Neale Donald Walsch - Conversations with God 4

In the middle of the night on August 2, 2016, Neale Donald Walsch found himself drawn into a new and totally unex­pected dialogue with God in which he suddenly faced two questions: Is the human race being offered help by Highly Evolved Beings from Another Dimension? Is there a key role that humans are being invited to play in advancing their own evolu­tion by joining in a mutual mission to assist the planet during the critical times ahead?
He was told that the answer to both questions is yes.
Then he was given 16 specific examples of how Highly Evolved Beings respond to life differently than humans do-and how adopting even a few of those behaviors could change the course of world history for the better forever.
That information makes up the body of this work.
A striking invitation to every reader sets the stage for the extraordinary explorations that follow. Picking up where Book 3 in the Conversations with God Trilogy series left off, the revelations about Highly Evolved Beings and about how ordi­nary humans can answer the call to help awaken the species on Earth will breathtakingly expand your view of both your personal and your collective future.
Which is exactly what the dialogue was intended to do.

Comment: This is an unexpected 4th installment in the conversations the author had with God. According to him, this was not in the plans but, as it happened before, he felt the need to wake up an start writing about a new dialogue. This time, the subject was metaphysics and things humans could to to become better beings.

The author had said no more books like these would come out, that is, the result of an experience while he is directly talking to God for this purpose. The first three books seemed to follow a pattern which looked like it was complete but then this new book was published. In it, the author continues to talk with God and to exchange ideas about what could humanity do to become better and what else is out there.

Again, I found myself comparing this book with the others. I know everyone sees things differently but it just seems so unlikely that, as the "conversation" continues, the themes become so... new age. I know, I know, what should I expect, but it really makes me a little disillusioned how different in tone the first book is in relation to the following ones.

The first book was truly an amazing experience. Whether readers believe or not the author had an emotional self experience where he felt in his heart and mind God would reply to his anguished call for help, the truth is that the book had a powerful message, written in a simple way which anyone reading could feel like the one talking to God and if He were to be able to spend the time replying, those would have been the kind of answers we could expect to have. I think the dialogue format and the kind of content in that book worked out very well. The message was going through and the whole notion of what was being said, believable in its own right.

The following installments, however, feel like something else. The subjects still felt like they matter but the way the information is presented doesn't feel as if it was given in such a natural manner. I don't mean it feels staged or forced but it feels more like a compiling of ideas shared in dialogue format rater than a smooth, natural development of a conversation you might be having with someone. Even the questions asked feel rehearsed, as well as the tone of the replies.

For me, the same applies to this book and it just doesn't feel I'm actually seeing the summary of a conversation. The content in this installment is also rather complicated, not as much by how it is said, or what is said but because it doesn't feel like it can be the kind of conversation one would have if God was there. It's so...technical. I mean this in the sense that the information feels more than philosophical, it feels rather academic in all its metaphysical content. There is also the question of how people might accept the message, which, in my opinion would be "not much" since the human race is too keen on complacency and easy things.

There are also advices and comments on what people should do to evolve, etc, but it does feel like it's too "new age", too much like a list of rules to follow to try to implement and not the result of a natural dialogue. It does feel too tidy, as if the author organized things too well for the reader's benefit but by doing so, the smooth part of the talk was lost.

I don't think the kind of ideas presented and the advice shard would be easy to follow. Like in the previous book, the kinds of suggestions here are just too broad, too big for people to slowly start implementing on their own. I think some are even a little too "alien" (pun intended if you read the book) for most people to seriously consider.

All in all, this was entertaining but it doesn't even get close to the amazing greatness of the first book.

Grade: 6/10

Mini - Comments

It does seem I have included several mini-comments lately, but often I:

A) read books in Portuguese with no edition in English to better present the book here; 

B) read books I don't feel like talking much about and I can write about two or three that might have something in common.

This time, the common ground is the fact both books were in Portuguese and both, we could say, provide food for thought, although at different levels.

The first one is another book I borrowed from the person who likes to lend me things I might find interesting and the second one is mine, I've had it in the pile since 2008 actually.

The first is by a new author, so I didn't have any expectations unless on what type of story is would be and the second is written by an author I had read before, so nothing new to expect there.

The first star of the night by Nadia Ghulam and Javier Diéguez

This could be the literal title of the original. It references a moment the protagonist and her childhood cousin and best friend shared when thinking of what the other might be doing.

Portuguese cover

This had everything to be a very emotional book, since it is told by someone who lived in Afghanistan when the war was ongoing and when the taliban gained power. Through the guise of returning to know the whereabouts of her family, after living in Barcelona for some time to study, Nadia shares what she encounters and what is happening while reminiscing on the lives of the women of her family.

I liked knowing more about the Afghani lives and citizens and what they went trough in a very simple manner. Nadia isn't sharing this to criticize or to defend anyone or anything, although her pain and the pain of her countrymen and women is more than obvious in these pages. I would say this book wasn't even more special for narrative reasons: the fact she is telling things happening during her travel, then remembering, then alluding to secondary people...it's too distracting. At times it almost feels impersonal. This was a good book to learn but it's not the most fluid or engaging, in terms of narrative style.

Grade: 6/10

Conversations With God III by Neale Donald Walsch

This is the third book on this series. These books were refreshing to read back in the 90s not only by the approach used in this the inspirational theme but because they offered a lot of content which could be seen as possible to help people think and act better towards their surroundings.

