Inprint - New Books of interest

The Instinct to Heal: Curing Stress, Anxiety, and Depression Without Drugs and Without Talk Therapy by David Servan-Schreiber, M.D., Ph.D. (Rodale $23.95, Hardcover.)

Americans seek therapy in record numbers and consume more medications that ever before, yet stress, anxiety, and depression continue to rise to epidemic proportions. People can spend years on the psychoanalytic couch without making any progress, and for many psychiatrists the prescription-writing reflex has become almost automatic, despite the fact that benefits often disappear as soon as drug treatment stops. Standard treatments are not long-term solutions.

Psychiatrist/neurologist Dr. David Servan-Schreiber knows that we can cure our emotional pain. He’s seen certain natural methods produce tremendous results in his clinical practice, in that of his peers, and even in war-torn regions where horrific memories can leave deep scars.

Numerous studies have documented the benefits of these methods on anxiety and depression. Servan-Schreiber explains how each of them can help us escape the therapy/drug trap by working through the body to tap into the emotional brain’s self-healing processes rather than relying on the cognitive process of language. Weaving accounts of his first-hand experience and findings with the research of hundreds of other scientists, he outlines a program that is becoming embraced throughout the world as a permanent cure for emotional pain.

The Letters of H.P. Blavatsky: Volume 1, 1861-1879 edited by John Algeo. (Quest Books, $29.95, Hardcover.)

Helena P. Blavatsky, or “H.P.B.” as she preferred her friends to call her, was the most influential esotericist of modern times and co-founder of the Theosophical Society. Her books include Isis Unveiled, From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan, The Secret Doctrine, The Key to Theosophy and The Voice of the Silence. In addition to these, she wrote many newspaper and magazine articles. She was also a prolific correspondent with her family and colleagues, friends and foes, the learned and the simple. Her published works present the public Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, her correspondence the private H.P.B.

That correspondence is now being presented in The Letters of H.P. Blavatsky. The letters span nearly two decades, from the early 1860s to early 1879. During this time she traveled over the world, underwent personal crises, discovered her identity, formed lasting friendships, became a public figure, founded the Theosophical Society, published her first major work, and saw a vision of her future. Her correspondence tells the whole story, with an insider’s knowledge and in her own voice.

Beginning Mindfulness: Learning the Way of Awareness by Andrew Weiss. (New World Library, $14.95, Paperback.)

When Andrew Weiss began teaching meditation, he discovered that his students responded best when he broke down the process of learning mindfulness practice into discrete and progressive steps. Knowing that most people had little time to devote to meditation, he also made it his priority to teach the direct application of mindfulness to daily life. Instead of focusing solely on sitting meditation, he found that people needed to see everything they did as an opportunity to awaken the meditative inquiry of mindfulness. While he taught the practices of sitting and walking meditation, he paid equal attention to everyday life activities. Gradually he created handouts for each week’s instruction and “home-play” assignments, turning his teaching into a progressive, easy-to-follow path to give people mindfulness skills. Through the years, his handouts developed into a self-bound handbook, which quickly became the preferred text for groups wanting to learn mindfulness in Thich Nhat Hanh’s Order of Interbeing.

Beginning Mindfulness is intended for lay-people practicing in their work and family lives without the luxury of long meditation retreats. It is deeply rooted in Buddhist practice but remains unbound by any one particular Buddhist tradition. Weiss blends the traditions of his teachers: that of Korean Zen Master Seung Sanh, Vietnamese Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh, insight meditation or vipassana, as well as the Hindu yogic tradition. An easy, doable program of leaning to practice the Buddhist art of mindfulness, Beginning Mindfulness is, as one psychologist who uses the manual with her groups put it, “a simple manual that really works.”

The Power of Self-Dependence: Allowing Yourself to Live Life on Your Own Terms by Dr. Jorge Bucay. (Rayo, an Imprint of HarperCollins, $19.95, Hardcover.)

With an easy-to-read format, engaging stories and anecdotes drawn from a multitude of sources — folktale, the Bible, eastern philosophy, and the Talmud — The Power of Self Dependence leads us beyond our commonplace notion of independence to a more profound concept of self-dependence.

Taking on the role of life coach, Dr. Jorge Bucay proposes that in order for us all to attain balance in our lives and to achieve inner peace, we must acknowledge our dependence on those around us — whether they are friends, family, or even co-workers. We can’t, Bucay firmly establishes, go it alone.

With a blend of spirituality and practical wisdom, Bucay explains why independence proves to be an illusion and demonstrates how understanding this allows us to transform ourselves into healthy, enlightened individuals. Without ignoring our own need for independence, he shows us that as people, we are social creatures who must learn to trust and embrace one another. Before we can seek happiness, we must first learn to be self-dependent — on our own instincts and of those closest to us. Once we have attained this delicate balance between trusting ourselves and trusting those we love and depend upon, we clear the path toward the ultimate goal: personal happiness.

Limitless Mind: A Guide to Remote Viewing by Russell Targ. (New World Library, $14.95, Paperback.)

Remote-viewing allows people to receive and broadcast information, and is part of a larger observation of instantaneous connection of consciousness across space and time. If there are no barriers to conscious connection between human beings, then we all share a singular consciousness. This belief is shared by numerous mystics of the Christian, Buddhist, Gnostic, Kabalistic, Sufi, and yogi traditions. In fact, Russell Targ draws from the great Hindu spiritual master, Patanjali, who wrote in his Yogi Sutras that all humans have the ability to see into the far distance, see the future, heal the sick, and diagnose illness. The psychic abilities of most humans are dampened by the clatter of our conscious minds. Targ offers several techniques and exercises to overcome all of this clatter and develop remote-viewing skills. Remote-viewing offers a path of self-inquiry and self-realization and expands our limited awareness of the consciousness shared by all humans.

Popular misconceptions of psychic ability and ESP have often prevented these topics from being taken seriously, yet an abundance of scientific research shows that we all have a tremendous capacity for developing these talents. In 1972, physicist Russell Targ co-founded the Stanford Research Institute’s program to investigate the development of psychic abilities. In his ten years with this program, he came to understand that most people have the ability to describe events and locations that are blocked from ordinary perception. The term “remote viewing” was coined for this ability. In this, his sixth book, he explores the scientific as well as the spiritual implications of remote viewing and offers detailed exercises to assist readers in cultivating their own psychic abilities.