What are the purposes of the university? What should be the aims of liberal education? With phrases like "cultural relativism", "political correctness", "cultural literacy", and "canon wars" buzzing through the halls of academia and of government and appearing almost daily in heated public debates, these are important questions. With good will and common sense, Charles W. Anderson enters the fracas. He argues that teaching students to think, by developing their capacity for practical reason, can provide a unifying mission for the university and an integrating theme for the curriculum. A distinguished political philosopher with years of experience teaching in undergraduate liberal arts programs, Anderson shows here how the ideal of practical reason can reconcile academia's research aims with public expectations for universities: the preparation of citizens, the training of professionals, the communication of a cultural inheritance. It is not good enough, he contends, to simply say that the university should stick to the great books of the classic tradition, or to denounce this tradition and declare that all important questions are a matter of personal or cultural choice. By applying the methods of practical reason, teachers and students will think critically about the essential purposes of any human activity and the underlying arguments of any text. They will have standards of excellence and rigor to use as tools in all fields. Prescribing the Life of the Mind suggests that the exercise of practical reason can accommodate and bring together the diverse factions and points of view now at war in the universities: the scientists and the humanists, those who teach classic rationalism andthose who insist on postmodernist perspectives. Readers both within and beyond the academic community will welcome Anderson's practical and thoughtful approach. In addition to his convincing arguments, Anderson makes specific curriculum-building suggestions that should promote lively, healthy, and useful discussions.

In his bestselling book The Memory Bible, Dr. Gary Small showed us how to improve our memory by changing our diet and lifestyle and by incorporating physical and mental exercise. Now, in response to readers' requests, Dr. Small offers The Memory Prescription -- a simple, effective two-week program to improve memory quickly. Based on years of medical research at one of the country's leading memory loss institutions, Dr. Small focuses on 'the Big 4' : mental activity, healthy brain and body diet, stress reduction, and physical fitness, and he offers a step-by-step regimen that can be customized to each reader's specific needs.

"Many of us grapple with how to stay happy, calm, and focused in a world that seems to get more complex by the minute. How do we keep our wits about us, our mood stable, and our memory intact when our brains and bodies are bombarded with information and influences from every side? This one-of-a-kind resource combines cutting-edge science with compassion and wisdom to offer answers we can really use. Heal Your Mind continues the three-pronged healing approach that Dr. Mona Lisa Schulz and Louise Hay pioneered together in All Is Well: Heal Your Body with Medicine, Affirmations, and Intuition. Here, it's applied to aspects of the mind ranging from depression, anxiety, and addiction to memory, learning, and even mystical states. You'll learn what's going on in your brain and body when: You feel sad, angry, or panicked; An addictive substance or behavior has hold of you; You have trouble focusing, reading, or remembering · A past trauma is clouding your mind in the present; An emotional state is a clue to a physical ailment ; And more And in each chapter, you'll get a "virtual healing experience" through case studies in the All Is Well Clinic, where Dr. Mona Lisa uses medical intuition to pinpoint issues in a wide range of prototypical client histories and she and Louise offer solutions and affirmations to help restore well-being. Today, the "pill-for-every-ill" approach is so prevalent that we may think our minds and bodies need an endless array of expensive, ever-changing pharmaceutical interventions. In truth, medicines are just one approach to healing the mind; nutritional supplements give us another important way to support mind-body health; and affirmations, as well as various forms of therapy, can restore us to balance by changing the way we think. Heal Your Mind puts all these tools at your disposal to help you choose your own path toward wholeness"--

Publisher Description

Our remedies are only as good as the way in which we dispense them. That is the central premise of Thinking About Prescribing. In this new, thought-provoking volume, more than two dozen experts make the case for an ongoing alliance between pharmacotherapists, young patients, and their families. Chapters tackle issues ranging from the psychodynamics of medication use in youth with serious mental illness, adapting evidence-based motivation and therapy techniques to enhance adherence, cultivating the synergistic role of primary care providers and psychotherapists, engaging in psychoeducation with patients, to prescribing via telemedicine. Readers will pick up the foundational knowledge they need to develop a partnership with patients that is based on trust and candid communication--rather than on just the cold facts about psychotropic medications. Chapters feature key takeaways that distill the most salient points, helping readers to reference--and retain--the information easily.

