The Soul of Desire: Discovering the Neuroscience of Longing, Beauty, and Community

Curt Thompson’s previous work on shame has been life-transforming for numerous readers. Here he continues his interdisciplinary exploration of one of the elemental human experiences that founds our sense of self—the desire to see and to share beauty. Disarmingly self-disclosing, deeply in touch with Scripture and classic Christian sources, and engagingly conversant with the advances and insights of current neuroscientific research, this book beckons us to a deeper, healing knowledge of ourselves and, ultimately, of God.

—Wesley Hill, associate professor of New Testament at Western Theological Seminary

‘An artist and a psychiatrist get into a car . . . ’ sounds like the start of a joke, yet this is actually how I met Curt Thompson. And as unlikely a pairing as we appear on paper, The Soul of Desire seems like an equally absurd mash-up of ideas. But I am happy to say that we became fast friends, and this book, too, turns out to be a wonderfully balanced amalgamation of neuroscience, aesthetics, and Christian faith. Allow this book to help you let go of shame, put yourself in the path of oncoming beauty, and begin imagining that life can be lived as an expression of God’s artistry.

—Ned Bustard, author and illustrator of Saint Nicholas the Giftgiver and creative director for Square Halo Books

In The Soul of Desire, Curt Thompson shares a profound and uplifting message about what makes beauty simultaneously spiritual and human. This wonderful book will enrich the faith of readers as they seek meaning and purpose in the turmoil of life.

—Arthur C. Brooks, professor at Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Business School, author of Love Your Enemies: How Decent People Can Save America from the Culture of Contempt

Curt’s latest book is really his most hopeful book, a challenge to cultivate the kind of imagination and embodied practice that shifts us from brokenness to beauty. But it’s as much Curt’s character as it is his wisdom that draws me to this. A remarkable life, a remarkable book!

—Chuck DeGroat, professor of pastoral care and Christian spirituality at Western Theological Seminary, senior fellow at Newbigin House of Studies

In his previous books, The Soul of Shame and Anatomy of the Soul, Curt Thompson integrated neuroscience and theology seamlessly, cheering us on in a hopeful, unhurried journey toward healing. In Curt’s new book, The Soul of Desire, he brings it all back to the start, setting us right in the path of God’s beauty. With the skillfulness of a therapist and the earnestness of an evangelist, Curt Thompson implores us to see how God desires for us to create beauty in thecontext of confessional community—that our lives would be authentically generative, like works of art.

—Sandra McCracken, singer-songwriter and author of Send Out Your Light