When Love Meets Fear: Becoming Defense-Less and Resource-Full

Having first read Richo's "How to be an Adult," calling When Love Meets Fear: How to Become Defense-Less and Resource-Full his "best book" is quite a statement. The former is a wonderful and life changing tome that teaches the keys to meaningful relationships with others. When Love Meets Fear builds on that message with a book expressly on the subject of fear. The root of anger, frustration and stonewalling in relationships, understanding and accepting our fear is our greatest journey in life. One caution: This book takes many sittings to read properly. I was able to read only a few pages then I needed to put the book down and spend a day or two thinking about what I had just read. Almost like magic, I found myself time and again reading just the few pages I most needed to hear as I worked my way through.

I cannot say enough good things about this book. I have tried a lot of self-help techniques but the ones contained in this book are unlike any I've encountered.The biggest lesson I got out of this book is that so many of our problems nowadays occur because we had painful experiences earlier in life but instead of facing them and accepting the ramifications - we chose to lie to ourselves instead. Richo explains the most common lies: life is just, suffering is avoidable, things don't change, etc. I understand from this book that it is much better to just experience those original painful feelings instead of spending your life overanalyzing every minute of every day trying to make the world something it is not.

This book simply explains the key to happiness. It is to let go of our fears, which is at the root of unhappiness, hate, aggression, apathy, and everything negative in the world. Once we are able to do that, we can open our hearts and embrace each other with love, respect, empathy, hope and forgiveness. It is a simple idea but something very difficult to do because our fears run very very deep within us all. Once we are able to do this to some extent, we try to help others do the same. It is simply the mission of all of our lives, whether we are aware of it or not. When you think about it, nothing else really matters as much. This is what this book tries to help us understand. It is a wonderful message! In another excellent book called "The Ever-Transcending Spirit" by Toru Sato, the author explains how this works in relation to human development and evolution. It shows us how we consciously begin living this life when we are naturally ready for it. These books are absolutely exquisite!

This book has been incredibly helpful on my journey of self discovery. Like Richo's earlier book, How to Be an Adult, this is an intelligent, well-written, and fascinating exploration of deep psychological processes. This is a book I pick up and refer to over and over again. I love the quotes peppered thoughout. Finally, a self-help book that really helps!

Finding this book when I did was the perfect psychological/spiritual prescription for helping to heal, not only some old fears, but also some new surprise anxiety panics. It helped turn my fears into calm emotions of self-knowing and self-acceptance. I sleep better at night since having read this book.