Keep It Shut: What to Say, How to Say It, and When to Say Nothing at All, Study Guide


Karen Ehman - 2015
    What not to say. When it is best to remain silent. Or what to do when you ve said something you wish you could now take back.Beyond just a How not to gossip study, Karen will teach what the Bible says about the many ways we are to use our words and the times when we are to remain silent. Using our speech to interact with friends, co-workers, family and strangers will be covered along with the many places we use our words such as in private, in public, online and in prayer. Even the words we say silently to ourselves. Unsolicited opinion-slinging, speaking the truth in love, not saying words just to people-please and dealing with our verbal anger are sub-topics that will also be addressed.Each session will feature a different character from the Bible, using them either as an example of someone to emulate or whose verbal actions we should avoid replicating."

You Can Be Right (or You Can Be Married): Looking for Love in the Age of Divorce


Dana Adam Shapiro - 2012
    A serial monogamist for more than two decades, Shapiro had just ended his fifth three-year relationship and wanted to know why the honeymoon phase never lasted until the actual honeymoon. Believing that you learn more from failure than from success, he spent the next four years interviewing hundreds of divorced people, living vicariously through the romantic tragedies of others, hoping to become so fluent in the errors of Eros that he would be able to avoid them in his own love life. The result is a timely treasure trove of marital wisdom—a provocative look inside the hearts, minds, beds, and e-mails of regular people who’d thought they found “The One” and lived to tell the tales of what went wrong. Shockingly intimate, universally relevant, and profoundly personal, this is a page-turning, voyeuristic peek into the private lives of our friends and neighbors that is as racy as it is revelatory. But ultimately, You Can Be Right (or You Can Be Married) is a hopeful investigation of modern love and a practical guide for any couple looking to beat the roulette-level odds of actually staying together forever.

It Didn't Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle


Mark Wolynn - 2016
    Anxiety. Chronic Pain. Phobias. Obsessive thoughts. The evidence is compelling: the roots of these difficulties may not reside in our immediate life experience or in chemical imbalances in our brains—but in the lives of our parents, grandparents, and even great-grandparents. The latest scientific research, now making headlines, supports what many have long intuited—that traumatic experience can be passed down through generations. It Didn’t Start with You builds on the work of leading experts in post-traumatic stress, including Mount Sinai School of Medicine neuroscientist Rachel Yehuda and psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps the Score. Even if the person who suffered the original trauma has died, or the story has been forgotten or silenced, memory and feelings can live on. These emotional legacies are often hidden, encoded in everything from gene expression to everyday language, and they play a far greater role in our emotional and physical health than has ever before been understood.   As a pioneer in the field of inherited family trauma, Mark Wolynn has worked with individuals and groups on a therapeutic level for over twenty years. It Didn’t Start with You offers a pragmatic and prescriptive guide to his method, the Core Language Approach. Diagnostic self-inventories provide a way to uncover the fears and anxieties conveyed through everyday words, behaviors, and physical symptoms. Techniques for developing a genogram or extended family tree create a map of experiences going back through the generations. And visualization, active imagination, and direct dialogue create pathways to reconnection, integration, and reclaiming life and health. It Didn’t Start With You is a transformative approach to resolving longstanding difficulties that in many cases, traditional therapy, drugs, or other interventions have not had the capacity to touch.

Runaway Husbands: The Abandoned Wife's Guide to Recovery and Renewal


Vikki Stark - 2010
    Wife Abandonment Syndrome is a pattern of behavior on the part of a husband who leaves his wife out-of-the-blue from what she believed was a happy marriage. Following his sudden departure, he replaces the caring he'd typically shown her with anger and aggression. He often moves directly in with a girlfriend, leaving his bewildered wife totally devastated. Written by family therapist Vikki Stark who was herself affected by Wife Abandonment Syndrome, Runaway Husbands helps women understand what motivated their loving husbands to turn into uncaring strangers and provides them with the tools they need to move forward and rebuild their lives in new and unexpected ways.

Taking the Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears


Pema Chödrön - 2009
    The good news is that once we start to recognize these patterns, they instantly begin to lose their hold on us and we can begin to change our lives for the better.“This path entails uncovering three basic human qualities,” explains Pema. “They are natural intelligence, natural warmth, and natural openness. Everyone, everywhere, all over the globe, has these qualities and can call on them to help themselves and others.”This book gives us the insights and practices we can immediately put to use in our lives to awaken these essential qualities. In her friendly and encouraging style, Pema Chödrön helps us take a bold leap toward a new way of living—one that will bring about positive transformation for ourselves and for our troubled world.

Dear Mr. You


Mary-Louise Parker - 2015
    You renders the singular arc of a woman’s life through letters Mary-Louise Parker composes to the men, real and hypothetical, who have informed the person she is today. Beginning with the grandfather she never knew, the letters range from a missive to the beloved priest from her childhood to remembrances of former lovers to an homage to a firefighter she encountered to a heartfelt communication with the uncle of the infant daughter she adopted. Readers will be amazed by the depth and style of these letters, which reveal the complexity and power to be found in relationships both loving and fraught.

