The Constant Outsider chronicles the radical choices made by the author as part of an intense struggle to fit in and be accepted within the challenging and often violent environments of Dorchester, South Boston and beyond.This memoir is a true and exciting account of what it was like for the son of an Italian immigrant to grow up, live, and work in the predominantly Irish sections of Boston, Massachusetts during some of the most volatile and violent decades in their histories. For those who were not exposed first hand to the extreme criminal activity and violence which was Southie during the Whitey Bulger years, the events the author experienced and the people he encountered should prove riveting. Having to co-exist with killers, drug dealers and other assorted criminals, as well as the many fine and honest people that were part of the community, sometimes caused the author to walk a fine line between participating in or rejecting the lawlessness that surrounded him.
The healing benefits of writing can support traditional therapy. While much has been written about the physical and emotional benefits of writing, little has been written specifically for mental health professionals detailing how to use therapeutic journaling with their clients. Therapeutic journaling—any type of writing or related expressive process used for the purpose of psychological healing or growth—can be an extremely helpful adjunctive therapy. When integrated into an overall treatment plan, regardless of the therapist’s clinical orientation, journaling can become a dynamic tool for personal growth and healing. The first part of this book, “Journaling and the Clinical Process,” gives an overview of therapeutic journaling and the many potential benefits from its use. It provides concrete and specific steps for introducing journaling to psychotherapy clients and answers questions about structure and logistics. For example, engaging your client in writing a biographical statement will not only help focus the treatment plan but also provide a vast amount of background information. This section also introduces two very beneficial mnemonic devices to help clients focus and organize journaling between sessions. The next section, “Presenting Problems and Journaling Solutions,” addresses nine different diagnoses and explains specifically how therapeutic journaling can be integrated into the treatment plan of these diagnoses. Key diagnoses are covered: adjustment disorders, anxiety, depression, grief, low self-esteem, couple and relationship issues, addictions, disordered eating, and post-traumatic stress disorder. The final part of the book, “Journaling Roadblocks and Building Blocks,” addresses potentially difficult, sticky, or challenging situations regarding journaling, such as possible resistance to therapeutic journaling, privacy issues, safe boundaries, and protection of client material. Importantly, it also reviews those circumstances in which it is best not to use therapeutic journaling or when journaling is contraindicated. The author offers a program designed for therapists for creating their own therapeutic journaling practice. The Healing Power of Writing is filled with case studies, step-by-step exercises, and clear and practical guidelines for mental health professionals who want to incorporate journaling into their clients’ treatment.
An inspiring personal development book that “can change your life” (Pete Hegseth, New York Times bestselling author and cohost of Fox & Friends) and help you obtain elite levels of success, from former Special Forces Green Beret Daniel Fielding. Thought-provoking, engaging, and accessible, The Asset Mindset effortlessly delivers twelve chapters of self-awareness, self-manifestation, and personal development, helping you to: -Discover and change any negative mindsets and behaviors that prevent you from achieving success. -Build a mindset you will be proud to live with and start creating positive changes today. -Turn yourself into an elite level asset, the kind that overcomes any obstacle that life may throw at you. Take ownership of your life and effectively pursue your goals as never before with this ultimate guidebook that is the key for “today’s pursuit for success” (Ray “Cash” Care, Navy SEAL veteran).
The medical profession requires extensive training and preparation in order to ensure the success and competency of future doctors and healthcare professionals. With an emphasis on professional development and medical education, current professionals in this field acknowledge the importance of residency programs and training in the professional development of future doctors. Optimizing Medicine Residency Training Programs presents a comprehensive overview of chapters ranging from the history of medicine to opportunities and research for further exploration geared toward the professional development and medical training for the next generation of doctors and healthcare professionals. This publication is an essential reference source for academicians, practitioners, and professionals interested in the education and training of modern medical professionals.
