Barbara De Angelis "Secrets About Life Every Woman Should Know: Ten Principles for Total Emotional and Spiritual Fulfillment "

If you find Kastaneda too dramatic and you think the methods he offers are not applicable to your busy life, you may try Barbara de Angelis "Secrets About Life Every Woman Should Know". 

It is Kastaneda or Hawaiian shamans packed and explained to modern women who do not want to be bothered with extravagances such as Daoism, I mean those many women who have usual life problems like a broken heart, children, job etc.

The book is a bit long - Barbara belongs to a "chewing" type. Maybe being long and sentimental is something typical for an American. I can't judge, but I have this impression. Elizabeth Gilbert is also a "chewing" type. Sometimes I think American editors ask their authors to bring bricks with no less than 500 000 words, so the authors have to chew. Why shorter novels are not in fashion? Why not to announce, just like in Vogue - "This year is the year of short stories, mini is back again"! Have you noticed how heavy children books became?

Back to Barbara. In fact, being a "chewing" type is being analytical. I, unfortunately, also belong to this type. Instead of writing something creative like "Brigitte Jones" and make people smile, a "chewing" type would rather chew and provide people with an "understanding".

Did you know that love can be explained? Barbara gives one of THE BEST explanations of love, no sarcasm here. In fact if you have no money and time to fly to India's ashrams or you do not want to pay psychologist's fees, the cheapest and, in my opinion, the best solution, is Barbara's book. She walks you through her life, she is very sincere and very helpful.

Taisha Abelar - The Sorcerer’s Crossing: A Woman’s Journey

Taisha Abelar is a magician of a new generation and belongs to the party of the last nagual, Carlos Castaneda, whom Times called "an enigma wrapped in a mystery".  (Carlos Castaneda is an author of books that describe a teaching of Toltec shamans)

From a practical point of view, the book of Taisha Abelar is better than the whole Castaneda’s saga about the party of the nagual, Don Juan. The thing is that Don Juan is too powerful and eccentric, he makes people to lose their minds, so to speak, and he does it directly from Castaneda's books. His vocabulary is complex and expressive, his actions are full of drama, his energy feels coming down in torrents. Communicating with Don Juan is not so safe, even if it is through the book. Impressible persons ran to smoke Mescalito, or, with a completely brain-washed face, announce themselves as "warriors", or immediately identify themselves as naguals and begin to form parties of “seers”. 

The explanations of Taisha Abelar are simple and straightforward. Everything that Castaneda fit into multiple volumes you will find in her book. She is more practical. Magic tricks, exercises helping to achieve health, beauty and energy release are, in many ways, similar to those taught by daoists. It is simple – do this and that and you will find happiness. May be I found Taisha more understandable, because she was taught a women way. Her companion, Florinda Donner, said that women are closer to the “knowledge” due to the following difference between men and women: "While men are building their understanding in words, women are creating their understanding with their lives. Both methods are equally effective, but each of them corresponds to their way of life. In terms of energy, a man connected with the knowledge by something like a cone, and he moves to the knowledge step by step. In terms of physics, this can be described as rays of light, and men are moving in the direction of its source, but never reach it. For women it is different, because for them the cone is upside down".

Four shamans from the party of Don Juan (Nelida, Clara, Emilito and Don Juan himself) taught Taisha different techniques. It is very interesting to read Taisha’s view on the same people (or rather the super-humans), which Castaneda described earlier in his works.

The book is very interesting and inspiring as Taisha’s message to people: "We constantly hear from people - if only I was a member of your group, then I could do this or that. But they do not realize that the place, where you are, is something with which you need to start."