On October 18, 2013, ForeWord Reviews posted this book review by Kristine Morris of Ilchi Lee’s latest book, Change: Realizing Your Greatest Potential.
“In Change: Realizing Your Greatest Potential, Ilchi Lee, New York Times bestselling author of The Call of Sedona (2012), issues a call that places the power to become all we can be squarely in our own hands.
Lee says his own awakening came after a rigorous retreat on a Korean mountaintop. In a flash, he realized he was not the small, limited self he believed himself to be, but that his mind is cosmic mind and his energy is universal energy. “With that answer,” he writes, “everything else that I needed to know about life fell into place . . . Realizing that I was timeless and changeless gave me a place to stand and a kind of leverage.” Since that day, about thirty-three years ago, the author has made it his life’s work to share what he learned with the world. He has authored thirty-five books and created mind/body trainings that include Dahn Yoga and Brain Education. Lee also serves as president of the University of Brain Education and the International Brain Education Association.
Based in Korean Taoism, Lee’s work reveals simple truths that underlie all authentic spirituality: in order to live an authentic life and experience a feeling of completion at the time of death, it is necessary only to know what you really are, do basic things well, and live with a genuine intention to benefit all—the last of these, Lee affirms, comes effortlessly to all humans once they recover their natural rhythm and balance and allow the subtle energy of life to flow through them. “The most precious discovery,” he writes, “is that we have the natural intention to benefit other people, even strangers, without condition or expectation of return.” With his belief in basic human goodness, Lee offers a solid reason to have hope, both at the personal and planetary levels, even in the darkest of times.
Lee strips away all but the essential and effectively clarifies the difference between absolute values, “those that are given by nature, such as air and water,” and those that are relative, or man-made, such as cultures and social institutions, thus providing an avenue for agreement between adversaries. Seeing ourselves as citizens of planet Earth rather than as members of particular religions, tribes, or nations will, he affirms, eliminate most of the divisive elements that make peace an impossible goal. Because a balanced society can only be built by balanced individuals, Lee provides basic instruction in breathing well, eating well, and sleeping well—simple yet profound tools for personal transformation that can create a ripple effect in the world.Lee’s plan is to start a movement of one hundred million awakened hearts and minds capable of making conscious and Earth-centered choices that will benefit all. With his heartfelt and well-reasoned book as a guide, the task looks far less daunting, and our own part in it essential.”