Ilchi Lee did it the hard way. Not the book. His life.

Well, not his whole life, just the part where he was asking himself the questions the rest of us try to avoid.

You know the questions: Who am I? Why am I here? What's the purpose of my life? The questions you ask yourself when you're a sophomore in college and then push aside because you don't think they can be answered.

Or you know the answer and it just seems too, well ... you'd feel silly saying it out loud.

Though it's a small part of this slender volume -- two and a half pages out of 192 -- Lee does provide a short summary of his personal ordeal. Twenty-one days alone on Mount Moak in his native South Korea. No food. No sleep. No answers. Not a first.

What's remarkable about Lee's story is that, although it may be the single most important experience of his life -- he found the answers he so stubbornly sought -- he tells it simply and briefly.

And here's the kicker: He doesn't really recommend it.

Toward the end of the book, you can almost hear Lee chuckle to himself as he writes "... despite my ordeal, let me emphasize that this awareness does not require any kind of physical trauma or test. It issimply (as I found out later!) a matter of surrender, which can be achieved in any number of ways."

More remarkable, though, is this part of the story: Lee admits that, right after his mountaintop experience, another troubling question immediately sprang to mind -- the very question you can imagine yourself asking.

"Is my enlightenment real? Or is it nothing but an illusion?"

The test he decided on was a very practical one. "I reasoned that if my enlightenment was real, I would be able to communicate the peace and love I experienced to others," he writes. "If I could not do this, then the experience must only be my own mistaken thinking."

Human Technology is not Lee's first attempt to share his insights on the page -- it's his 28th book -- but in the end it's a great place to start.

In this "toolkit for authentic living," Lee has distilled his ideas about physical, mental, and spiritual health and provided easy-to-follow exercises -- from ancient Asian techniques such as acupressure and moxibustion to creative new methods to stimulate the brain -- all with the aim of helping his readers become more self-reliant, less dependent on so-called experts.

The book's greatest strength -- its simplicity -- may also be its greatest weakness, however. In a world of complex systems and ever greater specialization, a world in which we daily use technologies we don't really understand, it may be all too easy to dismiss Lee's simple toolkit.

But he wants you to be the specialist in your own life, your own health, your own sense of purpose.

In Douglas Adams' science fiction series, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, we laugh when we learn that the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything is, according to the supercomputer Deep Thought, 42.

It's hard to say which is more absurd, the answer or expecting a computer to provide it, but it's easy to imagine Ilchi Lee giggling along with the rest of us.

"The most important questions in your life are too precious to be answered by anyone but you," he writes. "Ideally, institutions and specialists should exist to assist in the self-education of the individual. Each individual must recover her sense of mastery over her own life. Only then will technology serve humanity instead of reigning over us."

Human Technology is a good beginning.

In elegantly simple language, Dr. Lee reminds the reader "We carry a deep wish to create a healthier, happier and more peaceful society. I believe in the power of that wish. I believe that the people who nurture this wish by the choices and actions that stem from their courageous insights make history." Dr. Lee continues to strengthen this vision of a healthy society with assessable tools and insights into authentic living. He maintains that good health needs daily attention. Purposeful living needs a clear vision supported through action. Sexuality needs to be a responsible connection between two mature people. All of these elements are intertwined into the weave of authentic life.

The tools offered in this volume are easy to understand yet grounded in deep principles. Dr Lee has the facility of knowing what information is pertinent to the issues and getting right to the point. And as in his other books, Dr Lee's compassion and love for all of humanity shines thorough out this important work. I recommend it highly for anyone interested in living consciously, conscientiously, consistently and compassionately.