Customer Reviews: Read 47 more reviews...
 Martha Beck wins again July 22, 2008
Truly a tool of invoking personal change and transformation.
NOT 'Another Diet Book'.
Dalai Lama isn't this funny July 18, 2008
Took Martha Beck's Four Day Win to a week-long writer's conference on the coast. After two days, I was getting so much from the book I ditched the conference and took to the beach. For five days I read and wrote and listened to the seagulls. The exercises in the book were easy, and her sly writing made me laugh out loud every paragraph or two. (Rather like a sunburned crazy bag-lady.) Came out of the week stepping light, feeling free, and writing like crazy.
I recommend everyone take Martha Beck on vacation (if even to the coffee shop). You will have fun, find peace, and come back a lighter person.
INSIGHTFUL and a Good Book even if you're not wanting to lose weight. July 15, 2008
There are philosophical quotes in here that are put into new perspective. The concept of creating your own paradise to feel free from stress and the desire to self destruct is explained amazingly. She uses a metaphor of a scientific experiment that I quote to anyone who is feeling that their day to day life is like running on a hamster wheel. If we can create a section of our day, our home, our life that stirs the emotions from inner self, we can truly feel free. I was inspired and awakened by this book.
At last! July 2, 2008
At last....here is a diet book that really isn't a diet book and that really makes sense. I do wonder, however, if it isn't illegal, immoral, or insane to keep laughing out loud while reading a weight loss book. Great writing...she is FUNNY!
Wonderful, but you must be ready for this book! June 11, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I really do love this book. It remains to be seen whether or not it will work for me (losing that last 20 lbs for going on 20 years now!). Or rather, it remains to be seen whether or not I will get down to business and take to heart the really wonderful information in this book! I do think one has to be mentally "ready" for the information Beck presents. I'm not sure how useful the book would have been 5 or 6 years ago before I digested a library's worth of diet/exercise books. I wasn't ready for the internal work then. So I have traveled a rather long road which has led me (in desperation??) to "being ready" to absorb the wisdom in this book. After a lot of years and reading a mountain of diet books, all of which supposedly had the magic "recipe" to drop the extra fat, I've finally reached the conclusion that the answer has been in my head all along, not in the details of some exceptional, magic diet program thought up by someone else. Those programs haven't worked primarily because I haven't been able to stick with any of them and make them work. The question is always, "Why haven't I stuck with anything long enough to succeed?" This is where Martha Beck's approach just might be the answer. Boy oh boy did I identify myself in some of her descriptions. She describes her own past weight battle and it mirrors my own, so I'm already relating on that level. I like her analogies of the Dictator-Wild Child-Watcher within us (yep...my Wild Child gets loose and goes on the rampage way too often), and I find myself agreeing with the concept of developing the Watcher as a key to ultimately attaining the right weight. I'm forcing....yes, forcing myself to answer some of the questions she asks. There aren't really a lot of them, this isn't a protracted psychological workbook or anything, but after sticking my nose up at a lot of this self examination stuff for years on end, I'm finally starting to think there might be something to making yourself sit down and really think about the things that affect your out of control eating behaviors. One thing I really really like is Beck's style.....intelligent, knowledgeable, wise, and best of all, humorous. This can't be all dark and seriousness, and her occasional light and humorous comments hit the funny bone in just the right way. She's a person you instinctively know you would really like in person. She "speaks" to you in a really approachable way, and you know she's a friend. Meanwhile, I'll report back later regarding my success with this approach. I feel very positive at this point, and that's a good thing!
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