The Road Less Traveled, 25th Anniversary Edition: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values, and Spiritual Growth

Front Cover
Simon and Schuster, 2002 - 320 pages
Now featuring a new introduction by Dr. M. Scott Peck comes the 25th-anniversary edition of the beloved bestseller The Road Less Traveled.

Perhaps no book in this generation has had a more profound impact on our intellectual and spiritual lives than The Road Less Traveled. With sales of more than 7 million copies in the United States and Canada, and translation into more than twenty-three languages, it has made publishing history, with more than ten years on The New York Times bestseller list.

Now, with a new introduction by the author, written especially for this 25th-anniversary deluxe hardcover edition of the all-time national bestseller in its field, M. Scott Peck explains the ideas that shaped this book and that continue to influence an ever-growing audience of readers.

Written in a voice that is timeless in its message of understanding, The Road Less Traveled continues to enable us to explore the nature of loving relationships and leads us toward a new serenity and fullness of life. It helps us determine how to distinguish dependency from love; how to become a more sensitive parent; and ultimately how to become one’s own true self.

Recognizing that—in the famous opening line of his book—“Life is difficult” and that the journey to spiritual growth is a long one, Dr. Peck never bullies his readers, but rather gently guides them through the hard and often painful process of change toward a higher level of self-understanding.

Combining profound psychological insight and deep spirituality, this one-of-a-kind hardcover anniversary edition is a book to treasure and turn to again and again for inspiration and understanding. As Phyllis Theroux wrote in The Washington Post when the original edition of The Road Less Traveled was first published, “It is not just a book but a spontaneous act of generosity.”
 

Selected pages

Contents

Preface
11
Delaying Gratification
18
ProblemSolving and Time
27
Neuroses and Character Disorders
35
Dedication to Reality
44
Openness to Challenge
51
Withholding Truth
59
The Healthiness of Depression
69
Love Is Separateness
160
Love and Psychotherapy
169
The Mystery of Love
180
The Religion of Science
193
The Case of Marcia
208
The Baby and the Bath Water
221
The Miracle of Health
235
The Miracle of the Unconscious
243

Love Defined
81
The Myth of Romantic Love
91
Dependency
98
Cathexis Without Love
106
Love Is Not a Feeling
116
The Work of Attention
120
The Risk of Loss
131
The Risk of Commitment
140
The Risk of Confrontation
150
The Miracle of Serendipity
253
The Definition of Grace
260
The Alpha and the Omega
268
The Problem of Evil
277
The Nature of Power
284
Resistance to Grace
297
The Welcoming of Grace
306
Afterword
312
Copyright

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About the author (2002)

M. Scott Peck, M.D. is the author of the New York Times best-seller The Road Less Traveled, with six million copies in print. His other books include Further Along the Road Less Traveled, The Road Less Traveled and Beyond, Meditations from the Road and Golf and the Spirit.

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