Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah [Mass Market Paperback]

First of all, regardless of the message, the book is very well written and enjoyable. Moreover, it was written long before the "new age" trend and "dime-a-dozen" inspirational stories, so it's not written with the intent to sell you on a new self-help plan.

In this story (as in most of his stories), Bach tries to enlighten readers that maybe life is not as complicated as is often thought. Everyday, from religion to politics, we are constantly presented with the message that life is difficult and you had better follow the highly complex set of rules that governs what you are, where you will go and how you had better get there. In Bach's story, however, the reluctant messiah learns a new perspective. Maybe, he comes to find, he already has the answers to his life, or at least the answers to how to pursue a good life... if he would just stop listening to his pre-conceived ideas of limit and complication.

I highly suggest reading the book. I also highly suggest remembering the book is fiction! Think about the message and concepts. Instead of trying to "vaporize clouds," try maybe to vaporize some of your problems. And, instead of walking the world professing a new faith or perspective on "God" after being inspired by Bach's ideas, try instead to overcome one of your own, preconceived limits, or re-examine what you've been taught about the

Having met Mr. Bach, hearing him speak and reading every one of his books multiple times, I can assure you he is a real person with real ideas. Moreover, I feel sure that he would agree, that he writes "stories" to help people expand their minds. Too often, his work is misinterpreted to be a "gospel." Instead, in my impression, he simply wants to share new ideas, or as he said, "when he get's an idea, it bothers him until he writes it an let's it go..."

We as humans evolve not from one or two ideas, but from a lifetime of learning. Mr. Bach, in my opinion, is one of those highly insightful individuals who has inspired millions to look at life through a slightly different lens. Mr. Bach's Illusions is a fantastic journey - one of many - on the lifelong road of growing as a person.

I hope you enjoy it!

Here's my gripe: Yes, the world is fully an illusion. We are all One, and all of this duality is just a big fat movie to occupy each node of existence with conflict/balance issues for eternity. Great, Rich has written a Hinduism for dummies. But he dumbed it down so much as to make it seem that, hey, all you need to do is REALIZE you're staring at yourself everytime you look at a fellow creature, rock, or phenomenon, and WHA-bam, you'll be able to manipulate the whole mess like Sim City 3000. Miracles, bug-free airplanes, impossible feats of yahda, yahda, yahda. I'm not saying that's impossible--I've witnessed a miracle or two in my time; I'm saying that WE, human beings, mere mortals, though we may perform the very miracles ourselves, cannot, do not, will not, can never do so at the demand of our conflicted minds. When we do something phenomenal, like an athelete, like a musician, like a messiah, it is simply through the QUIETING of the ever-chattering voices in our heads to such a point that the devine will, the will of the universe flows through us. When we flutter like a flag in the wind, rather than the rigid pole, we execute the impossible. We move with rhythms beyond our mortal selves. And without fail, the most unrestricted of these movements never fail to be biblical in their effect on our lives and of those around us.

This is my gripe with the book. It really doesn't address this issue of Self, and the chatter of our minds. In fact, I felt that it glorified, like a Hollywood movie, the X-man quality of enlightenment--just point your palm at the sky, and pow, you COMMAND a miracle! If you walk away from this book thinking, wow! enlightenment, what a thing to shoot for, I wanna be enlightened, I just have to remember: it's all just an illusion! then you're already turning away from what is ALREADY the entire power of the cosmos inside and surrounding yourself. To think of life as an illusion is to denounce just how REAL it all is as well. Sorry, ya'll, there's no 'easy out' for facing both sides of the equation in every respect. It isn't God, it isn't Illusions, and it isn't this book.

If you want a very powerful yet realistically inspirational story about miracles and how they come about, try the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, or for a philosophical breakdown that pretty much tackles every angle of human thought: try Cloud Hidden, by Alan Watts.