Publisher's Weekly Review
Hammerschlag ( The Dancing Healers ), for 14 years Chief of Psychiatry with the Indian Health Service, explains in this well-told memoir how he learned from Native Americans to make use of the energy source within ourselves for healing. If the author's explanation of the science of psychoneuroimmunology--which suggests that ``what you know matters less than what you feel''--is thin, his anecdotes are telling. One patient suffering from clenched jaws lost his pain and his anger after climbing a mountain and screaming obscenities. Hammerschlag recalls how a Native American healer, in teaching him to pray, caused him to lose his cynicism, and how the wishes of dying children remind us how to dream. His musings sometimes stray from the Native American base, but they include worthwhile advice: people should learn to find joy in small, daily things, and doctors should be wary that medical jargon obscures human feelings. Hammerschlag concludes wth a somber warning from the Hopi people, who predict that our ``obsession with seeking material goods'' will lead to our ruin. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
An eclectic accumulation of life experiences and sound advice for healthier living from Hammerschlag (a former longtime chief of psychiatry with the Indian Health Service; The Dancing Healers, 1989--not reviewed). The attention to tribal belief systems here turns most often to southwestern groups--Hopi, Navajo, Apache--in keeping with the author's many years of service to the Indians of that region. But Hammerschlag casts his net more widely as well, partaking in Native American Church ceremonies; seeking out a Mayan healer in Belize; and generally making himself receptive to pearls of wisdom, whatever their sources. Even a chance encounter with an elderly woman in Manhattan's Metropolitan Museum of Art proves fruitful, as she enlightens Hammerschlag in the true value of wearing sneakers. The personal odysseys and quests that accompany descriptions of spiritual healing are equally diverse, ranging from a repressed southern businesswoman's taking years to find the means to tell a domineering subordinate he's fired, to Hammerschlag's own battle to overcome his Holocaust-engendered bias that all Germans are Nazis at heart--His better judgment ultimately prevails during a visit to his ancestral home in Germany, where gentile friends of his father's welcome him with open arms. Here, autobiography and anecdote are mainstays in the rambling course to enlightenment--but while the storytelling is engaging, the testimonial approach too often seems an end in itself, with the whole proving rather less than the sum of its parts. As sincere and compassionate as it is disorganized--but of merit for its insightful moments, and for its underlying faith in the ability of individuals to redeem themselves.
Booklist Review
So many Hopi religious objects have been sold (often, alas, by tribal people looking for quick cash) that entire cycles of ceremonies have fallen into desuetude. Why not just make new symbols, Hammerschlag innocently (maybe, in fact, ignorantly) asks a Hopi elder. Because, she tells him, if the people have sunk so low as to sell their religious heritage, making new objects won't fix their disorder of the spirit. This book of essays looks at some of the spiritual messages, especially those about physical and emotional healing, of Native American cultures. Hammerschlag does not, thank heaven, belong to that burgeoning tribe, the Wannabes, who exploit Native American religious material as wantonly as nineteenth-century ranchers exploited their land. A medical doctor, he grace~fully interweaves his professional practice, his Jewish heritage, even his psychological quirks with stories of his many years in Hopiland in order to share a remarkable and generous spirit. ~--Pat Monaghan
Library Journal Review
Hammerschlag, who was for 14 years chief of psychiatry with the Indian Health Service, provides a deeply moving and entirely credible account of his experiences with native healers and their patients. Even more important, he discusses the lessons he learned from such encounters and reveals the wisdom of much of their treatment. He demonstrates humility and respect for native cultures; he learns the importance of treating the patient, not just the disease, of facilitating the growth of spirit as well as healing mind and body. This is a wonderful book for general readers, physicians, and other helping professionals. Recommended for public and seminary libraries. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
