For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity


Liz Plank - 2019
    Men grow up being told that boys don’t cry and dolls are for girls. They learn they must hide their feelings and anxieties, that their masculinity must constantly be proven. They must be the breadwinners. They must be the romantic pursuers. This hasn’t been good for the culture at large: 99% of school shooters are male; men in fraternities are 300% more likely to rape; a woman serving in uniform has a higher likelihood of being assaulted by a fellow soldier than to be killed by enemy fire.In For the Love of Men, author Liz Plank offers a smart, insightful, and deeply researched guide for what we're all going to do about toxic masculinity. For both women looking to guide the men in their lives and men who want to do better and just don’t know how, For the Love of Men will lead the conversation on men's issues in a society where so much is changing but gender roles have remained strangely stagnant.What are we going to do about men? Plank has the answer--and it has the possibility to change the world for men and women alike.

Together: Why Social Connection Holds the Key to Better Health, Higher Performance, and Greater Happiness


Vivek H. Murthy - 2020
    The good news is that social connection is innate and a cure for loneliness. In Together, the former Surgeon General will address the importance of community and connection and offer viable and actionable solutions to this overlooked epidemic.

1001 Ways to Be Romantic


Gregory J.P. Godek - 1991
    Lists 1001 creative ways to show I love you under such headings as erotica, myths of romance, no-cost gestures, 1-800-ROM-ANCE, great escapes, and time for love, and includes romance coupons and true love stories.

Uncoupling: Turning Points in Intimate Relationships


Diane Vaughan - 1986
    One of the partners starts to feel uncomfortable in the relationship. The world the two of them have built together no longer 'fits.'"How do relationships end? Why does one partner suddenly become discontented with the other - and why is the onset of that discontentment not so sudden after all? What signals do partners send each other to indicate their doubts? Why do those signals so often go unnoticed? And how do people who saw themselves as part of a couple come to terms, not just with absence and abandonment, but with a new, single identity?This groundbreaking book, which combines extensive research with in-depth interviews, offers a startling vision of what happens when relationships come apart. What it reveals is a process that begins in secret but gradually becomes public, implicating not only partners but their social milieu. The result is an enlightening and affecting book that is invaluable both as a work of sociology and as a guide for anyone who wants to prevent - or weather - the collapse of a relationship.

Personality Isn't Permanent: Break Free from Self-Limiting Beliefs and Rewrite Your Story


Benjamin P. Hardy - 2020
    Benjamin Hardy draws on psychological research to demolish the popular misconception that personality--a person's consistent attitudes and behaviors--is innate and unchanging. Hardy liberates us from the limiting belief that our "true selves" are to be discovered, and shows how we can intentionally create our desired selves and achieve amazing goals instead. He offers practical, science-based advice to for personal-reinvention, including: - Why personality tests such as Myers-Briggs and Enneagram are not only psychologically destructive but are no more scientific than horoscopes - Why you should never be the "former" anything--because defining yourself by your past successes is just as damaging to growth as being haunted by past failures - How to design your current identity based on your desired future self and make decisions here-and-now through your new identity - How to reframe traumatic and painful experiences into a fresh narrative supporting your future success - How to become confident enough to define your own life's purpose - How to create a network of "empathetic witnesses" who actively encourage you through the highs and lows of extreme growth - How to enhance your subconscious to overcome addictions and limiting patterns - How redesign your environment to pull you toward your future, rather than keep you stuck in the past - How to tap into what psychologists call "pull motivation" by narrowing your focus on a single, definable, and compelling outcomeThe book includes true stories of intentional self-transformation--such as Vanessa O'Brien, who quit her corporate job and set the Guinness World Record for a woman climbing the highest peak on every continent in the fastest time; Andre Norman, who became a Harvard fellow after serving a fourteen-year prison sentence; Ken Arlen, who instantly quit smoking by changing his identity narrative; and Hardy himself, who transcended his childhood in a broken home, surrounded by issues of addiction and mental illness, to earn his PhD and build a happy family.Filled with strategies for reframing your past and designing your future, Personality Isn't Permanent is a guide to breaking free from the past and becoming the person you want to be.

