Promise of the Soul : Identifying and Healing Your Spiritual Agreements

""Promise of the Soul is a spiritual workbook. Through simple, accessible exercises and reflections, Kenny offers us practical and proven methods that have enabled thousands of his counseling clients to relinquish their separation from God s love and live from the heart.... Step by step, Kenny s approach shows us how we can release ourselves from self-imposed limitations and lifelong feelings of inadequacy to live a more soul-infused life. It is impossible to read this book without finding yourself somewhere in its pages and setting yourself free. It is a real opportunity."" --From the Foreword by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D., author of Kitchen Table Wisdom and My Grandfather s Blessings ""An excellent resource for creating a new covenant that will enable you to expand your belief system and your life."" --Bernie Siegel, M.D., author of Love, Medicine and Miracles and Prescriptions for Living ""This book, like the topic itself, is beautiful and enchanting. This spiritual light is steeped in the great traditions, yet its presentation is original, creative, and brilliant. An essential key to making peace with God is identifying and healing your spiritual covenant and realizing the promise of your soul."" --Harold Bloomfield, M.D., author of Making Peace with God ""Promise of the Soul is an exceptional guide to examining the spiritual promises or covenants we make with the sacred. Whether we are Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, or of any other faith, this book transcends all paths and beliefs to help each of us identify which sacred promises are limiting and which are beneficial to our spiritual unfolding and inherent well-being."" --Angeles Arrien, Ph.D., author of The Four-Fold Way and Signs of Life ""By bringing to light our basic beliefs about how life works, Dennis Kenny gives us room to breathe, to change, to be liberated from prisons of our own making. As a skilled chaplain and teacher, he shows us simple ways to become larger, happier people all that God really wants us to be. This book might just set you free."" --Wayne Muller, author of Sabbath and How, Then, Shall We Live?

"Promise of the Soul is a spiritual workbook. Through simple, accessible exercises and reflections, Kenny offers us practical and proven methods that have enabled thousands of his counseling clients to relinquish their separation from God s love and live from the heart.... Step by step, Kenny s approach shows us how we can release ourselves from self-imposed limitations and lifelong feelings of inadequacy to live a more soul-infused life. It is impossible to read this book without finding yourself somewhere in its pages and setting yourself free. It is a real opportunity." —From the Foreword by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D., author of Kitchen Table Wisdom and My Grandfather s Blessings

"An excellent resource for creating a new covenant that will enable you to expand your belief system and your life." —Bernie Siegel, M.D., author of Love, Medicine and Miracles and Prescriptions for Living

"This book, like the topic itself, is beautiful and enchanting. This spiritual light is steeped in the great traditions, yet its presentation is original, creative, and brilliant. An essential key to making peace with God is identifying and healing your spiritual covenant and realizing the promise of your soul." —Harold Bloomfield, M.D., author of Making Peace with God

"Promise of the Soul is an exceptional guide to examining the spiritual promises or covenants we make with the sacred. Whether we are Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, or of any other faith, this book transcends all paths and beliefs to help each of us identify which sacred promises are limiting and which are beneficial to our spiritual unfolding and inherent well-being." —AngelesArrien, Ph.D., author of The Four-Fold Way and Signs of Life

"By bringing to light our basic beliefs about how life works, Dennis Kenny gives us room to breathe, to change, to be liberated from prisons of our own making. As a skilled chaplain and teacher, he shows us simple ways to become larger, happier people all that God really wants us to be. This book might just set you free." —Wayne Muller, author of Sabbath and How, Then, Shall We Live?

Publishers Weekly

Kenny's book is based on an unarguable premise and illustrated by case studies drawn from his clinical psychology practice: people have self-limiting beliefs rooted in childhood experience. From there the hospital chaplain and founding director of the California Pacific Medical Center's Institute for Health and Healing builds a system of three personality types, each of which bases choices and actions on an implicit and conditional bargain ("covenant") with God, a bargain that may not fit an adult as well as it does the child who first makes it. The novice author provides exercises to help the psychologically curious identify their "covenant style" in an effort to make that style conscious and then to change it by adding other characteristics and behaviors. None of this is really new. "Covenant" is reminiscent of the "agreement" popularized in Don Miguel Ruiz's successful book The Four Agreements, which offers another system for behavior guidance and change. And typology is certainly as old as the enneagram or ayurveda, the ancient Indian system of human-constitutional types. The material that is new recent studies yielding interesting evidence for mind-body connections and implications for health is cursorily treated in one chapter. At best, Kenny's work can be helpful in reframing information for self-analysis; at worst, it's one good idea drawn out to make a book. (Apr.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Promise of the Soul......Page 2 Contents......Page 8 Foreword......Page 12 Acknowledgments......Page 16 PART ONE Identifying Your Promise......Page 18 1 The Promise of Your Soul: Why Healing Your Covenants Is Important......Page 20 2 God and Your Spirituality......Page 34 Exercise 1: What Do You Believe?......Page 46 Exercise 2: Ask Yourself About Your Spirituality......Page 48 Exercise 3: Write to Your Higher Power......Page 49 Exercise 4: Examine Your Life Prayer......Page 51 3 Healing Covenants: Mind, Body, and Spirit......Page 54 PART TWO Balancing Your Promise......Page 66 4 Determining Your Covenant Style......Page 68 Exercise 5: Write Down the Answers for Finding Your Spiritual Style......Page 78 5 The Promise of the Giver......Page 86 6 The Promise of the Wanter......Page 104 7 The Promise of the Searcher......Page 128 8 Identifying Your Interior, Exterior, and Quiet Covenant Styles......Page 146 Exercise 6: Determine Your Three Different Styles......Page 147 Exercise 7: Understand Your Styles......Page 168 PART THREE Changing Your Promise, Changing Your Life......Page 170 9 The Challenges of Changing Your Covenant......Page 172 10 The Benefits of Changing Your Covenant......Page 194 11 From Disease to Ease......Page 204 12 Creating Your New Covenant......Page 220 Exercise 8: Create a New Covenant......Page 224 13 Creating a Ceremony for Your New Covenant......Page 232 14 The Blessing Moments......Page 252 Bibliography......Page 260 Index......Page 264 A guide to healing via spirtual self-exploration and inner change features personal stories and interactive prescriptive advice that will assist readers in determining their spiritual personality style, revealing how to turn their negative covenants into positive ones for a life of balance, happiness, and health