Epiphanies: A Psychotherapist's Tales of Spontaneous Emotional Healing

In her first book, Jauregui attempts to guide readers through the intricate realms of self-exploration and scientific explanation. Each short chapter delves into an existential question-What is a person? What was Freud's true intention? Can quantum mechanics help explain human consciousness? What is the mind?-as Jauregui briefly touches on everything from Einstein to Hawking and psychotherapy to physics. Passionately and intelligently, Jauregui, a psychotherapist in Berkeley, Calif., compares the mathematical field of fractals to the human condition, and recounts stories of patients whose personal revelations have brought them joy in the face of great pain. In this book's case, however, brevity does not equal simplicity: the narrative jumps too quickly from one topic to the next and often it's a stretch to understand how each chapter relates to the previous. Though both the scientific anecdotes and the tales of healing Jauregui relates are compelling, they sometimes make odd bedfellows.