The Mature Mind: The Positive Power of the Aging Brain


Gene D. Cohen - 2005
    The fastest-growing segment of the population, those beyond the age of fifty, are no longer content to simply cope with the losses of age. Mental acuity and vitality are becoming a life-long pursuit. Now, the science of the mind is catching up with the Baby Boom generation. In this landmark book, renowned psychiatrist Gene Cohen challenges the long-held belief that our brain power inevitably declines as we age, and shows that there are actually positive changes taking place in our minds. Based on the latest studies of the brain, as well as moving stories of men and women in the second half of life, The Mature Mind reveals for the first time how we can continue to grow and flourish. Cohen's groundbreaking theory-the first to elaborate on the psychology of later life-describes how the mind gives us "inner pushes" and creates new opportunities for positive change throughout adult life. He shows how we can jump-start that growth at any age and under any circumstances, fine-tuning as we go, actively building brain reserves and new possibilities. The Mature Mind offers a profoundly different and intriguing look at ourselves, challenging old assumptions, raising bold new questions, and providing exciting answers grounded in science and the realities of everyday life.

Resilient: How to Grow an Unshakable Core of Calm, Strength, and Happiness


Rick Hanson - 2018
    And now he's showing the way to build the very foundation of well-being: Resilience. Today, people feel rattled by political and economic forces, and realize that they need to be able to rely on their own inner guidance systems in order to stay happy and calm. Not simply about weathering negative experiences, Resilient's groundbreaking program shows you how to harness the power of positive experiences in order to build an unshakeable core.In this succinct guide to lasting happiness, Dr. Hanson has distilled 40 years of clinical work and teaching into the tools that actually work. Each of these 12 tools grows a key inner strength for resilience, allowing you to enter a positive cycle in which resilience creates a sense of well-being, which creates even more resilience, and so on. Developed from his incredibly popular online course called The Foundations of Well-Being, this essential book offers everything you need to shore up these powerful inner strengths. In his inimitable friendly, warm, straightforward tone, Dr. Hanson shares stories, support, and simple thoughts and actions that lead to deeply rooted change. Here is the groundwork that will allow you to meet life with a whole heart.

The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement


David Brooks - 2011
    Now, with the intellectual curiosity and emotional wisdom that make his columns among the most read in the nation, Brooks turns to the building blocks of human flourishing in a multilayered, profoundly illuminating work grounded in everyday life.This is the story of how success happens. It is told through the lives of one composite American couple, Harold and Erica—how they grow, push forward, are pulled back, fail, and succeed. Distilling a vast array of information into these two vividly realized characters, Brooks illustrates a fundamental new understanding of human nature. A scientific revolution has occurred—we have learned more about the human brain in the last thirty years than we had in the previous three thousand. The unconscious mind, it turns out, is most of the mind—not a dark, vestigial place but a creative and enchanted one, where most of the brain’s work gets done. This is the realm of emotions, intuitions, biases, longings, genetic predispositions, personality traits, and social norms: the realm where character is formed and where our most important life decisions are made. The natural habitat of The Social Animal. Drawing on a wealth of current research from numerous disciplines, Brooks takes Harold and Erica from infancy to school; from the “odyssey years” that have come to define young adulthood to the high walls of poverty; from the nature of attachment, love, and commitment, to the nature of effective leadership. He reveals the deeply social aspect of our very minds and exposes the bias in modern culture that overemphasizes rationalism, individualism, and IQ. Along the way, he demolishes conventional definitions of success while looking toward a culture based on trust and humility.The Social Animal is a moving and nuanced intellectual adventure, a story of achievement and a defense of progress. Impossible to put down, it is an essential book for our time, one that will have broad social impact and will change the way we see ourselves and the world.

What Every Body is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent's Guide to Speed-Reading People


Joe Navarro - 2008
    Is it?She says she agrees. Does she?The interview went great - or did it?He said he'd never do it again. But he did.Read this book and send your nonverbal intelligence soaring. Joe Navarro, a former FBI counterintelligence officer and a recognized expert on nonverbal behavior, explains how to "speed-read" people: decode sentiments and behaviors, avoid hidden pitfalls, and look for deceptive behaviors. You'll also learn how your body language can influence what your boss, family, friends, and strangers think of you. You will discover:The ancient survival instincts that drive body languageWhy the face is the least likely place to gauge a person's true feelingsWhat thumbs, feet, and eyelids reveal about moods and motivesThe most powerful behaviors that reveal our confidence and true sentimentsSimple nonverbals that instantly establish trustSimple nonverbals that instantly communicate authorityFilled with examples from Navarro's professional experience, this definitive book offers a powerful new way to navigate your world.