We’ve been led to believe that when we get sick, it’s our genetics. Or it’s just bad luck—and doctors alone hold the keys to optimal health. For years, Lissa Rankin, M.D., believed the same. But when her own health started to suffer, and she turned to Western medical treatments, she found that they not only failed to help; they made her worse. So she decided to take matters into her own hands. Through her research, Dr. Rankin discovered that the health care she had been taught to practice was missing something crucial: a recognition of the body’s innate ability to self-repair and an appreciation for how we can control these self-healing mechanisms with the power of the mind. In an attempt to better understand this phenomenon, she explored peer-reviewed medical literature and found evidence that the medical establishment had been proving that the body can heal itself for over 50 years. Using extraordinary cases of spontaneous healing, Dr. Rankin shows how thoughts, feelings, and beliefs can alter the body’s physiology. She lays out the scientific data proving that loneliness, pessimism, depression, fear, and anxiety damage the body, while intimate relationships, gratitude, meditation, sex, and authentic self-expression flip on the body’s self-healing processes. In the final section of the book, you’ll be introduced to a radical new wellness model based on Dr. Rankin’s scientific findings. Her unique six-step program will help you uncover where things might be out of whack in your life—spiritually, creatively, environmentally, nutritionally, and in your professional and personal relationships—so that you can create a customized treatment plan aimed at bolstering these health-promoting pieces of your life. You’ll learn how to listen to your body’s "whispers" before they turn to life-threatening "screams" that can be prevented with proper self-care, and you’ll learn how to trust your inner guidance when making decisions about your health and your life. By the time you finish Mind Over Medicine, you’ll have made your own Diagnosis, written your own Prescription, and created a clear action plan designed to help you make your body ripe for miracles.

BRAIN PRESCRIPTIONS THAT REALLY WORK In this breakthrough bestseller, you'll see scientific evidence that your anxiety, depression, anger, obsessiveness, or impulsiveness could be related to how specific structures in your brain work. You're not stuck with the brain you're born with. Here are just a few of neuropsychiatrist Dr. Daniel Amen's surprising--and effective--"brain prescriptions" that can help heal your brain and change your life: To Quell Anxiety and Panic: ¸ Use simple breathing techniques to immediately calm inner turmoil To Fight Depression: ¸ Learn how to kill ANTs (automatic negative thoughts) To Curb Anger: ¸ Follow the Amen anti-anger diet and learn the nutrients that calm rage To Conquer Impulsiveness and Learn to Focus: ¸ Develop total focus with the "One-Page Miracle" To Stop Obsessive Worrying: ¸ Follow the "get unstuck" writing exercise and learn other problem-solving exercises

Argues that the lack of joy in one's daily life is a more serious problem than stress, and suggests five steps for attaining a better and more rewarding balance in our lives.

The brilliant, controversial, bestselling critique of American culture that “hits with the approximate force and effect of electroshock therapy” (The New York Times)—now featuring a new afterword by Andrew Ferguson in a twenty-fifth anniversary edition. In 1987, eminent political philosopher Allan Bloom published The Closing of the American Mind, an appraisal of contemporary America that “hits with the approximate force and effect of electroshock therapy” (The New York Times) and has not only been vindicated, but has also become more urgent today. In clear, spirited prose, Bloom argues that the social and political crises of contemporary America are part of a larger intellectual crisis: the result of a dangerous narrowing of curiosity and exploration by the university elites. Now, in this twenty-fifth anniversary edition, acclaimed author and journalist Andrew Ferguson contributes a new essay that describes why Bloom’s argument caused such a furor at publication and why our culture so deeply resists its truths today.

My Prescription for Anti-Depressive Living offers a window into the life and mind of an extraordinarily creative person who was once told by a pottery professor that he had no talent and should consider another career. Not only did Adler stick with pottery, he transformed it from a dreary, unappealing summer camp craft into a contemporary signifier of modern, handcrafted luxury and became America's first (and only) celebrity potter. Interior designer Bill Sofield has declared, "Jonathan Adler does for American pottery what Noel Coward did for cocktail parties -- he makes life witty, sophisticated, and simply delicious." And now, on a much larger canvas, Adler reveals how you can do the same. My Prescription for Anti-Depressive Living explores Jonathan's own tongue-in-cheek design "manifesto," with each chapter devoted to a different "tenet," moving through the major incarnations of his interiors and products and ending with the story of his personal creative odyssey. The book is a visual feast, jam-packed with images of interiors and objects for the home, both those designed by Jonathan and those that have inspired him. At the heart of the book are ten of Adler's signature interiors, ranging from photographer Andrea Stern's landmark modernist beach house to the Parker Palm Springs, a desert resort that Adler gave a head-to-toe makeover. Overviews and details of the Parker are prominently featured throughout the book, as are images of the three homes (in Greenwich Village, Shelter Island, and Palm Beach) Jonathan and his partner, Simon Doonan, share with their dog, Liberace, and five other private residences. Part portrait of the artist as a young decorator, part call to armchairs, Adler's much-anticipated literary debut is spirited, provocative, and, ultimately, inspiring.