The focus of this book is on how our attitudes and reactions during times of adversity, be it illness, divorce, loss of employment, etc., can strengthen or weaken our characters. Ultimately, the message conveyed is that it is desirable to choose positive assertions that will in the end allow us to step forward and reach wisdom and deeper happiness.
Many poignant stories are shared about people who have faced difficult times. Aside from citing celebrated personalities such as Helen Keller, and Dr. Martin Luther King. Jr. I think the most touching stories are those that Brehony shares about her own family. The readers get to step into her home arena and view for themselves the closeness she holds in her heart with her family members, especially her grandmother, an aunt,and her parents. She also details an interview she had with Dan Maslowski, an U.S. Army pilot who survived three years in a POW camp that I found exceptional. Dan says "No one would ever choose to go through something like that. You would never think you could. But sometimes in life you don't have a choice. The power can come through." Broheny continues the theme of the text within After the Darkest Hour: How Suffering Begins the Journey to Wisdom, offering us the ideal that there can be a gifts derived from our tragedies. We are offered a choice to look at these painful experiences as opportunities for change and growth or we can perceive them as victimizing circumstances that are totally unfair.
On page 164 Brehony outlines eight specific belief systems that can result in suffering. She then offers help in identifying our beliefs and gives suggestions on how we can go about changing our viewpoints, thus lessening our pain. She goes further devoting almost half of her text to strategies of growing through our pain. (*Outline of A Dozen Strategies For Growing Through The Pain)
I found myself nodding in agreement with many of the ideas expressed, often I'd breathe a deep Ah..Ha! when Brehony touched on something that resonated with me personally. At times I'd notice my eyes welling up with tears of compassion as I became swept away with retelling of such profound lives people have led in the many stories shared. My overall accessment is that After the Darkest Hour is a worthwhile read, the pages are filled with so much information I believe it would serve many of us well to read it again and again.
About the Author
Kathleen A. Brehony, PH.D. Jungian-oriented psychotherapist. Also author of Awakening at Midlife and Ordinary Grace.
