100 Books Like Healing Developmental Trauma

This book reveals how the body stores emotional and traumatic memories long after the mind tries to forget them.

Van der Kolk explains why symptoms like anxiety, emotional numbness, anger, or disconnection can surface years later.

Many men who “push through” or never talk about their trauma find clarity in this book’s explanation of how stress affects the brain and nervous system. It helps readers understand themselves physically and emotionally, while giving hope that healing is possible through therapy, mindfulness, and self-awareness.

This is the best book ever written about the psychology of the male perpetrator in a trauma bond.

In this book, I was able to see into the mind of an abuser and no longer make excuses for them. I love how the author described the different types of abusers and how he explained how to leave a trauma bond.

I refer this book to every one of my patients.

I loved this book because the research Sandra Brown illuminates about narcissistic abuse is groundbreaking.

I was gripped by how the author described the people who are the perpetrators of trauma bonds. It was the first book that I had read about domestic violence that did not blame the victim.

In fact, the author presented personality research that changed my whole perception of the victim in a trauma bond.

I loved this book by Dr. Carnes because he presents an in-depth study of toxic relationships, why they form, who is most susceptible, and how they become so powerful.

The book kept my interest with how Dr. Carnes gave a clear explanation of the bond that compels people to tolerate the intolerable.

I also respected how the author provides practical steps to identify compulsive attachment patterns and ultimately to change or end them for good.

I recommend this book because of its accessibility and tie to the new age theories of consciousness. This book has the depth to bring value to experts, yet is accessible to anyone who wants to be a better leader. The authors demonstrate that hard work is not enough, recognizing how we’ve been conditioned to survive instead of thrive. They tout the benefits of compassion, empathy, resilience, and authentic engagement and encourage readers to rewire their thinking to manifest real change. This book doesn’t sugarcoat the fact that real change isn’t easy. It requires intention, finding purpose, and practice. But the authors also give you the tools and empowerment to make change a reality.

Shame is often more traumatizing than we realize, and there hasn't been enough exploration of its connection to prolonging the impact of initial traumatic events. In my first book, I dedicated an entire section to shame, and it was this work that significantly aided in delving deeper into its various forms and consequences.

This book's ability to distinguish between shame and guilt is particularly enlightening. While it may not be the most enjoyable read, it was undoubtedly a valuable reference for me when I needed to develop a better understanding of this crucial aspect of trauma.

We will need optimism to tackle the big challenges ahead of us. We should therefore understand some of the strengths and pitfalls of this mindset. I read Tali Sharot’s The Optimism Bias while I was working on a research project about self-deception and the book made a big impression. Sharot is one of the world’s leading cognitive neuroscientists and in this book she offers more than a description of a decision-making bias. Instead, she provides a detailed, sweeping account of how optimism works in the brain, operates in cognition, and plays out in diverse areas of human life. One key lesson: optimism about the future should be embraced with an awareness of both its adaptive benefits and its potentially devastating costs.

Broks draws upon his experience as a neuropsychologist to tell illuminating case studies of those with brain injury and other anomalies of experience. Woven through are reflections on the philosophy of what it means to have a mind which is based on the meat of the brain and what it means for our sense of selves to have damage to that brain.

Humane and moving, with flashes of dark humour, Broks brings back from the outlying lands of human experiences lessons that are relevant for all of us.

Since journalism school, I have always been drawn to storytelling that tells the truth, but better. Journalism that reads like fiction, that makes you feel something, and makes you think differently. The stories that stick with you and change your perspective on more than just the direct subject. Conversations questioning the self, identity, and the world around us, ultimately in the pursuit of happiness, make me feel alive. 

In university, I studied philosophers like Descartes, Voltaire, Plato, and Machiavelli. Then I fell in love with the classics like The Odyssey and Dante’s Inferno. From there, it was Joan Didion and Virginia Woolf. Through all of it, a common thread. How do we define humanity?

Nicholas Carr’s The Shallows explores themes like attention, discipline, cultural commentary, thought process, and emotional clarity. Over the last few decades, we have been experiencing a digital-age shift, and Carr’s writing shares the very human… show more.

Early evolutionary biology was preoccupied with notions of Social Darwinism (the survival of the fittest), but later developments in the field have focused not only on evolving patterns of social cooperation but also on the nature of the human brain itself. The latter is the subject of neuroscientist Elkhonon Goldberg’s The New Executive Brain: Frontal Lobes in a Complex World. Goldberg observes that human cerebral evolution has resulted in the development of a complex human brain. Humans possess, by way of their frontal lobes (especially their prefrontal cortex), complex executive functions involving advanced intentionality and decision-making. Goldberg recognizes that emotional areas of the brain interact with its executive functions, but his neuroscientific investigations support my own view that human reason, rightly understood, should supervise human thought and action.