The History of Last Night's Dream: Discovering the Hidden Path to the Soul


Rodger Kamenetz - 2007
    When Sigmund Freud awakened modern interest in the dream a century ago, his theory of interpretation undermined the potential insights dreams had to offer. For Freud, dreams were little more than fragmented puzzle parts made up of events from our waking lives. Most of us today still live under Freud's far-reaching influence. When we wake up after experiencing a powerful series of images, we too readily explain them away or simply ignore them all together. Whatever emotion or insight the dream evokes slowly fades. But what if Freud was wrong? Unless we challenge his deeply-ingrained assumptions, we will forever lose the gift of our dreams.International bestselling author Rodger Kamenetz believes it is not too late to reclaim the lost power of our nightly visions. Kamenetz's exploration of the world of dreams reopens all the questions scientists and psychologists claimed to have settled long ago. The culmination of decades of research, The History of Last Night's Dream is a riveting intellectual and cultural investigation of dreams and what they have to teach us. We discover how the age-old struggle between what we dream and how we interpret our dreams has shaped Western culture from biblical times to today. Kamenetz introduces us to an eighty-seven-year-old female kabbalist in Jerusalem, a suave Tibetan Buddhist dream teacher in Copenhagen, and a crusty intuitive postman-turned-dream master in northern Vermont. He fearlessly delves into this mysterious inner realm and shows us that dreams are not only intensely meaningful but that they hold essential truths about who we are. In the end, each of us has the choice to embark on this illuminating path to the soul. But one thing is certain: our dreams will never be the same again.

The Mind Illuminated: A Complete Meditation Guide Integrating Buddhist Wisdom and Brain Science


Culadasa (John Yates) - 2015
    Clear and friendly, this in-depth practice manual builds on the nine-stage model of meditation originally articulated by the ancient Indian sage Asanga, crystallizing the entire meditative journey into 10 clearly-defined stages. The book also introduces a new and fascinating model of how the mind works, and uses illustrations and charts to help the reader work through each stage. This manual is an essential read for the beginner to the seasoned veteran of meditation and can be read from front to back, or used as a reference guide, choosing chapters as needed based on the current state of the reader’s practice.

The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter and Miracles


Bruce H. Lipton - 2005
    Author Dr. Bruce Lipton is a former medical school professor and research scientist. His experiments, and that of other leading-edge scientists, have examined in great detail the processes by which cells receive information. The implications of this research radically change our understanding of life. It shows that genes and DNA do not control our biology; that instead DNA is controlled by signals from outside the cell, including the energetic messages emanating from our positive and negative thoughts. Dr. Lipton's profoundly hopeful synthesis of the latest and best research in cell biology and quantum physics is being hailed as a major breakthrough showing that our bodies can be changed as we retrain our thinking.

Capture: A Theory of the Mind


David A. Kessler - 2015
    David A Kessler has studied this question with regard to tobacco, food, and drugs. Over the course of these investigations, he identified one underlying mechanism common to a broad range of human suffering. This phenomenon—capture—is the process by which our attention is hijacked and our brains commandeered by forces outside our control.In Capture, Dr. Kessler considers some of the most profound questions we face as human beings: What are the origins of mental afflictions, from everyday unhappiness to addiction and depression—and how are they connected? Where does healing and transcendence fit into this realm of emotional experience?Analyzing an array of insights from psychology, medicine, neuroscience, literature, philosophy, and theology, Dr. Kessler deconstructs centuries of thinking, examining the central role of capture in mental illness and questioning traditional labels that have obscured our understanding of it. With a new basis for understanding the phenomenon of capture, he explores the concept through the emotionally resonant stories of both well-known and un-known people caught in its throes.The closer we can come to fully comprehending the nature of capture, Dr. Kessler argues, the better the chance to alleviate its deleterious effects and successfully change our thoughts and behavior Ultimately, Capture offers insight into how we form thoughts and emotions, manage trauma, and heal. For the first time, we can begin to understand the underpinnings of not only mental illness, but also our everyday worries and anxieties. Capture is an intimate and critical exploration of the most enduring human mystery of all: the mind.

The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You


Elaine N. Aron - 1996
    In this groundbreaking book, Dr. Elaine Aron, a clinical psychologist, workshop leader, and an HSP herself, shows you how to identify this trait in yourself and make the most of it in everyday situations. Drawing on her many years of research and hundreds of interviews, she shows how you can better understand yourself and your trait to create a fuller, richer life.

