Book Review – Deepfeel Diving by Dragos Ghitiu
It was interesting that the opportunity to review this book came up because there were two notable synchronicities with recent conversations. One was related to our ‘Factory Reset Meditation’ lesson/technique to fix those that have been broken by meditation or poorly structured “mindfulness” that has been forced upon them by an employer or medical provider. A similar list of questions that form the starting point for our technique appear on the first page of the first chapter of this book. The other conversation was relating to the loss of vital energy as a result of unresolved shadow work. This kind of work is the purpose of this transformative text.
The first ‘entry point’ given for the technique outlined in the book is the physical body. Our school advocates for an embodied underpinning to meditative work and it is notable that this appears first in the practical portion of the book. However modest or personalised the bodywork, it is essential to tighten up your sails to see which way the wind is blowing. The book moves on to look at emotions. We would recommend graduating from there on to some kind of emotional transmutation process whether you are working with the elements, sound, colour etc. This is implied in the text and plenty of options are available for free, the six healing sounds is a good start and is all over YouTube and elsewhere.
Back in August 2024 we reviewed a book by the author on Yiquan, and the experimental nature of the Yiquan method has a lot in common with what is being proposed in Deepfeel Diving. Yiquan would make a perfect complementary physical practice. However, Deepfeel Diving appears to be the author’s magnus opus and the method his raison d’etre.
This book is incredibly cheap in either the paperback or kindle formats. It is brief but seemingly deliberately so, you could pick a section and read it in less than a minute ready to jump into a time efficient few minutes of practice. It is very much self-guided so could do with a sequel to go into some more details and provide case studies to answer questions and provide validation to those on the journey. This is alluded to in part 3 ‘During the Dive’ and it may be the preference of the author to pursue this in person.
There is a huge difference between reading a book and working a book. If you use Deepfeel Diving for the latter you will find that months and years from now this book will look well loved and worn sat in your daily commute bag and your mind, body and spirit will be increasingly refined.
Review by Tim Tynan – Head Instructor W.X.T.B.A. (Review is of the original manuscript)
Paperback affiliate link (UK): https://amzn.to/3Tl4PVD
Kindle affiliate link (UK): https://amzn.to/3HBE7FP