by Richard Bach [Author of Johnathan Livingston Seagull] | reviewed by June Milligun, M.Ed., CCHt
Richard Bach has a deep love of flying his own plane, soaring through the skies and testing his mettle against the elements. As a result, much of his writing uses flying as either a metaphor or a background. As always, he provides life lessons that are fascinating and enlightening.
In this work of fiction, Bach writes about a flight instructor named Jamie Forbes who hears a radio distress call from a very frightened woman in another small aircraft. Her husband, the pilot, has fallen unconscious and she doesn’t know how to fly the plane. Jamie talks her down and helps her land safely at a nearby airport, then calmly flies on without even stopping. Later on the radio he hears the woman being interviewed by a local station, explaining how a mysterious man in another plane hypnotized her so that she could land safely. He smiles, remembering that he just gave her suggestions, and knowing that since she was in a very receptive state (she wanted to live), she accepted those suggestions and acted accordingly, landing the plane with no incident.
All this starts him thinking about a time when he himself was hypnotized and how it changed the way he looked at life. After that experience he realized how powerful suggestions can be; they can run our lives unless we are able to step back and look at things through a wider lens.
Jamie meets his own guiding stranger on this flight from Seattle to Florida. As the trip progresses, he realizes how each of us creates, step by step, what seems to be the solid world around us. His presentation of the ideas of the Law of Attraction are woven into this intriguing story so that the reader can take a look at how they are living their own life, how they are creating their own reality, either consciously or subconsciously. It is light, easy and infinitely fascinating, as synchronicities and unique discoveries pop up around every corner.
As Jamie begins to look at his own “accepted suggestions,” he is amazed at the number of times he has “attracted” just exactly what he was expecting. The stranger, who has now become a friend, surprisingly shows up at one airport after another as she guides him into a deeper understanding of how life really works. She explains why “Hypnotism is suggestion accepted.” She says, “Every time we think or say: I am…, I feel…, I want…, I think…, I know…, You are…, You can…, You know…, You ought…, I should…, I will…, This is…, This isn’t… Every time we use some value judgment: good, bad, better, evil, best, beautiful, useless, terrific, right, wrong, terrible, enchanting, magnificent… Every statement we make isn’t just a statement, it is a suggestion and every one we accept slides us deeper. Every repeated suggestion intensifies itself.”
She explains that, “Of all the suggestions we’ve ever heard or seen or touched, our truth is the crowd of those we’ve accepted. It’s not our wishes that come true, or our dreams; it’s the suggestions we accept.”
Jamie realizes that if hypnosis is nothing but suggestions accepted, then a whole lot of the world we see around us must be paintings from our own brush. He began to realize that there is Hypnosis from Culture, family, religion, politics, peers and so on. The good news is that we always have choice. As adults, it is never too late to decline a suggestion. We can begin to de-hypnotize ourselves from the dysfunctional suggestions we’ve accepted by just standing back and looking at what those suggestions (which have become attitudes and beliefs) are doing to our lives. For whatever we hold consistently in our thoughts, comes true in our lives. Do those thoughts help us to move ahead in our chosen direction? Do they make us feel good about ourselves? Do they empower us?
The last part of the book launches us into a fantastic yet understandable discussion of space/time, as Jamie realizes that he is at choice in every area of his life. It would be inappropriate to reveal the ending of the book. It is brilliant, mirroring the very latest realizations from physicists who are also consciousness researchers. It is encouraging that a growing number of people are now beginning to understand the links between physics and consciousness, and hopefully in the future we will all realize how much power we really have.
Bach’s ideas about life will make you think. As the author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Illusions, One, the Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah and the Bridge across Forever, he isn’t a stranger to big ideas. After almost ten years of silence, he’s written another winner, and it is as up-to-date (or ahead of its time) as any of his other books were. Reading this will be time well spent.
For more info, contact June Milligan, specializing in helping people learn how to let go of unproductive thinking. (775) 786-9111 www.joyfulchanges.com
