Everyone experiences stress, loss, grief, and disconnection in life. We often feel isolated and alone in our sorrow and pain. For many years, I’ve shared openly about my personal challenges, starting in 2003 with my Babyfruit blog about my multiple miscarriages to the speeches I’ve given around the world in the 90s, to several of the books I’ve written. Through storytelling, I try to turn my heartbreak into lessons—to turn my pain into tangible steps that can help others navigate hard things and feel less alone. Helping others is part of my healing process.
I wrote...
The Happy, Healthy Nonprofit: Strategies for Impact without Burnout
This is one of the definitive books on the mental and physical impacts of trauma. Anyone who is dealing with trauma in their lives or feeling trapped or damaged by traumatic experiences will gain incredible insights as to what trauma is doing to them and how to mitigate its effects.
This book is a bit more technical and scientific than some of the others I’m recommending, but it is essential knowledge that can set the stage for deep healing.
"Essential reading for anyone interested in understanding and treating traumatic stress and the scope of its impact on society." -Alexander McFarlane, Director of the Centre for Traumatic Stress Studies
A pioneering researcher transforms our understanding of trauma and offers a bold new paradigm for healing in this New York Times bestseller
Trauma is a fact of life. Veterans and their families deal with the painful aftermath of combat; one in five Americans has been molested; one in four grew up with alcoholics; one in three couples have engaged in physical violence. Dr. Bessel van der…
So many people are grieving and may not understand what they are feeling, especially when what they are grieving seems undefined or ambiguous—such as the loss of a job, a marriage, or watching a loved one slowly slip away due to illness or age.
The author of this book is a grief educator who sets out to define and validate “ambiguous grief” and provide tools for moving forward on a healing journey.
Expanding on Pauline Boss's seminal work on ambiguous loss, this book explores the complications and deviations from traditional grief when mourning a loss, but not a death-and offers real solutions for healing.
Grief isn't always the result of something finite, marking a death or complete end. Soul-shattering grief can also be activated by a dramatic shift in an important relationship, such as a divorce or significant breakup, a life-changing medical diagnosis, or a broken connection with an addicted child. How do we grieve people who are still alive, but no longer who they once were to us?
Gifts from a Challenging Childhood
by
Jan Bergstrom,
Learn to understand and work with your childhood wounds. Do you feel like old wounds or trauma from your childhood keep showing up today? Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed with what to do about it and where to start? If so, this book will help you travel down a path…
Regardless of your religious beliefs, anyone who feels they are suffering mentally, emotionally, physically, or even spiritually can gain benefits from this book that is rooted in Buddhist teachings. I have always found solace in the teachings of Zen Buddhism.
The author, a psychotherapist, and Zen teacher shares eight “roads” one can take to transform one’s life, creating change within and without. The combination of both Eastern and Western wisdom makes this book accessible to anyone seeking to feel more connected and content.
Though we are seemingly more connected to our world than ever before, many of us cannot ignore a nagging sense of loneliness and isolation. To keep this anxiety and discontentment at bay, we can search for connection through unhealthy distractions, believing these will bring us true nourishment. And yet, loneliness is on the rise, exacting detrimental effects on our mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual wellbeing. Even those of us who have succeeded in the ways that society applauds, often feel unanchored, disengaged, and purposeless. If true pleasure is what we desire, how do we look past the surface, to discover…
As adults, we don’t always realize how our childhood—and our parents—have played a major role in how we feel about ourselves and our relationships. This is not about blaming parents but realizing how we may not have learned important aspects of healthy relationships because of our upbringing.
This book sets out to help people free themselves from the effects of growing up with immature parents to heal deep wounds that have led to feelings of anger or fear of abandonment. With that newfound freedom comes the ability to create positive relationships with oneself and others.
Are you one of the countless people who grew up with emotionally immature parents? If you suffer from this troubling parent/child dynamic, you may still recall painful moments from your childhood when your emotional needs were not met, when your feelings were dismissed, or when you took on adult levels of maturity in an effort to "compensate" for your parents' behavior. And while you likely cultivated strengths such as self-reliance and independence along the way- strengths that have served you well as an adult-having to be the emotionally mature person in your relationship with your parent is confusing and even…
Gifts from a Challenging Childhood
by
Jan Bergstrom,
Learn to understand and work with your childhood wounds. Do you feel like old wounds or trauma from your childhood keep showing up today? Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed with what to do about it and where to start? If so, this book will help you travel down a path…
This culturally rich book, written by an Indigenous Medicine Woman, guides you through a different set of paths you can walk on your healing journey. For many, these traditions will be new and unfamiliar, but they are universal in their focus on honoring both oneself and one’s roots, in this case, one’s ancestors and Ancestral guides.
Indigenous Medicine Woman Asha Frost invites readers to learn the healing medicine of the 13 Ojibway moons and the spirit animals that will guide their wisdom journey.
The Medicine you have been searching for lives within you. Follow the path of the 13 Ojibwe Moons with Animal Spirits and Ancestors as your guides as you unlock your connection to your own unique, inherent healing power. Through storytelling, ceremonies, and Shamanic journeys, learn to apply ancient wisdom to your life in ways that are respectful and conscious of the stolen lands, lives, and traditions of Indigenous peoples.
This book didn’t start out as a book for individuals and organizations in the nonprofit sector dealing with burnout. My co-author, Beth Kanter, and I set out to write a book about self-care in the age of always-on and always-in-our-hands technology.
While that topic ended up as only one chapter in our book, everything we wrote can serve anyone who is experiencing intense stress at work or home and is looking to shift their perspective, environment, and life.