The Art of Seduction


Robert Greene - 2001
    Now Greene has once again mined history and literature to distill the essence of seduction, the most highly refined mode of influence, the ultimate power trip. The Art of Seduction is a masterful synthesis of the work of thinkers such as Freud, Ovid, Kierkegaard, and Einstein, as well as the achievements of the greatest seducers throughout history. From Cleopatra to John F. Kennedy, from Andy Warhol to Josephine Bonaparte, The Art of Seduction gets to the heart of the character of the seducer and his or her tactics, triumphs and failures. The seducer's many faces include: the Siren, the Rake, the Ideal Lover, the Dandy, the Natural, the Coquette, the Charmer, and the Charismatic. Twenty-four maneuvers will guide readers through the seduction process, providing cunning, amoral instructions for and analysis of this fascinating, all-pervasive form of power. Just as beautifully packaged and every bit as essential as The 48 Laws of Power, The Art of Seduction is an indispensable primer of persuasion and offers the best lessons on how to take what you want from whomever you want or how to prevent yourself from being taken.

Facing Codependence: What It Is, Where It Comes from, How It Sabotages Our Lives


Pia Mellody - 1989
    Mellody sets forth five primary adult symptoms of this crippling condition, then traces their origin to emotional, spiritual, intellectual, physical and sexual abuses that occur in childhood. Central to Mellody's approach is the concept that the codependent adult's injured inner child needs healing. Recovery from codependence, therefore, involves clearing up the toxic emotions left over from these painful childhood experiences.

On Becoming a Person: A Therapist's View of Psychotherapy


Carl R. Rogers - 1961
    A new introduction by Peter Kramer sheds light on the significance of Dr. Rogers's work today. New discoveries in the field of psychopharmacology, especially that of the antidepressant Prozac, have spawned a quick-fix drug revolution that has obscured the psychotherapeutic relationship. As the pendulum slowly swings back toward an appreciation of the therapeutic encounter, Dr. Rogers's "client-centered therapy" becomes particularly timely and important.

In Sheep's Clothing: Understanding and Dealing with Manipulative People


George K. Simon Jr. - 1996
    "This book clearly illustrates the true nature of disturbed characters, exposes the tactics the most manipulative characters use to pull the wool over the eyes of others, and outlines powerful, practical ways to deal more effectively with manipulative people."

For Her Own Good: Two Centuries of the Experts' Advice to Women


Barbara Ehrenreich - 1976
    Authors Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English have never lost faith in science itself, but insist that we hold those who interpret it to higher standards. Women are entering the medical and scientific professions in greater numbers but as recent research shows, experts continue to use pseudoscience to tell women how to live. This edition of For Her Own Good provides today's readers with an indispensable dose of informed skepticism.

How to Win Every Argument: The Use and Abuse of Logic


Madsen Pirie - 2006
    Each entry deals with one fallacy, explaining what the fallacy is, giving and analysing an example, outlining when/where/why the particular fallacy tends to occur and finally showing how you can perpetrate the fallacy on other people in order to win an argument. Originally published to great acclaim in 1985 as "The Book of Fallacy", this is a classic brought up-to-date for a whole new generation.

Love and Limerence: The Experience of Being in Love


Dorothy Tennov - 1979
    During the first phase, the Phase of Wandering and Wondering Through Questionnaires and Testimonials, I was primarily involved in other topics, but the "love cards" assessments, in which students anonymously selected statements that applied to them and rejected those that did not, and the paper and pencil surveys submitted to groups continued to supply evidence of the importance of the topic, and of its prevalence, but I had not advanced beyond Shakespeare in understanding. Toward the end of that first phase, my emphasis had begun to shift from answers to questions posed by an investigator to the collection of personal testimonies, those of volunteers as well as those of published autobiographers, novelists, and historians. Transition to the second phase, the Phase of Limerence, was abrupt. It happened in the fall of 1973. Earlier that year I had presented the first formal paper on the subject at the meetings of the American Psychological Association. That paper, titled "Sex differences in romantic love among college students," was based entirely on questionnaire results. There were sex differences in pencil and paper reports, but, as I was later to learn, examination of the details of the experience revealed more sex similarities than differences in the phenotypical experience. The discovery, later that year, of people who had not, did not and apparently could not imagine themselves having the experience that I was describing, marked a turning point. By the time of a second formal paper in 1977, I had arrived at the conceptions found in Love and Limerence, and had begun to write the book. The third phase began with the publication of Love and Limerence. It was the Phase of Confirmation. Love and Limerence was based largely on interviews that exposed the weakness of paper and pencil assessments. The words of love admitted of different meanings. New data in the form of voluntary written testimonials poured in from readers of the book. Many of these letters used the same words: "What you describe is exactly what happened to me." Others thanked me for allowing them to know that they were not alone, that as crazy as the condition was, it was not a sign of mental ill-health, but a normal phenomenon. The state was one of madness, but the person undergoing the experience was not (necessarily) mad. In hindsight, it should not seem surprising to the human nature scientist that there should be built into us through evolution control over reproductive functioning that supercedes other motivations. According to what I refer to as Limerence Theory, limerence is an interaction between the feelings of one person and the actions of another. It appears to occur across sexual, racial, age, cultural, and other categories of humans and it endures as long as do the conditions that sustain it. When intense, it crowds other motives out of the psyche. It should be noted that Limerence is not synonymous with meanings customarily attached to the term "infatuation." Furthermore, and most importantly, it is entirely absent in some relationships and in some people. Finally, in my judgment, both limerence and nonlimerence represent normal functioning. Limerence presents problems for the modern individual, causing inattention to other aspects of life, especially to responsibilities and to other relationships. Limerence for someone other than the spouse is a major cause of marital and family disruption. Furthermore, the limerent's behavior may hinder rather than enhance a relationship with the desired person if a response in kind does not occur. When frustrated, limerence may produce such severe distress as to be life threatening. People's reaction to Limerence Theory depends partly on their acquaintance with the evidence for it and partly on personal experience. People who have not experienced limerence are baffled by descriptions of it and sometimes resistant to the evidence that it exists. To such outside observers, limerence seems pathological. Although often the subject of romantic poetry and fiction, it has been called an addiction, an indication of low self-esteem, irrational, neurotic, erotomanic, and delusional. To people who are unacquainted with it first-hand, it inconceivable that any person should assign so much importance to another person. Fortunately, direct experience is not necessary to someone who reads the evidence. There are many scientifically known phenomena that are not directly perceivable. Although self-report is traditionally regarded with suspicion by scientists, reports that are as consistent with one another as these descriptions of limerence are hard to doubt. This is a scientific book. That it may not seem so is a part of the story itself. In finding limerence, a human condition distinct yet subject to obfuscation everywhere, we enter into new territory, the territory of the universal mental landscape. There is much more to be found there as others continue the exploration.

