Books about Ourselves from Amazon.com

In this fascinating and far-reaching book, Newsweek science writer Sharon Begley reports on how cutting-edge science and the ancient wisdom of Buddhism have come together to reveal that, contrary to popular belief, we have the power to literally change our brains by changing our minds. Recent pioneering experiments in neuroplasticity–the ability of the brain to change in response to experience–reveal that the brain is capable of altering its structure and function, and even of generating new neurons, a power we retain well into old age. The brain can adapt, heal, renew itself after trauma, compensate for disabilities, rewire itself to overcome dyslexia, and break cycles of depression and OCD. And as scientists are learning from studies performed on Buddhist monks, it is not only the outside world that can change the brain, so can the mind and, in particular, focused attention through the classic Buddhist practice of mindfulness.

With her gift for making science accessible, meaningful, and compelling, Sharon Begley illuminates a profound shift in our understanding of how the brain and the mind interact and takes us to the leading edge of a revolution in what it means to be human.

“There are two great things about this book. One is that it shows us how nothing about our brains is set in stone. The other is that it is written by Sharon Begley, one of the best science writers around. Begley is superb at framing the latest facts within the larger context of the field. . . . This is a terrific book.”
–Robert M. Sapolsky, author of Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers

“Excellent . . . elegant and lucid prose . . . an open mind here will be rewarded.”
–Discover magazine

“A strong dose of hope along with a strong does of science and Buddhist thought.”
–The San Diego Union-Tribune.
Price: $8.38 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The tools you need tocreate self-sufficient, ecologically sustainable cities

“A surprisingly effective model for connecting people with dreams to the resources they need.” —Austin Chronicle

With more than half the world’s population now residing—and struggling to survive—in cities, we can no longer afford to think of sustainability as something that applies only to forests and fields. We need sustainable living right where so many of us are: in urban neighborhoods. But how do we do it?

That’s where Toolbox for Sustainable City Living comes in. In 2000 the dynamic Rhizome Collective transformed an abandoned warehouse in Austin, Texas, into a sustainability training center. Here, with their first book, Scott and Stacy, two of Rhizome’s founders, provide city dwellers—those who have never foraged or gardened along with those who dumpster-dive and belong to CSAs—with step-by- step instructions for producing our own food, collecting water, managing waste, reclaiming land, and generating energy. 

With vibrant illustrations created by Juan Martinez of the Beehive Collective and descriptive text based on years of experimentation, Stacy and Scott explain how to build and grow with cheap, salvaged, and recycled materials. More than a how-to manual, Toolbox is packed with accessible and relevant tools to help move our communities from envisioning a sustainable future toward living it.

Scott Kellogg a Stacy Pettigrew are co-founders of the Rhizome Collective, an educational and activist organization based in Austin, Texas, that recently received a $200,000 grant from the EPA to clean up a 10-acre brownfield that they are transforming into an ecological justice park. Toolbox developed out of R.U.S.T.—Radical Urban Sustainability Training—their intensive weekend seminar in urban ecological survival skills.

 

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Price: $9.59 [Notify me when price goes down.]

America's best-selling book on all aspects of women's health With more than four million copies sold, Our Bodies, Ourselves is the classic resource that women of all ages can turn to for information about every aspect of their well-being. Completely revised for the first time in a decade, these pages give women everything they need for making key decisions about their health -- from definitive information from today's leading experts to personal stories from other women just like them. This updated edition of Our Bodies, Ourselves includes the latest on:

• Nutrition and exercise

• Relationships, sexuality, and sexual health

• Complementary health practices

• Reproductive choices, pregnancy, and childbearing

• Growing older

• Medical testing and procedures

Together with its companion website (ourbodiesourselves.org), Our Bodies, Ourselves is a one-stop resource for women of all generations.

Plus: The rearranged food pyramid, a chapter about sexual orientation and gender identity, advice for making safer sex more fun, the latest on breast-feeding, support for women experiencing pregnancy loss, and a section devoted to getting the best care in today's complicated health care system.

Praise "The best women's health reference book I've ever seen." -- Julianne Moore.
Price: $9.58 [Notify me when price goes down.]

After the release of Total Forgiveness, the most common question that readers had for author R. T. Kendall was, "How do I forgive myself?" In this follow-up book, Kendall dives deep into the subject to give readers the tools they need to put the past behind them.In How to Forgive Ourselves--Totally, R. T. Kendall has provided a clear and compelling book that puts before us the hope and possibility of experiencing incredible freedom and peace that can only come when we walk in total forgiveness. And we have not totally forgiven until we have forgiven ourselves as well as those who have hurt us.
Price: $8.98 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Every parent would happily give up ever scolding, punishing or threatening if she only knew how to ensure that her toddler/child/teen would thrive and act responsibly without such painful measures. Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves is the answer to this universal wish. It is not about gentle ways to control a child, but about a way of being and of understanding a child so she/he can be the best of herself, not because she fears you, but because she wants to, of her own free will.

