the way Arthur Koestler described insight: “The moment of truth, the sudden emergence of a new insight, is an act of intuition. Such intuitions give the appearance of miraculous flushes, or short-circuits of reasoning. In fact they may be likened to an immersed chain, of which only the beginning and the end are visible above the surface of consciousness. The diver vanishes at one end of the chain and comes up at the other end, guided by invisible links.” His description of the phenomenon nicely recognizes that insight involves making connections previously not made. Although everyone has a plethora of information available at any given time…most of that information remains neatly contained in socioculturally given categories that seem to have concrete boundaries that disallow easy converse with other available information.…"
"In struggling to define for myself as rigorously as possible just what an insight is, the best I have been able to suggest so far is: a significantly increased understanding and comprehension of a phenomenon previously understood less perfectly. …As T. S. Eliot says in one my favorite verses:
‘We shall not cease from exploration,
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started,
And know the place for the first time.’”
More excerpts from the book:
“Radical insights do not come to people of conviction who already have all the answers."
"Ask yourself: Who constructed your reality for you and what makes you think that that reality is the best one for you?"
"When faced with an apparently insoluble problem, smile at it with relentless calm, until it yields and answers itself for you. Insoluble problems can be your best friends, for they can teach you first to be humble, second that your expectations are your obstacles, and third that learning to surrender is one of your most powerful weapons."
"When you travel with humility, compassion will be your companion."
Although he rejects labeling, Victor Gideon is a graduate of Bowdoin College and has been an educator, research psychologist (not licensed), and therapist for over forty years – but often prefers to think of himself as a psychosociologist. He also worked under the tutelage of Abraham Maslow at Brandeis University. He has worked with individuals, couples, families, government agencies, non-profits, and businesses of every size and flavor, from start-ups to multinational, multibillion-dollar conglomerates as a counselor in matters of conflict, transition, and ethics. He is the author of numerous papers, articles, and several books and is currently working on his magnum opus, The Creation of Meaning. His work is described at www.theemergentsolution.com.
