Change Your Brain, Change Your Life: The Breakthrough Program for Conquering Anxiety, Depression, Obsessiveness, Anger, and Impulsiveness
by Daniel G. Amen
from Three Rivers Press
In this age of do-it-yourself health care (heck, if the doctor only sees you for 10 minutes each visit, what other options are there?), Change Your Brain, Change Your Life fits in perfectly. Filled with "brain prescriptions" (among them cognitive exercises and nutritional advice) that are geared toward readers who've experienced anxiety, depression, impulsiveness, excessive anger or worry, and obsessive behavior, Change Your Brain, Change Your Life milks the mind-body connection for all it's worth.
Written by a psychiatrist and neuroscientist who has also authored a book on attention deficit disorder, Change Your Brain contains dozens of brain scans of patients with various neurological problems, from caffeine, nicotine, and heroin addiction to manic-depression to epilepsy. These scans, often showing large gaps in neurological activity or areas of extreme overactivity, are downright frightening to look at, and Dr. Amen should know better than to resort to such scare tactics. But he should also be commended for advocating natural remedies, including deep breathing, guided imagery, meditation, self-hypnosis, and biofeedback for treating disorders that are so frequently dealt with by prescription only.
BRAIN PRESCRIPTIONS THAT REALLY WORK
In this breakthrough bestseller, you'll see scientific evidence that your anxiety, depression, anger, obsessiveness, or impulsiveness could be related to how specific structures in your brain work. You're not stuck with the brain you're born with. Here are just a few of neuropsychiatrist Dr. Daniel Amen's surprising--and effective--"brain prescriptions" that can help heal your brain and change your life:
To Quell Anxiety and Panic:
¸  Use simple breathing techniques to immediately calm inner turmoil
To Fight Depression:
¸  Learn how to kill ANTs (automatic negative thoughts)
To Curb Anger:
¸  Follow the Amen anti-anger diet and learn the nutrients that calm rage
To Conquer Impulsiveness and Learn to Focus:
¸  Develop total focus with the "One-Page Miracle"
To Stop Obsessive Worrying:
¸  Follow the "get unstuck" writing exercise and learn other problem-solving exercises
Power vs. Force: The Hidden Determinants of Human Behavior
by David R. Hawkins
from Hay House
David R. Hawkins details how anyone may resolve the most crucial of all human dilemmas: how to instantly determine the truth or falsehood of any statement or supposed fact. Dr. Hawkins, who worked as a "healing psychiatrist" during his long and distinguished career, uses theoretical concepts from particle physics, nonlinear dynamics, and chaos theory to support his study of human behavior. This is a fascinating work that will intrigue readers from all walks of life!
The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being
by Daniel J. Siegel
from W. W. Norton
An exploration of the nature of our mind, from the inside out, by a leading neurobiologist.
Over the last twenty years, there has been growing attention in the Western world to mindfulness—paying attention to life in the present moment. Here, Daniel J. Siegel investigates the phenomenon of mindfulness as it impacts our daily lives, offering readers insight into personal relationships, emotional behavior, parenting, and work.
The Divided Mind: The Epidemic of Mindbody Disorders
by John E. Sarno
from Harper Paperbacks
The book that will change the way we think about health and illness, The Divided Mind is the crowning achievement of Dr. John E. Sarno's distinguished career as a groundbreaking medical pioneer, going beyond pain to address the entire spectrum of psychosomatic (mindbody) disorders.
The interaction between the generally reasonable, rational, ethical, moral conscious mind and the repressed feelings of emotional pain, hurt, sadness, and anger characteristic of the unconscious mind appears to be the basis for mindbody disorders. The Divided Mind traces the history of psychosomatic medicine, including Freud's crucial role, and describes the psychology responsible for the broad range of psychosomatic illness. The failure of medicine's practitioners to recognize and appropriately treat mindbody disorders has produced public health and economic problems of major proportions in the United States.
One of the most important aspects of psychosomatic phenomena is that knowledge and awareness of the process clearly have healing powers. Thousands of people have become pain-free simply by reading Dr. Sarno's previous books. How and why this happens is a fascinating story, and is revealed in The Divided Mind.
Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes, Revised 25th Anniversary Edition
by William Bridges
from Da Capo Press
Kluge: The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind
by Gary Marcus
from Houghton Mifflin Co
Are we noble in reason? Perfect, in God's image? Far from it, says New York University psychologist Gary Marcus. In this lucid and revealing book, Marcus argues that the mind is not an elegantly designed organ but rather a "kluge," a clumsy, cobbled-together contraption. He unveils a fundamentally new way of looking at the human mind -- think duct tape, not supercomputer -- that sheds light on some of the most mysterious aspects of human nature.
Taking us on a tour of the fundamental areas of human experience -- memory, belief, decision-making, language, and happiness -- Marcus reveals the myriad ways our minds fall short. He examines why people often vote against their own interests, why money can't buy happiness, why leaders often stick to bad decisions, and why a sentence like "people people left left" ties us in knots even though it's only four words long.
Marcus also offers surprisingly effective ways to outwit our inner kluge, for the betterment of ourselves and society. Throughout, he shows how only evolution -- haphazard and undirected -- could have produced the minds we humans have, while making a brilliant case for the power and usefulness of imperfection.
Mirroring People: The New Science of How We Connect with Others
by Marco Iacoboni
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Eccentric Glamour: Creating an Insanely More Fabulous You
by Simon Doonan
from Simon & Schuster
Glamorous eccentrics are irresistible people. They are irreverent, occasionally impertinent, a tad mysterious, charming, often self-invented, good at applying eyeliner, and above all nonconformist. They are a fabulous confection of style, self-empowerment, and black patent sling backs. Everyone wants to be one, but how? Ubiquitous style guru Simon Doonan has the answer.
By no means a typical how-to manual, Eccentric Glamour is a mixture of cultural commentary and personal disclosure, generously seasoned with gushings of wildly dictatorial, provocative, and reckless style advice. Through cautionary tales and inspirational examples, Doonan shows how to develop your own brand of eccentric glamour -- by magnifying everything that is already unique and idiosyncratic about you.
In these comic essays, interspersed with one-on-one interviews with some of the world's most glamorous eccentrics (including Iman, Lucy Liu, Tilda Swinton, Malcolm Gladwell, and many more), Simon Doonan offers the women of America an alternative to the cheapness and tackiness that currently pass for personal style. Eccentric Glamour is intended as an antidote to the epidemic of slutty dressing and porno-chic that has taken over since the arrival of Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole Smith (may she rest in peace). While the typical TV boobs 'n' Botox makeovers force every woman to look the same, the transformations this book strives to inspire are the very opposite. Dressing like a ho is not just bad taste but boring! In Simon Doonan's book, conformity is the only crime and dressing down the only faux pas.
Eccentric Glamour is every woman's birthright. SO SAY NO TO HO!...and yes to ECCENTRIC GLAMOUR!
Biological Psychology (with CD-ROM)
by James W. Kalat
from Wadsworth Publishing
Dr. James W. Kalat's BIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY is the best selling text in the market because of its extremely high level of scholarship, clear and occasionally humorous writing style, and precise examples integrated throughout the text. Throughout all nine editions, the goal has been to make biological psychology accessible to psychology students, not just to biology majors and pre-meds. The goal has also been to convey the excitement of the search for biological explanations of behavior. Kalat argues that biological psychology is "the most interesting topic in the world," and this text convinces many students. Try-it-yourself activities in the book and on-line help illustrate phenomena and procedures described in the text. Accuracy, currency and a clear presentation style have always been the trademark signature of this text and this Ninth Edition has taken these qualities to the next level. An extremely skilled teacher, Dr. Kalat has written a text that not only speaks to today's students but to their professors as well. Accuracy, currency and a clear presentation style have always been the trademark signature of this text and this Ninth Edition has taken these qualities to the next level.
The Left Stuff: How the Left-Handed Have Survived and Thrived in a Right-Handed World
by Melissa Roth
from M. Evans and Company, Inc.
This book demystifies the place left-handness has held in society, shedding new light on this controversial discussion.
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