The Power of Premonitions: How Knowing the Future Can Shape Our Lives

by Larry Dossey

Book Overview

The doctor and bestselling author who first demonstrated the healing effects of prayer now offers an unprecedented look at the science of premonitions.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0525951164
• ISBN13: 9780525951162
• Release Date: April 2009
• Publisher: Dutton Books
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.16 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.1" x 9.1"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Refreshingly Thorough Investigation of Future Knowing

Dr. Larry Dossey's latest book, THE POWER OF PREMONITIONS, delves into a topic few scientists and researchers publicly address -- how some people demonstrate knowledge of future events. Dossey provides readers with an able guide to one of the more esoteric metaphysical phenomena, navigating through a dazzling collection of evidence of people who often know and act upon knowledge of the future, even when not fully conscious of having such premonitions. THE POWER OF PREMONITIONS provides answers for readers who remember past premonitions and wonder how common their experiences might be, as well as why they have premonitions some times and not others. Dossey outlines twelve premonition-promoting qualities that can enhance one's ability to know the future, and describes how various cultural perspectives have been shown to support or hinder the process. The interpretations of premonitions is every bit as fascinating as premonitions themselves, since premonitions have not been consistently comprehended for maximum positive value in peoples' lives. Some historical figures who've had amazing premonitions include Freud, Hitler, Jung, and Lincoln. Surprisingly, the meaning of some of these premonitions, while crystal-clear in hindsight, was not fully understood at the time. Dossey points out how having access to the power of premonitions can be used either positively or negatively, in similar fashion to most any other ability humans possess. Whereas a medical doctor such as Dossey might utilize premonitions for improved medical care, thieves or radical extremists can use premonitions for personal gain or social harm. In a particularly chilling section of the book, Dossey describes how terrorists have analyzed dreams for evidence of future success of destructive activities in order to prove alignment with divine plans and justify their actions. These and other stories caution readers to be guided by our highest noble character, rather than be misled by our own egos or selfish agendas. While Napolean once boasted of having nearly perfect precognition of future events, such pride did not prevent his subsequent fall. THE POWER OF PREMONITIONS touches briefly on the physics of time and causation when covering the element of time in future knowing. The concept of premonitions raises the matter of discerning if upon seeing the future, we are able to truly change that future... as well as whether it is possible to change the past. Apparently such things are indeed possible, and Dossey covers the mind-bending world of quantum physics along with the notion of probabilities involving probable futures and pasts. I highly recommend THE POWER OF PREMONITIONS to anyone seeking a balanced, open-minded overview of what we currently know to be true about premonitions... and to everyone wishing to gain the practical benefits of premonitions in their daily lives.

Back to the future...

"O, that a man might know the end of this day's business ere it come!" Julius Caesar, Act V, Scene I. Time and other thieves... The good Doctor has unleashed an outstanding contribution to our attempts to understand the chaos of being, and the very nature of time itself. In a work that manages to be both deeply scholarly and highly entertaining, Dr. Dossey has fashioned a mosaic of strange bedfellows that will at the very least help us to start asking the right questions. As expected, the book is a masterpiece of research, supported by acres of notes and references, dealing with numerous core topics, such as the block universe, chaos, entropy, repression and a look into the paradox-drenched quantum arena as a whole. While the case examples are fascinating and well chosen, the book also looks into cases of people successfully acting on premonitions, and the rituals of some cultures whereby destructive dreamed premonitions might be negated and dark outcomes averted. For me, the book's crowning magic lies in the closing sections, in which Larry Dossey cites examples of how mystery and embracing the unknown can be good for our psychological and physical wellbeing. We do indeed seem to need just enough chaos and uncertainty in our lives. In the same way, one of the theories about reincarnation is that we are not supposed to remember details of our previous lives, lest it bias our thoughts and actions in our current life. There's an allegorical song by Ani DiFranco called Little Plastic Castle, in which she sings... "They say goldfish have no memory I guess their lives are much like mine And the little plastic castle Is a surprise every time..." Good job, given the dang size of the bowl... Dr. Dossey takes the unusual and insightful step of asking the reader whether they want to invite premonitions into their consciousness, given the responsibility that may come with it. This dilemma was beautifully captured in the Garth Brooks classic, The Dance. "Hey who's to say, you know I might have changed it all And now I'm glad I didn't know The way it all would end, the way it all would go Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain But I'd have had to miss the dance..." Live with passion. Steven Cain (Sirius Moonlight, One Star Awake)

The Idea of Premonitions Drives Me Nuts, But...

