The Awakened Warrior: Living with Courage, Compassion & Discipline (New Consciousness Reader)

By: Fields, Rick

Book Overview

Gathers articles from the op New Age and New Thought thinkers of the day. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0874777755
• ISBN13: 9780874777758
• Release Date: September 1994
• Publisher: TarcherPerigee
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.92 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.5" x 1.0" x 6.3"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 12 and higher

Customer Reviews

Classic still worth the read.

This book is a compilation of essays by cutting edge thinkers on the subject of modern day warrior ship. While the book was first published in 1994, the articles and warrior philosophies presented in the book continue to inspire and speak forcefully for those on the path of an awakened consciousness. I found all of the articles interesting and forthright. Since these views cover a spectrum of thought emerging out of different spiritual traditions, they still hold a diverse magnetism in our contemporary moment. I found the interview by Sam Keen with the enigmatic Carlos Castaneda (while he was still alive) to be powerful. This is one of the few interviews Castaneda ever gave in public, and for this reason alone, the book remains a classic. The articles cover a wide range of authorship from Robert Bly, Dan Millman, C.G. Jung, and Richard Stozi Heckler, to name a few. All of the articles represent awakened consciousness and argue on behalf of eliminating excuses, rationalizations, and ask us to embrace and embodied praxis founded on personal responsibility. This book is a Classic and a must for anyone engaging awakened consciousness.

War! What Is It Good For?

Moore and Gillette postulate that there are four archetypal beings inside every man (or woman): The King, the Magician, the Lover, and the Warrior. Others who deal in archetypes add the Trickster and many more. However, it is the Warrior that has inspired the most literature and the most general attention. Books by, among a host of others, Dan Millman and Carlos Castaneda address what being a Warrior is about and serve as a rough guide to adopting some version of the Warrior lifestyle. Grand films such as BIRTH OF A NATION, THE SANDS OF IWO JIMA, THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, SPARTACUS, BRAVEHEART and THE LAST SAMURAI all present the Warrior in various guises and levels of development. Perhaps this should not be surprising. The Warrior has always been a central pillar in most societies. The ancient Celts, the Maasai, the Native Americans, and other cultures honored and treasured their Warriors. The Warrior really met his downfall through the development of the modern nation-state when rapidly-trained citizen Soldiers replaced the caste of Warriors who had been inculcated since birth with the Warrior ethos. THE AWAKENED WARRIOR is a series of essays (often chapters lifted from other books) addressing that ethos from a variety of perspectives. Contributors to this book range from Sam Keen (FIRE IN THE BELLY) to Clarissa Pinkola Estes (WOMEN WHO RUN WITH THE WOLVES). The contributors each have different (often contradictory) views on what is meant by Warriorship, and this kaleidoscopic approach permits the reader to draw his (or her) own conclusions. As a starting point in Warrior learning THE AWAKENED WARRIOR should be read in conjunction with THE CRAFT OF THE WARRIOR by Robert L. Spencer, a good introduction to the subject which provides the theory and basic concepts to go along with the practical examples in this book. Although THE AWAKENED WARRIOR suffers from a surfeit of Political Correctness (yawn!) and New Age overtones (yawn! yawn!), the essays do invite a discerning reader to think. What greater value can a book of this nature have?

On the Path

When I was in the Marine Corps, I read passages from this book to my troops to inspire them and keep them grounded. I'm a martial arts instructor now, and this book is manadatory reading for my advanced studedts. I've had this book in my library for 10 years, and I return to it from time to time to remind myself that karate training is much more than a physical journey, and there's much more to being a warrior than toughness and stregth. Okay, some of the articles are a little corny and idealistic (thus the 4 stars), but you can take away SOMETHING from every entry and reflect upon how you can apply the principles of "warriorship" in your life. Life is short. The book reminds us that it's much more about the giving than the taking, and that winning is victory, but so is achieving personal balance and presence. Train hard!