As always, though, the big setback is that no matter how many people might read these books, not all agree, not all share the enthusiasm and not all want to put into motion the general ideas that could, indeed, help change the world.

The first volume was amazing, it really felt the content was achievable. The second I found less appealing, since it focused on too specific situations, mostly on the US reality.

This third book returned to general and broader issues humankind faces but despite having enjoyed some of the hints and possibilities included, I feel some concepts were too confusing. I think modern societies just can't function like what was suggested unless everyone feels like doing their part and, sadly, many would not want to.

Still, these conversations the author has with God and what He might want us to really learn are fascinating. It's just so.... conceptual, though, that there are details I struggled to not dismiss because of how they were addressed. But it's certainly a better installment than the second one and a very good example of how to think of spirituality nowadays.

Grade: 6/10

Neale Donald Walsch - Conversations with God vol.II

Part of Conversations with God series, this work covers global topics of geopolitical and metaphysical life on the planet, and the challenges facing the world.
 "...this paradigm shift will take great wisdom, great courage, and massive determination. For fear will strike at the heart of these concepts, and call them false. Fear will eat at the core of these magnificent truths, and render them hollow.... Yet you will not have, cannot produce, the society of which you have always dreamed unless and until you see with wisdom and clarity the ultimate truth: that what you do to others, you do to yourself; what you fail to do for others, you fail to do for yourself; that the pain of others is your pain, and the joy of others your joy, that when you disclaim any part of it, you disclaim a part of yourself. Now is the time to reclaim yourself. Now is the time to see yourself again as Who You Really Are, and thus, render yourself visible again. For when you, and your true relationship with God become visible, then We are indivisible. And nothing will ever divide Us again."

Comment (with a long setting up): I got this book, according to my recordings of purchases, back in 2008. This is the second book in a trilogy titled Conversations With God by Neale Donald Walsch. I first knew about these books when a friend from school let me borrow the first installment back then, around 2001 or 2002 which means the books have been in my radar for decades now. 

These books are mostly spiritual so I kind of let them be until now, when I finally decided to pick the second volume.

In this second volume, the author keeps up with the conversation he has initiated with God in the first volume.

The books exist, according to the author, after a moment in his life where everything seemed to go wrong and he felt so angry he started to write a letter where he talked to God about it. He claims he felt a need to write more after that, as if someone were saying the words of a reply in his head, in which he recognized it could the voice of God putting into words what could be the answer to the author's complaints and questions.

Even if one doesn't truly believe this part of the author's experience as real, the dialogue that came from that resulted on a very wide book on several topics, a sort of lesson to those who wished to understand why life isn't easy. 

The conversation was divided into three books. Believing the author the process took months and the books weren't the result of just one "talk" but several in which God would answer different types of questions, which later on the author complied into different volumes. 

The first volume more centered about personal issues, individual sort like questions related to a person's life and problems,

The second volume focused on broader issues like society and political problems;

The third volume about the universal questions, more metaphysic issues and the discussion of things like the origin of the world and why life is what it is.

As I've said, I've read the first book almost two decades ago (how time flies...) and I was at a moment in my life I did feel like talking to someone and receiving a message, even if from God. I'm catholic, I believe and go to church but I admit I'm not a follower of every little "rule" the Catholic Church tells their followers. I believe more in the love and charity one must dedicate to ourselves and others, rather than all those supposed rules from the Bible. By the way, the Bible to me is a sort of guide, a huge metaphor about customs and ideas from centuries past with notions and advice we should adapt to our daily lives but isn't the only way to behave.

Anyway, the fist book talked to me and I was curious about reading the rest. Back then I didn't have easy access to new books, I couldn't afford them all the time, then university came and people's focus is always hanging. Only later on, when I already had a different grasp of my routines, did I meet these books again. I bought in Portuguese volumes II and

III but again, I let them stay in the shelf.

This year, while distributing titles through 2018 (I have a spreadsheet where I write down all this), I looked at my shelves to add some books that have been waiting for longer and this second volume I added to February. 

I'm sharing all these unimportant details only to create a scenario on why I, personally, read some things when I do and don't just pick the first thing in front of me. I was also left wondering how this book would feel like to me, now that so long had passed since the first one.

This book felt very different. I have the notion the first was like a message to me whereas this one I couldn't help but look at with critical eyes, namely the way the information is presented. The dialogue format is great and often the author's questions pertinent and realistic. But the way God replies...it's very difficult to believe this could actually be a natural conversation between God and a man and in the first book everything felt more probable.

This book also focuses a lot on international themes like politics and economy and why we often think some people in power act they way they do, what could happen if God could come to us and say what we should do.

Of course, the author "escaped" that trap by always stressing out everything «God» says isn't His opinion, it's only suggestions.

Still, little details aside, the message is still as powerful but I can't help feeling disappointed because, as to be expected, all the examples used to illustrate a situation - even from God's POV - are centered on the US reality, the author's nationality I suppose. This makes the message seem very limitative and reduced to one reality. In the first book, because the situations were about the individual self, all readers could get the message as if to themselves.

I also noticed some incongruence, some repetitions... again, what made the first book so intriguing and special seemed gone in this one and the idea this is a dialogue with God and not just the author's theories (even if good ones) presented seems to be less and less what we are supposed to start from.

All in all, this has very good observations, things not every people would immediately think about and the food for thought notion is quite well done. The execution, however, was a let down because it turned what made the books special into just an excuse.

I do hope the third book can present a much better message again.

Grade: 5/10