The Family Crucible: The Intense Experience of Family Therapy


Augustus Y. Napier - 1977
    . . that are remarkably fresh and helpful.”—New York Times Book ReviewThe classic groundbreaking book on family therapy by acclaimed experts Augustus Y. Napier, Ph.D., and Carl Whitaker, M.D.This extraordinary book presents scenarios of one family’s therapy experience and explains what underlies each encounter. You will discover the general patterns that are common to all families—stress, polarization and escalation, scapegoating, triangulation, blaming, and the diffusion of identity—and you will gain a vivid understanding of the intriguing field of family therapy.

What Shamu Taught Me About Life, Love, and Marriage: Lessons for People from Animals and Their Trainers


Amy Sutherland - 2008
    Trainers reward the behavior they want and, just as important, ignore the behavior they don’t. Rather than appease her mate’s rising temper by joining in the search, or fuel his temper by nagging him to keep better track of his things in the first place, Sutherland kept her mouth shut and her eyes on the dishes she was washing. In short order, Scott found his keys and regained his cool. “I felt like I should throw him a mackerel,” she writes. In time, as she put more training principles into action, she noticed that she became more optimistic and less judgmental, and their twelve-year marriage was better than ever.What started as a goofy experiment had such good results that Sutherland began using the training techniques with all the people in her life, including her mother, her friends, her students, even the clerk at the post office. In the end, the biggest lesson she learned is that the only animal you can truly change is yourself.Full of fun facts, fascinating insights, hilarious anecdotes, and practical tips, What Shamu Taught Me About Life, Love, and Marriage describes Sutherland’s Alice-in-Wonderland experience of stumbling into a world where cheetahs walk nicely on leashes and elephants paint with watercolors, and of leaving a new, improved Homo sapiens.

Love in Every Season: Understanding the Four Stages of Every Healthy Relationship


Debra K. Fileta - 2020
    But depending on how you navigate each season, your relationship will either strengthen and grow, or it will slowly begin to fade.    Maybe your relationship is in the first blooms of spring, when friendship takes root and attraction blossoms.   Maybe you’re in the season of summer, and things are starting to heat up—spiritually, emotionally, and physically.   Maybe you’re deep in fall, and your true colors are starting to shine through.   Or maybe you’re in winter, when the passion cools down and it would be all too easy to let the relationship freeze over.   Whether you’re single, dating, engaged or married, join author, counselor, and relationship expert Debra Fileta, creator of TrueLoveDates.com, as she takes you on an eye-opening psychological and spiritual journey through the four seasons of every healthy relationship. You’ll learn to…Recognize each season as it comes and navigate it with intention, focus, and practical steps.Avoid the pitfalls of each stage by preparing for the hard moments and seeing them as opportunities to grow and connect. Celebrate not just the magical moments of each season, but the day-to-day choices that pave the way for a lasting relationship.No matter what your relationship status, you’re invited on a journey to strengthen and grow your love in every season.