Caroline Myss

I have been in the orbit of Caroline Myss for an awfully long time.
I first started working in New Age books around the time of her phenomenal bestseller Anatomy of the Spirit. People just went crazy over that book, and when she came out to Australia she was mobbed, a kind of New Age popstar whose riff about healing, the chakras and the symbolic meanings of traditional religious symbols seemed to strike a chord among a certain demographic.
To be honest, I couldn't see what the fuss was about. I found the book dull (I never could finish it), the audio material I listened to was lacklustre, and people told me she was very cold and unfriendly in real life. Nothing, however, could stop the Myss juggernaut as it rolled over the New Age scene. Each release was huge, and her audience just grew and grew. I kept trying with the books, but I just didn't get it.
But things have changed. I read her Entering the Castle and was surprised by how engaging it was, and what a deep spiritual understanding she seemed to have. I was also impressed by her bravery in talking about St. Teresa to an audience of religion-hating New Agers. I heard her on Rachel Kohn's show, and she did seem a little shrill and arrogant, and Rachel got a lot of negative feedback about her.
I've not been well for some time now, and so I decided to listen to her CD Why People Don't Heal and wham! I was just hit by the truth of what she said and how relevant (and deeply challenging) it was to my life and to the lives of my peers. Her seeming arrogance is in fact her willingness to tell the truth, and to challenge prevailing attitudes that privilege weakness, victimhood and prolonged suffering. I'm suddenly a Caroline Myss groupie.

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