A Radical Awakening: Turn Pain into Power, Embrace Your Truth, Live Free Paperback – May 17, 2022

After enrolling in one of your classes on MindValley, I knew I had to get my hands on a couple of your books. This book right here! Epic, life-changing, shifting! Fully recommend to anyone who wants to parent better.

Dr. Shefali drops wisdom with an unmatched combination of playful wit and depth of insight. The way she brings truth alive on the page and in her speaking engagements is like a series of spiritual orgasms that bring clarity, levity and deeper connection to life. I have been on an intentional healing journey after realizing that I had been living in misery without seeing another way, hurting others and myself all the while, and Dr. Shefali's wisdom teachings have catalyzed by healing work with a rich consilience and harmony. Check out Dr. Shefali's Viral Wisdom contributions on YouTube and her online courses. She guides you to go deeper while living more lightly.A few quotes to get you in the mood for A Radical Awakening:"We believe we are the persona we adopted in order to cope with our childhood. Rather than contouring ourselves to the newness of each moment, the moment is reinterpreted to match the old template. We no longer live in a spontaneous way, authentically responding to the moment-by-moment experiences of life. Instead, we are highly charged and reactive, swinging like a wild pendulum according to the triggers coming from the outside. It isn’t easy to see our reactivity to a difficult situation as a repetition from our past. So fused are we with our pattern that we cannot fathom how these patterns are ingrained default systems that we are injecting into the present moment. It all feels so real. Once we discover that we are repeating an emotional pattern, we can start the process of dismantling these deeply ingrained ways." (p. 56)"Each time our truth gets buried, we engage in an act of betrayal toward ourselves. With every ensuing burial comes a greater and greater distrust and disconnection from ourselves. Our authentic self realizes that it doesn’t have a comrade in us. We don’t have our own back. We then experience a great darkness of the soul, which in modern verbiage is labeled depression. At the soul level, depression is a deep self-abandonment." (pp. 48-49)"I want to take you beyond the surface disruptions of your life to a deeper layer, where the patterns that drive us are always clear. The process of entering this deeper layer is like removing cobwebs from our eyes. The reason most of us don’t notice our patterns is that we have been hungry for two foods, love and worth. So hungry have we been that we are in a hallucinatory stupor. Attention, acceptance, and validation are the prizes we obsess over, rabidly hunting them at all costs. ...These patterns are a way of answering these questions: Am I loved? Am I seen? Am I worthy? Instead of discovering how to give these things to ourselves, we sought them from the external world, mainly our parents. Children everywhere are raised to seek approval and validation from their elders. Our parents are at the top of the hierarchy, of course, followed by our family’s elders, and then by teachers. This sets us up to depend on them. In our desire to obtain the love and worth we feel we need from them, we readily abandon ourselves and fall in line." (p. 53-54)"The ego is a vital and necessary ally—I liken it to the shell of an egg, which protects the chick before and during its hatching. If the eggshell stays intact, it will eventually kill the chick it was designed to protect. The goal of spiritual growth is never to annihilate the ego or begrudge its role. The goal is only to understand it and, through this, outgrow the need for it." (p. 59)

I have followed Dr. Shefali's work and know she is a change-maker and very effective psychologist with her clients. I'm a 55 year-old "young" nurse practitioner embarking on new adventures into ME and life and relationships and connections. I know the value of what she produces and how living an inauthentic life damages your body, brain, and spirit.I've been waking up since my young years, had sensitivities I didn't understand, and tried to "fit in" to a world that was trying to make me something that was unfamiliar to me. I revolted at every turn to NOT be what the world wanted me to be. My parents were asleep at the wheel, suffering themselves- German Air Force pilot officer perfectionist alcoholic dad and co-dependent pleasing military officer mom. God love them; they were born in a WWII Germany in the early 1940s. I inherited that stuff. We all inherit our ancestors' stuff....and this book shows you how to stop the perpetuation.Shefali opens her world for our understanding. I also fell victim to years of eating disorders, body hate, the virus of perfectionism, crappy relationships, not being able to connect to my materialistic, narcissistic friends and partners, and doing work that was not satisfying because it looked great on my CV. I never fit in. I never took on stereotypical roles. I've never been able to do work, relationships, or anything else in the traditional way because it didn't feel right to me....it wasn't part of my soul path. I think I never became a mom because I felt like I didn't want to pass the crap onto my child or maybe I didn't feel like I deserved to be a mom. I was awake and asleep at the same time.Dr. Shefali elucidates her journey with words that 100% resonated with me. She put into words what I have felt and what I see in so many of my overweight, symptomatic (every symptom in the book) men and women whose unhappiness lives and festers in their body tissues...with the soul screaming for help and for our attention. While you may not be able to relate to every story, you will relate to the themes which will help you be better with your "people." I think if you read this book like a journal, like a workbook, like a guide to keep diving deep and really being honest about what's going on in your world, you will get a boatload of value. I have notes and underlining and crimped pages all over, and maybe some day she will sign it.I don't think everyone is ready to read this. Be prepared to be uncomfortable. Be ready for the process; it's not a one-and-done. Discomfort means you're growing. I pray that something moves you to pick the book up and start some self-discovery. Because you're worth it. Your children are worth it. Your legacy and your world are counting on your awakening.Shefali, I'm one of Vishen's pro members - I hope you read this and know that you are making a difference, like he is. And BTW, you're not SUPPOSED to be reading the reviews, but I hope I get to meet you some day at A-Fest or Mindvalley-U.

I have read and been inspired by many a book in my 60 years of life and A Radical Awakening tops my list! It is more than a book, it is a guide to awakening and living consciously. It is guaranteed to deliver if you are open and ready to do the work. I began with the audible version while waiting for my hardcopy to ship. It was captivating from the start, never before has a book provoked so much self examination! I feel like I cut through years of therapy in 15+ hours of listening. I am now reading the hard cover and finding even more layers that I missed the first go around. Every time I go back, I find more. It just keeps giving and so does the author on her Instagram book clubs!That all said, this read is not for all, hence a few negative reviews. It can only be as good as the reader’s interpretation and their willingness to explore themselves beyond their beliefs. The journey of awakening is not for everyone. Thank you Dr. Shefali for this AMAZING book - I have never been more accountable in my life!

This book presents powerful ideas that are valuable and worthy of exploration for individuals and society as a whole. However, Dr. Shefali fails to recognize that her gender bias against males is unnecessary. The subjugating processes that are based on fear are universal to both men and women. She clearly presents important ideas for a more positive and empowered individual. However, I found her book to be mired in blaming men for all things wrong in the world when this is simply an easy intellectual scapegoat that simply reinforces another harmful duality,