Book Reviews
Putting Real Muscle into Self-Compassion Practice
I teach self-compassion in my own clinical practice and in workshops around the world. I practice self-compassion many times a day. (Life simply gives us those opportunities to practice all the time.) I’ve recommended many excellent practices in these posts and recommended many other teachers of these practices in these posts [see Resources below.] Now […]
Bouncing Forward – Transforming Bad Breaks into Breakthroughs
My book Bouncing Back was published in April 2013. Michaela Haas’s new book Bouncing Forward: Transforming Bad Breaks into Breakthroughs will be published October 6, 2015. Research in resilience and post-traumatic growth, both behavioral science and neuroscience, is rapidly expanding our understanding of how people can not only survive the most catastrophic of losses and […]
Your Brain on Nature
I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order. – John Burroughs Most of us know the incredible power of being in Nature – wilderness, beaches, parks, gardens, – to recover a sense of inner peace, serenity, coming “home.” Many of us even get to indulge in […]
The Brain’s Way of Healing
Norman Doidge’s The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science was the New York Times bestseller in 2007 that introduced neuroplasticity to millions of readers. Doidge defines neuroplasticity as “the property of the brain that enables it to change its own structure and functioning in response to activity […]
The New Science of Post-Traumatic Growth
Even the possibility of post traumatic growth is of interest to someone who wrote a book on bouncing back from adversity and disaster. In Upside: The New Science of Post-Traumatic Growth, (available August 2015) Jim Rendon presents new data that demonstrates post traumatic growth is not only possible but is a far more common outcome […]
Strengthening Willpower – a Key Step in Strengthening Resilience
When Kelly McGonigal’s book The Willpower Instinct came out in 2012, I was busy and focused on writing my own book Bouncing Back and so I “missed” it. I discovered it last month when Kelly and I were both teaching at conferences in Washington, D.C. and I read the book in preparation for meeting her. […]
The Upside of Your Dark Side
The title alone is enough to make you grab the book off the shelf. The nuggets of wisdom in ToddKashdan and Robert Biswas-Diener’s The Upside of Your Dark Side are enough to keep you reading straight through. The core of the message is being your whole self – not just your “good” self – drives success and fulfillment. […]
The Sweet Spot Expanded: More Tips on How to Find Your Groove at Home and Work
[This month’s newsletter is an expanded version of my January 8, 2015 Resources for Recovering Resilience post on how to find your groove at home and at work, with the quotes, stories and exercises I can include in the newsletter format. Especially as we move further into the new year, may you find these suggestions […]
Mindful Compassion – Powerful Practices of Healing and Awakening
Since teaching Compassion for Self and Others at Spirit Rock Meditation Center two weekends ago, I’ve discovered one of the most thoughtful and comprehensive explorations of both mindfulness and compassion ever: Mindful Compassion by Paul Gilbert, PhD, and Choden. The sub-title, how the science of compassion can help you understand your emotions, live in the […]
Synchronicities Give Shape – and Meaning – to Our Lives
Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous. – Albert Einstein This newsletter explores the uncanny moments when seemingly random events coincide – happen at the same moment in time – in ways that seem to be connected in their meaning. Or the way events over long stretches of time seem to be connected in their […]