Stumbling on Happiness


Daniel Todd Gilbert - 2006
    Vividly bringing to life the latest scientific research in psychology, cognitive neuroscience, philosophy, and behavioral economics, Gilbert reveals what scientists have discovered about the uniquely human ability to imagine the future, and about our capacity to predict how much we will like it when we get there. With penetrating insight and sparkling prose, Gilbert explains why we seem to know so little about the hearts and minds of the people we are about to become.

The Secret Language of Astrology: The Illustrated Key to Unlocking the Secrets of the Stars


Roy Gillett - 1999
    Both a history and a practical guide, adorned with superb illustrations and photographs, The Secret Language of Astrology unlocks the secrets of the stars, giving readers the tools to analyze and interpret the complex interplay of influences that shape our lives. Contains a special access code for an Astrolable™ website where readers can create detailed birth charts in seconds!

My Age of Anxiety: Fear, Hope, Dread, and the Search for Peace of Mind


Scott Stossel - 2014
    Today, it is the most common form of officially classified mental illness. Scott Stossel gracefully guides us across the terrain of an affliction that is pervasive yet too often misunderstood. Drawing on his own long-standing battle with anxiety, Stossel presents an astonishing history, at once intimate and authoritative, of the efforts to understand the condition from medical, cultural, philosophical, and experiential perspectives. He ranges from the earliest medical reports of Galen and Hippocrates, through later observations by Robert Burton and Søren Kierkegaard, to the investigations by great nineteenth-century scientists, such as Charles Darwin, William James, and Sigmund Freud, as they began to explore its sources and causes, to the latest research by neuroscientists and geneticists. Stossel reports on famous individuals who struggled with anxiety, as well as on the afflicted generations of his own family. His portrait of anxiety reveals not only the emotion’s myriad manifestations and the anguish anxiety produces but also the countless psychotherapies, medications, and other (often outlandish) treatments that have been developed to counteract it. Stossel vividly depicts anxiety’s human toll—its crippling impact, its devastating power to paralyze—while at the same time exploring how those who suffer from it find ways to manage and control it. My Age of Anxiety is learned and empathetic, humorous and inspirational, offering the reader great insight into the biological, cultural, and environmental factors that contribute to the affliction.

At Your Command


Neville Goddard - 1939
    His methods influenced countless people, from prolific writer Joseph Murphy to bestselling author Dr. Joe Vitale, author of the #1 bestseller, The Attractor Factor. Vitale discovered a rare pristine copy of Neville's first long lost book, paid a whopping $515 for it, and arranged to bring it back in print. You can now read this brilliant little gem and begin to realize that the world is truly "At Your Command!"

The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence


Gavin de Becker - 1996
    The new nanny gives a mother an uneasy feeling. A stranger in a deserted parking lot offers unsolicited help. The threat of violence surrounds us every day. But we can protect ourselves, by learning to trust—and act on—our gut instincts.In this empowering book, Gavin de Becker, the man Oprah Winfrey calls the nation's leading expert on violent behavior, shows you how to spot even subtle signs of danger—before it's too late. Shattering the myth that most violent acts are unpredictable, de Becker, whose clients include top Hollywood stars and government agencies, offers specific ways to protect yourself and those you love, including how to act when approached by a stranger, when you should fear someone close to you, what to do if you are being stalked, how to uncover the source of anonymous threats or phone calls, the biggest mistake you can make with a threatening person, and more. Learn to spot the danger signals others miss. It might just save your life.

A Survival Guide to the Misinformation Age: Scientific Habits of Mind


David J. Helfand - 2016
    Yet how much of this is mis- or even disinformation? A lot of it is, and your search engine can't tell the difference. As a result, an avalanche of misinformation threatens to overwhelm the discourse we so desperately need to address complex social problems such as climate change, the food and water crises, biodiversity collapse, and emerging threats to public health. This book provides an inoculation against the misinformation epidemic by cultivating scientific habits of mind. Anyone can do it--indeed, everyone must do it if our species is to survive on this crowded and finite planet.This survival guide supplies an essential set of apps for the prefrontal cortex while making science both accessible and entertaining. It will dissolve your fear of numbers, demystify graphs, and elucidate the key concepts of probability, all while celebrating the precise use of language and logic. David Helfand, one of our nation's leading astronomers and science educators, has taught scientific habits of mind to generations in the classroom, where he continues to wage a provocative battle against sloppy thinking and the encroachment of misinformation.