Title: Spirituality for Badasses: Book 1: How to Find Inner Peace and Happiness Without Losing Your Cool
Author: J. Stewart Dixon
Publisher: Jeff Stewart Dixon
ISBN: 978-0985857905
Genre: Self-Improvement/Spirituality
Pages: 329
Reviewed by: Barbara Scott
Pacific Book Review
Targeting a certain segment of the population – and they know who they are – author J. Stewart Dixon seeks to shine light on some darker aspects of consciousness and applaud the light that is there, shining for good and for all.
Dixon identifies his readership in his humorous but serious title: a badass is someone who has stayed aloof from the pack, hit the bars and smoke shops, and knows a fair bit about the wild side of life. But though they may have rebelled to the point of incarceration or extreme danger once or twice, badasses or bad apples are not necessarily bad people. Like many of us, they are seeking answers, but having a harder time finding them.
Spirituality has changed markedly in this century, no longer simply a case of church goers versus devil worshippers. There are some beautiful, accessible philosophies from the East with its sometimes less exclusivist religious stance, and newly fitted possibilities in the West developed through psychology, parapsychology, and other almost mainstream channels.
Dixon does not lecture, spurns the academic approach, and simply talks to the badasses who will choose to follow him. He will take them on a number of journeys – through his past, through imagination, toward such cherished goals as awareness, of which he says that no matter how we may feel or what is going on around us, “awareness remains okay…awareness remains unscathed…” With awareness, even the most embittered or endangered badass can say firmly, “I can handle this.” There will be struggles; the ego is everywhere and offers constant challenges. To make lemonade out of life’s many proffered lemons, you might, with Dixon guiding you through, need to take a terrifying rollercoaster ride, or, at times, just take a break before the next journey begins.
Dixon alludes to his professional work as a counselor and some of the difficulties he has experienced and the way he has handled them, introducing many “characters” and making the readers feel they are along for the ride through his laid back, direct, chatty, sometimes profane monologue. Those who read his work will not feel talked down to but may reach a sense of personal empowerment with much to look up, out and beyond to. His audience will include true badasses and those wanting to know more about becoming a badass for the sake of ultimate enlightenment. Dixon has designated this as Book 1 and concludes on the upbeat: “Let the adventure continue!”