Although a substantial part of my career as a psychologist has been devoted to parapsychological matters for more than 50 years, one part of the field has always been especially troublesome to me, the idea that people sometimes get information about the future, premonitions, precognitions, when there is no reasonable possibility of them getting it, given what we know about the nature of the physical world. I am thoroughly acculturated, like practically everyone, to believe that the past is gone, the future is not yet here, only the present moment is real, so time marches on. Sure, we can predict probable things - the sun will rise tomorrow - or things we know the causal mechanism of - the car will stop running soon if I don't put more gasoline in the tank. But then you can't help but hear stories on the order of "I dreamed this really improbable set of events that resulted in my being run down by a green car on such-and-such a street, although I don't usually go there, and sure enough this green car suddenly dashed around the corner and would have killed me if I hadn't been forewarned by the dream and so alert enough to jump back." The devoted materialist has no trouble with such stories, banishing them with words like "coincidence." In Dossey's new book he mentions the medical version of this: a story that indicates something you don't believe in is an "anecdote," one that confirms your beliefs is a "careful case history." In my recent book The End of Materialism, out just a month before this new Dossey book that I want to praise, I am forced to include precognition with what I call the Big Five psi phenomena, the ones that have been so thoroughly and rigorously tested that I see no reasonable doubt that they exist (telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, psychokinesis and psychic healing). Yet while I include precognition there because there is so much evidence for it in rigorous lab studies, in point of fact I find the idea of knowing the future so incomprehensible that I don't really think about it. When I discovered massive precognition effects had sneaked into my own laboratory data, e.g., I found I wasn't even psychologically "defended" against the idea, premonitions were just too far out to worry about. Now Larry Dossey, well-known physician, author and alternative medicine expert, has devoted a whole book to all aspects of premonitions, and I'm going to have to think about it. Indeed I've told Dossey that his book captured me. I have very little time for reading, I'm sent dozens of books people want me to read and that, given my interests, I would like to read, but never get time for. The Power of Premonitions: How Knowing the Future Can Shape Our Lives is so readable and fascinating, though, that I read the first 190 pages continuously and have taken it on my camping vacation with me to finish. It's too good! Spontaneous cases from real life, lab experiments, connections with the latest understanding of brain functioning, and, es

Ever Wish You Could Predict Next Week's Lotto Numbers?

[...] Author & Book Views On A Healthy Life! A FirstLook Review: The Power of Premonitions: How Knowing The Future Can Shape Our Lives (Dutton/ Apr 2009) by Larry Dossey, M.D. Ever wish you could predict the numbers in next week's lotto pick? Or have you had a dream that later came true? Believe it or not, Larry Dossey says that these things have happened. It's called premonition--a forewarning of an event yet to occur, also known as first sight or mindsight. Premonition has been around a long time, dating back in history to the ancient Greeks, the native Americans, and to the Hebrew people. Though most of us don't discuss such mystical experiences openly, odds are you've experienced this phenomena yourself. An interesting story from my own family: Not long ago my father was dying from pancreatic cancer, in his home, under hospice's care. My extended family, including my father's brother, sat together just outside on the home's lanai. During this emotional time, my uncle related a very incredible story about a dream he'd had in 1995 at his home in Michigan. In the dream my uncle saw a motorcycle accident, and laying face down on the side of a highway was my father, the motorcycle severed in half. My uncle raised his eyes to another person standing on the side, wagging his finger at my father's prone body--it was my grandfather who had passed away in the 1970's. My uncle was alarmed by the dream he said, but the only comforting factor was the motorcycle in the dream--a Honda Goldwing. He knew that Dad owned another type of bike. Nonetheless, my uncle phoned my dad, just to "Say Hi." At the end of the conversation, Dad cheerfully asked his brother, "By the way, did I tell you that I bought a Honda Goldwing?" Reluctantly, my uncle ignored his premonition and said nothing about it, thinking that he might sound a little nuts. A few months later, my dad lost his leg in a motorcycle accident on the side of I-95 under an overpass while avoiding the rain. He should have died three times that day, but unbelievable circumstances protected him. Seconds before the accident occurred, Dad thought, "Gee I should get over some more, before I get hit." Larry Dossey, M.D. is the award-winning author of several books. He has lectured at such major medical schools as Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Cornell, and the Mayo Clinic. Dossey is an international advocate for the role of the mind in health and the role of spirituality in healthcare. Larry Dossey shows through The Power of Premonitions how we all possess the innate capability of tapping into our possible future whether we like it or not. In his book, Dossey: * Describes cases of actual instances of premonitions: the Titantic, the Aberfan disaster, Harriet Tubman, Beatrice Nebraska, September 11, 2001 (9/11) * Examines "recent contributions of modern technology to this science: John L. Petersen at The Arlington Institute (government intelligence), James C. Carpenter of the Rhine Research Center,