Available Parent: Expert Advice for Raising Successful and Resilient Teens and Tweens


John Duffy - 2014
    Dr. John Duffy's The Available Parent is a revolutionary approach to taking care of teens and tweens. Teenagers are often left feeling unheard and misunderstood, and parents are left feeling bewildered by the changes in their child at adolescence and their sudden lack of effectiveness as parents. The parent has become unavailable, the teen responds in kind, and a negative, often destructive cycle of communication begins. The available parent of a teenager is open to discussion, offering advice and solutions, but not insisting on them. He allows his child to make some mistakes, setting limits, primarily where health and safety are concerned. He never lectures -- he is available but not controlling. He is neither cruel nor dismissive, ever. The available parent is fun and funny, and can bring levity to the most stressful situation. All of that is to say, there are no conditions to his availability -- it is absolute.

The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter


Margareta Magnusson - 2017
    In The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, artist Margareta Magnusson, with Scandinavian humor and wisdom, instructs readers to embrace minimalism. Her radical and joyous method for putting things in order helps families broach sensitive conversations, and makes the process uplifting rather than overwhelming.Margareta suggests which possessions you can easily get rid of (unworn clothes, unwanted presents, more plates than you’d ever use) and which you might want to keep (photographs, love letters, a few of your children’s art projects). Digging into her late husband’s tool shed, and her own secret drawer of vices, Margareta introduces an element of fun to a potentially daunting task. Along the way readers get a glimpse into her life in Sweden, and also become more comfortable with the idea of letting go.

Dave Matthews Band: Music for the People


Nevin Martell - 1999
    Traces the evolution of the Dave Matthews Band, and describes their experiences on the road.

How to Be Yourself: Life-Changing Advice from a Reckless Contrarian


Simon Doonan - 2020
    Through his unconventional wisdom and singular storytelling, Simon Doonan is the ideal instructor to help readers find – and then flaunt – their own creative style and vision. With provocative wit, he walks us through every aspect of our lives: fashion, socializing, love, work, decor, and family, sharing case studies, quotations by cultural icons and practical tips.Illustrated with amusing vintage and contemporary photographs, some lifted from the Doonan family album, How to Be Yourself is an inspiring, joyful and entertaining survival guide – a literary GPS that promises to transport you away from your phone and back to yourself.

How To Talk So Kids Can Learn


Adele Faber - 1995
    This breakthrough book demonstrates how parents and teachers can join forces to inspire kids to be self-directed, self-disciplined, and responsive to the wonders of learning.

The Read-Aloud Handbook


Jim Trelease - 1982
    Now this new edition of The Read-Aloud Handbook imparts the benefits, rewards, and importance of reading aloud to children of a new generation. Supported by delightful anecdotes as well as the latest research, The Read-Aloud Handbook offers proven techniques and strategies—and the reasoning behind them—for helping children discover the pleasures of reading and setting them on the road to becoming lifelong readers.

The Fortune Hunters: Dazzling Women and the Men They Married


Charlotte Hays - 2007
    With original interviews and photos, Charlotte Hays casts light on the determination, skill and sometimes the ruthlessness that have shaped some of the most successful and lucrative unions of our time.

Father to Son: Life Lessons on Raising a Boy


Harry H. Harrison Jr. - 2000
    He just comes with boundless energy, spirit, and love, all waiting to be shaped. And one of the powerful forces in the shaping is the wish to grow up to be "just like Dad," who was himself a young boy once. With apologies to mothers and daughters, there's really nothing like the primal bond between a son and his father. A little book of wisdom for fathers on raising boys, "Father to Son" is a guide to the joys and responsibilities of fatherhood. Divided into sections covering the different stages of a boy's life, the book features one succinct lesson per page--some lighthearted, some serious, all supported by the book's strong moral backbone. Here is the importance of passing along skills-- "Show him how to eat an Oreo." "Show him how to put a baseball in a new glove and wrap a belt around it." Of setting a good example--"Be home for dinner." "Do push-ups together." Of staying involved-- "Race him. You'll never forget the day he beats you." "Be sure to meet his girlfriends." Being flexible--"If his favorite thing about organized sports is the uniform, let him wear it to school." Offering guideposts, material and intangible-- "Hang a punching bag in the garage." "Put a computer in his room. Never a TV." "Never tell him boys don't cry-ask him why he's crying." Nurturing responsibility-- "Make him understand that even a small lie makes him a liar." "Teach him the joy of finishing a job." And instilling wonder--"Teach him the joys of staring at the moon." "Encourage him to go barefoot."

Working Successfully with Screwed-Up People


Elizabeth B. Brown - 2012
    Some people just don't listen, don't care, and aren't willing to compromise. And you probably work with some of them. The incomprehensible supervisor. The person in the next office who chats more than works. The customer who, by the way, isn't always right. For all those co-workers who drive you crazy, there's a solution.The bestselling author of Living Successfully with Screwed-Up People turns her insightful eye to the workplace, showing readers how they can get along with and work successfully beside the people who drive them up the wall. "It doesn't take two people to change a relationship in the workplace," says Elizabeth B. Brown. "It takes one--me!" Her expert advice will help workers in any profession learn how to be unflappable, imperturbable, and unflustered when dealing with the difficult people in their workplace.