Reviews
Creating a World Without Poverty:
How Social Business can Transform Our Lives
by Muhammad Yunus with Karl Weber / Public Affairs / $26
Giving microcredits from seven to ten dollars to the poor can eliminate poverty over the world. Don’t believe it? Well, this simple idea has already done so for millions of people. The 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus’ new book is a must. I took it to bed with me in order to have something that would prompt a good sleep. After midnight, though, I couldn’t stop reading. I was fascinated by the simplicity of the small yet successful ideas that Yunus proposed. The book, written with the collaboration of Karl Weber, tells the story of Yunus’ Grameen Bank (The Village Bank) in Bangladesh, one of the largest microcredit enterprises in the world. It wasn’t Yunus’ great research that urged him to this activity; it was poverty surrounding him everywhere.
How can a person teach elegant theories in a Bangladesh university classrooms while outside famine rages? In 1974, Yunus tried to convince banks to lend money to poor people, but the banks thought this idea was ridiculous. For them, the poor were not worthy because they didn’t pay back. Yunus decided that he would be the guarantor for the loans. He was stunned by the results: the poor paid the loans on time! They were worthy of receiving credit after all. In 1983, he decided to start his own bank. Since Grameen opened, it has given $6 billion in credit with a repayment rate of ninety-nine percent. By November 2006, about 100 million people around the world had benefited from microcredits. Yunus’ next goal: to reach 500 million people and help them escape from poverty.
For Yunus, charity is not enough. Government solutions are not enough. The NGOs alone are not enough. What can solve poverty is socially responsible business: working for a profit and for the wellbeing of the people. His visionary idea was to convert poor people—especially women—into entrepreneurs. And the program that lends this money is giving thousands a new life. Don’t be poor. Read this book!—PG www.publicaffairsbooks.com
What My Feet Say About Me
The Art of Foot Reading to Better Understand Yourself and Others
by Bobbi Warren / $14.95
As a reflexologist, I am known to look at other people’s feet. In fact, I love feet. Recently, I had some fun reading longtime San Diego based reflexologist Bobbi Warren’s book What My Feet Say About Me. Now I not only look at people’s feet in relation to their health, but also in relation to their personalities.
Different angles, sizes and shapes of the feet can provide you with surprising insight into a person’s life. As you learn how to read feet, you will discover amazing things. You will find the emotions and thoughts that cause health challenges, see how thoughts—both positive and negative—shape your life and realize how others see you. You might even uncover hidden truths about yourself. Warren explains that every toe stands for some area of your life. Every toe has a meaning and also a sub-meaning. The big toe, for example, stands for thinking—it represents intellectual thought and your self-image or self-esteem. The second toe stands for feeling. The right foot relates to the past and male influence, whereas the left foot relates to the present and female influence. Warren tells us that the top of the foot is what a person is willing to show the world and that the sole of the foot shows us what a person wants to hide.
She covers every part of the foot in shape, color, temperature, the angle of the feet in relation to each other, and much more. We are introduced to the relationship between our emotions and the different parts of our bodies using the Reflexology foot map. Warren explains that in Foot Reading we are looking for the underlying emotional or habitual thought patterns that contribute to health challenges.
Warren has conducted training seminars in Reflexology and has practiced her art for almost three decades. She explains how her work in Reflexology naturally grew into an interest in Foot Reading: “I noticed there was a correlation not only between what I found relating to a person’s health, but also certain personality relationships,” she says. I find Foot Reading to be a valuable tool to use alongside Reflexology in order to help me understand my client’s needs and assist them in dealing with their various health issues. And it is not only my clients who will benefit from Foot Reading. I hadn’t even finished reading Bobbi’s book when some of my family and friends already wanted me to tell them what I see in their feet! www.TheFootLadies.com or 619.469.1694