One pastor’s journey from idealism, through disillusionment, to an acceptance of grace After forty years as a Presbyterian pastor, Douglas Brouwer wondered if he had spent his life, as the author of Ecclesiastes laments, “chasing after wind.” What did all the hard work on evenings and weekends and holidays, away from his family, amount to? What was there to make of the long string of petty conflicts and the overwhelming feeling of disillusionment? And in the current age of shrinking mainline churches, what could he point to as the end result of his decades in ministry? Chasing after Wind will resonate with pastors everywhere who went into ministry to do lifechanging work for God and ended up spending most of their time managing the parking situation outside the church, fielding parishioner complaints about the color of the sanctuary carpet (or, in Brouwer’s case, the color of his shoes), and endlessly fundraising for mission projects and building maintenance. In telling his story, Brouwer comes to recognize that the most meaningful parts of his career—the “holy bits,” as he calls them—were in unexpected moments where everything was stripped away but the mysterious work of God. Recounting these times of curious joy and shared mourning, he demonstrates how a pastor can find grace and peace in looking back on a life in ministry.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY MICHIKO KAKUTANI, THE NEW YORK TIMES • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY TIME NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY MORE THAN 45 PUBLICATIONS, INCLUDING The New York Times Book Review • The Washington Post • NPR • The New Yorker • San Francisco Chronicle • The Economist • The Atlantic • Newsday • Salon • St. Louis Post-Dispatch • The Guardian • Esquire (UK) • GQ (UK) After three acclaimed novels, Gary Shteyngart turns to memoir in a candid, witty, deeply poignant account of his life so far. Shteyngart shares his American immigrant experience, moving back and forth through time and memory with self-deprecating humor, moving insights, and literary bravado. The result is a resonant story of family and belonging that feels epic and intimate and distinctly his own. Born Igor Shteyngart in Leningrad during the twilight of the Soviet Union, the curious, diminutive, asthmatic boy grew up with a persistent sense of yearning—for food, for acceptance, for words—desires that would follow him into adulthood. At five, Igor wrote his first novel, Lenin and His Magical Goose, and his grandmother paid him a slice of cheese for every page. In the late 1970s, world events changed Igor’s life. Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev made a deal: exchange grain for the safe passage of Soviet Jews to America—a country Igor viewed as the enemy. Along the way, Igor became Gary so that he would suffer one or two fewer beatings from other kids. Coming to the United States from the Soviet Union was equivalent to stumbling off a monochromatic cliff and landing in a pool of pure Technicolor. Shteyngart’s loving but mismatched parents dreamed that he would become a lawyer or at least a “conscientious toiler” on Wall Street, something their distracted son was simply not cut out to do. Fusing English and Russian, his mother created the term Failurchka—Little Failure—which she applied to her son. With love. Mostly. As a result, Shteyngart operated on a theory that he would fail at everything he tried. At being a writer, at being a boyfriend, and, most important, at being a worthwhile human being. Swinging between a Soviet home life and American aspirations, Shteyngart found himself living in two contradictory worlds, all the while wishing that he could find a real home in one. And somebody to love him. And somebody to lend him sixty-nine cents for a McDonald’s hamburger. Provocative, hilarious, and inventive, Little Failure reveals a deeper vein of emotion in Gary Shteyngart’s prose. It is a memoir of an immigrant family coming to America, as told by a lifelong misfit who forged from his imagination an essential literary voice and, against all odds, a place in the world. Praise for Little Failure “Hilarious and moving . . . The army of readers who love Gary Shteyngart is about to get bigger.”—The New York Times Book Review “A memoir for the ages . . . brilliant and unflinching.”—Mary Karr “Dazzling . . . a rich, nuanced memoir . . . It’s an immigrant story, a coming-of-age story, a becoming-a-writer story, and a becoming-a-mensch story, and in all these ways it is, unambivalently, a success.”—Meg Wolitzer, NPR “Literary gold . . . bruisingly funny.”—Vogue “A giant success.”—Entertainment Weekly
A South Boston garage owner becomes irrevocably connected to the Mob. Seemingly innocent missteps sow the seeds of deception, which leads to violence that calls for the ultimate revenge; murder.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and the American Book Award, the bestselling Common Ground is much more than the story of the busing crisis in Boston as told through the experiences of three families. As Studs Terkel remarked, it's "gripping, indelible...a truth about all large American cities." "An epic of American city life...a story of such hypnotic specificity that we re-experience all the shades of hope and anger, pity and fear that living anywhere in late 20th-century America has inevitably provoked." —Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, The New York Times
