Me and the Orgone

Me and the Orgone – The True Story of One Man's Sexual Awakening (1971) is an autobiographical account written by American actor Orson Bean about his life-changing experience with the controversial orgone therapy developed by Austrian psychiatrist Wilhelm Reich.

The book tells how, after ten years of unsuccessful psychotherapy, Bean discovers medical orgone therapy, a therapeutic intervention that focuses on renewing what it describes as "energy flows" within the patient, orgone being Wilhelm Reich's name for the "life energy".

It is a strongly personal account of a man who gets a second chance at a personal sexual revolution, feeling his body beginning to change, feeling freer and more alive, and also seeing his relationships transformed.

It also contains information on the former Fifteenth Street School in New York City where Dr. Reich's concepts were applied to childhood education.

According to a review in Time, Bean's account is "clear and balanced", discussing Reich's "final tragic swerve toward insanity" even as it "over-insists ... his greatness.