"Aldort’s book should be on the must read list of all Moms and Dads. This book could carry a subtitle: "Saving the Emotional Lives of Our Children and The Future of Humanity.""

- James Prescott, Ph.D. Institute of Humanistic Science

"Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves operates on the radical premise that neither child nor parent must dominate; it is for those who want to give up scolding, threatening and punishing. Her SALVE "formula" alone is worth the price of the book." - Peggy O'Mara Editor and Publisher of Mothering

"Every once in awhile, a writer comes along who is comfortable speaking the truth, no matter how much it might challenge us or make us uncomfortable. Naomi Aldort is one of those people. In Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves, Naomi Aldort takes the struggle out of parenting and replaces controlling and shaping style of parenting with one that values, trusts and nurtures children's innate abilities and autonomy."

- Wendy Priesnitz Editor of Life Learning magazine, author of School Free and Challenging Assumptions in Education

"In this stunning insight into human nature, Naomi Aldort opens a window into harmonious family living. This book should to be widely read and not just by parents but by every being who strives for a more peaceful world."

- Veronika Robinson, Editor of The Mother magazine, UK.
Price: $11.49 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Now in paperback, the guide to living a meaningful life from the world stress expert

"[The] journey toward health and sanity is nothing less than an invitation to wake up to the fullness of our lives as if they actually mattered . . ." --Jon Kabat-Zinn, from the Introduction

Ten years ago, Jon Kabat-Zinn changed the way we thought about awareness in everyday life with his now-classic introduction to mindfulness, Wherever You Go, There You Are. Now, with Coming to Our Senses, he provides the definitive book for our time on the connection between mindfulness and our physical and spiritual wellbeing. With scientific rigor, poetic deftness, and compelling personal stories, Jon Kabat-Zinn examines the mysteries and marvels of our minds and bodies, describing simple, intuitive ways in which we can come to a deeper understanding, through our senses, of our beauty, our genius, and our life path in a complicated, fear-driven, and rapidly changing world.

In each of the book’s eight parts, Jon Kabat-Zinn explores another facet of the great adventure of healing ourselves -- and our world -- through mindful awareness, with a focus on the "sensescapes" of our lives and how a more intentional awareness of the senses, including the human mind itself, allows us to live more fully and more authentically. By "coming to our senses" -- both literally and metaphorically by opening to our innate connectedness with the world around us and within us -- we can become more compassionate, more embodied, more aware human beings, and in the process, contribute to the healing of the body politic as well as our own lives in ways both little and big..
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From terror attacks to the war on terror, real estate bubbles to the price of oil, sexual predators to poisoned food from China, our list of fears is ever-growing And yet, we are the safest and healthiest humans in history. Irrational fear seems to be taking over, often with tragic results. For example, in the months after 9/11, when people decided to drive instead of fly—believing they were avoiding risk—road deaths rose by more than 1,500.

In this fascinating, lucid, and thoroughly entertaining examination of how humans process risk, journalist Dan Gardner had the exclusive cooperation of Paul Slovic, the world renowned risk-science pioneer, as he reveals how our hunter gatherer brains struggle to make sense of a world utterly unlike the one that made them. Filled with illuminating real world examples, interviews with experts, and fast-paced, lean storytelling, The Science of Fear shows why it is truer than ever that the worst thing we have to fear is fear itself..
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"Know thyself," a precept as old as Socrates, is still good advice. But is introspection the best path to self-knowledge? What are we trying to discover, anyway? In an eye-opening tour of the unconscious, as contemporary psychological science has redefined it, Timothy D. Wilson introduces us to a hidden mental world of judgments, feelings, and motives that introspection may never show us.

This is not your psychoanalyst's unconscious. The adaptive unconscious that empirical psychology has revealed, and that Wilson describes, is much more than a repository of primitive drives and conflict-ridden memories. It is a set of pervasive, sophisticated mental processes that size up our worlds, set goals, and initiate action, all while we are consciously thinking about something else.

If we don't know ourselves--our potentials, feelings, or motives--it is most often, Wilson tells us, because we have developed a plausible story about ourselves that is out of touch with our adaptive unconscious. Citing evidence that too much introspection can actually do damage, Wilson makes the case for better ways of discovering our unconscious selves. If you want to know who you are or what you feel or what you're like, Wilson advises, pay attention to what you actually do and what other people think about you. Showing us an unconscious more powerful than Freud's, and even more pervasive in our daily life, Strangers to Ourselves marks a revolution in how we know ourselves.

(20021005).
Price: $16.45 [Notify me when price goes down.]