The Body Sacred - Softcover

Sylvan, Dianne

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0738707619 ISBN 13: 9780738707617

Publisher: Llewellyn Publications, 2005

Synopsis

When you look in the mirror, do you see a Goddess? For anyone who's experienced a "fat day" or wished a doctor could make them younger, Wiccan Dianne Sylvan speaks candidly about overcoming body hatred and offers a spiritual path back to Divine femininity.

Sharing her own struggles with poor body image and self-acceptance, Sylvan explores how the impossible standard of female beauty has developed and endured. Emphasizing the Mother, the Healer, the Lover, and other archetypes of one's relationship with the sacred body, the author provides a uniquely Wiccan approach to achieving a healthy, new self-perception as Goddess.

Praise:
"This topical guide to reclaiming a positive self-image, which builds on foundations presented in Sylvan's earlier work and is written in a very personal and approachable style, is not imbued with self-help jargon and platitudes but with the author's hard-won self-respect and perspective."―Library Journal

"Marrying cultural critique with user-friendly how-to, [Sylvan] urges readers to reject society's insistence that they spend countless hours and billions of dollars trying to look thin and youthful. Rather, says Sylvan, women should embrace their bodies for what they are―incarnations of the Goddess. Above all, this book is practical... What distinguishes this book more than anything is Sylvan's sense of humor―she's tackling a serious topic, but she'll have readers laughing from page one."―Publishers Weekly

About this title

About the Author:

Dianne Sylvan (Austin, TX) has been a practicing Wiccan since the age of sixteen. She is co-founder and President of Blessedways, a Wiccan educational and spiritual organization based out of Central Texas.  Through Blessedways she teaches classes on Wicca, the Runes, spiritual magic, and ecstatic dance.  

In addition to her books, Dianne's work has appeared in Circle Magazine, NewWitch magazine, and the Llewellyn Wicca Almanac and Witches' Calendar; she has also been interviewed by the Wiccan Pagan Times.  More of her articles on living Wiccan spirituality can be found on her website, Dancing Down the Moon.

From Publishers Weekly:

Americans are not just engaged in wars on terror and drugs, says Wiccan priestess Sylvan. We are also waging a war against our bodies, trying to prevent our breasts from sagging, our faces from wrinkling and our buns from expanding. Sylvan, a self-proclaimed fattie, has had enough. Marrying cultural critique with user-friendly how-to, she urges readers to reject society's insistence that they spend countless hours and billions of dollars trying to look thin and youthful. Rather, says Sylvan, women should embrace their bodies for what they are—incarnations of the Goddess. Above all, this book is practical. Sylvan suggests exercises and rituals designed to help readers live more comfortably in their own skins: envision five women who hate their bodies, and then note that these women probably look perfectly fine; meditate on Artemis, the divine huntress, an "intensely physical goddess"; tape a copy of Maya Angelou's poem "Phenomenal Woman" to the mirror; dance or take up tai chi. What distinguishes this book more than anything is Sylvan's sense of humor—she's tackling a serious topic, but she'll have readers laughing from page one. Pull-out quotes in the margins offer inspiring wisdom from women ranging from Eleanor Roosevelt to Alanis Morissette. (Oct.)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Llewellyn Publications
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0738707619
• ISBN 13: 9780738707617
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 312