Dr. Daniel Amen's breakthrough brain-healing program has helped hundreds of thousands to overcome depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and attention deficit disorder. The maverick author of Change Your Brain, Change Your Life and Healing ADD now presents his proven program for repairing and strengthening our relationships, child-rearing practices, work and study routines, and, ultimately, our soulful connections, in the deepest ways possible. Guided by this book, each of us can learn to balance and optimize the parts of the brain responsible for inner growth, intimacy, and spiritual health.
Drawing upon his experience with over fourteen thousand brain-imaging studies of patients from all walks of life, Dr. Amen has developed an essential tool called the Amen Brain System Checklist, a 101-question self-test used to evaluate the five brain systems that are key to achieving and maintaining a healthy brain-soul connection. The questionnaire identifies the problem brain areas readers may need to work on, offers insight into the degree to which these imbalances affect their lives, and provides targeted strategies for each area of the brain involved with spiritual issues.
These are just a few of the many "brain prescriptions" to be found in Healing the Hardware of the Soul:
Develop focus and improve decision-making with the One-Page Miracle for the Soul
Use prayer, meditation, and diaphragmatic breathing exercises for superior emotional and spiritual flexibility
Heal painful deep soul memories through thought and behavior exercises
Learn how forming strong, positive new bonds actually controls impulsive behavior and stabilizes mood swings
Dr. Amen's recommendations include cutting-edge advice on diet, nutritional supplements, and the judicious use of medication when needed. He also explains which medications can unbalance the brain when used improperly. Dramatic before-and-after pictures of the brain demonstrate the medical effectiveness of these clinically based healing techniques.
Whether we learn the self-help strategies of cognitive reprogramming, self-hypnosis, or nutraceutical therapy, seek out psychotherapy, or rely on prescription antidepressants and antianxiety medications, Dr. Amen's sage advice and comprehensive treatment programs give us all the tools we need to optimize our work, relationships, and spiritual connections to become the people we want to be.
As the title suggests, Healing the Hardware of the Soul is a unique blend of advanced scientific technique and fundamental religious principles. Dr. Daniel Amen, a graduate of Oral Roberts University, isn't promoting a strictly Christian agenda, but he makes it repeatedly clear that one of the crucial steps in achieving mental health is prayer. Depending on your beliefs, this insistence can range from pleasing to offensive.
His work is centered around the physical aspects of the brain--in some ways, it resembles a modern form of phrenology. Using detailed imaging technology, he has established connections between specific behaviors--panic disorders, depression, ADD--and over- or underactive areas of the brain. As with most new forms of medical research, his work is both lauded and ridiculed, and only further research will determine its ultimate validity.
For people anxious to put his findings to use, there are several chapters devoted to questionnaires that can be used in place of brain scans. Exercises and suggestions follow, and stay surprisingly simple--forming personal connections, seeking appropriate medical care and medications, and creating short-term, specific goals are a few old standbys. Regardless of what methods Amen is using to arrive at the solutions, it's clear he finds plenty of value in tried-and-true solutions. --Jill Lightner
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 5.0 / 5.0
Healing The Hardware of the Soul:
Very interesting and helpful. Just getting time to use it and am so happy I bought it. Should be encourageing to make some needed changes in my life.
Another great Amen book!:
I am a fan of Dr. Amen's work for many reasons. He has really opened up the science of the mind in profound ways. He is a brain researcher who attended a Christian University. His findings about the human brain will change the way we look at things like mental health, behavioral problems and as this book illustrates, even the nature of the soul/brain relationship. I don't agree with Dr. Amen on all of his conclusions (like doing brain scans on our elected officials so we can see what sort of brain problems... more info
The Inspiration for my New-Found Compassion:
For the first time in my life, BECAUSE of Dr. Amen's book, my outlook on sick & suffering people, is FOREVER altered. I am deeply grateful for this book, for Dr. Amen's work, his compassion, and his graciousness in sharing it with the world. I, like most people, have expended energy on judging certain people, and groups of people. After a huge spiritual & emotional break-through while reading this book, this has changed. I have true compassion and lack of judgement for sick people, because I now... more info
