Natureza Gabriel Kram’s new book is titled Restorative Practices of Wellbeing, and as its title suggests focuses on self-betterment by way of homeopathic and alternate medicinal techniques. However Kram isn’t just preaching out-and-out holism. The techniques provided in the read come from a place of distinct left-mindedness, never resorting to cheap language, emotional tricks, or spiritualistic dogma. The main theme of Restorative Practices of Wellbeing is overcoming severe trauma, particularly childhood trauma, which according to Kram has steadily been rising to meteoric heights.
URL: https://restorativepractices.com/
Kram associates this in part with the increasing social alienation and isolation because of technological innovation and subsequent changes in people’s day-to-day interaction models. “What we are experiencing, in the modern world, is an epidemic of disconnection,” he writes. “We’ve deviated from this ancestral mode of living, this evolved developmental nest that for millions of years shaped and held us, turning on the biology of connection, so that we could thrive…The modern world systemically disconnects…Young says that we’ve created a society of people who are co-located, but disconnected.
We individually and collectively engage in activities that damage ourselves, one another, and the integrity of the only biosphere in the known universe as a daily matter of course. This disconnection is aided and abetted by digital communications technologies that enable people to be ever-more isolated in their own private minds and worlds.”
By introducing the read in damning language, complete with evocative examples and articulations, Kram is able to ease a wide array of reader profiles into the titular aspects of the book. Potential pains of perceptual adjustment are negated by way of his coming from a place of secularism, without excess maudlin drivel yet nonetheless appearing enthused and passionate about what he speaks on. “In Indigenous and traditional societies, when people experienced stress, or threat, war, or disaster, there was a body of practices that existed to bring the people back into balance.
Often priests, or shamans, or medicine people were the custodians of these activities that brought restoration and balance,” he states. “…The book you are holding organizes several hundred such practices into three primary areas: internal practices, relational practices, and nature awareness practices…This project was conceived as an integral part of our Restorative Practices model, as a compendium of Restorative Practices to support your well- being. The model was developed to reset and retune our individual and collective physiologies back to a baseline of safety and connection.”
AMAZON: https://www.amazon.com/Natureza-Gabriel-Kram/e/B08W1MY5BH
Whether you’re someone who approaches life as a spiritualist, a cultural anthropologist, or simply an open-minded gentleman on the street, there’s something for everyone in Restorative Practices of Wellbeing’s pages. That’s a rare thing to find in books of this nature, and something to be seriously commended. Kram’s dressing of this wide-ranging, thematic universality only adds to the aforementioned qualities. He’s never oversimplified and lacking, yet stays tight and concise. There’s not a word wasted, and everything supports a clear and concise set of arguments…
Garth Thomas