Download or read book White Like Me written by Tim Wise and published by ReadHowYouWant.com. This book was released on 2010-10-29 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Flipping John Howard Griffin's classic Black Like Me, and extending Noel Ignatiev's How The Irish Became White into the present-day, Wise explores the meanings and consequences of whiteness, and discusses the ways in which racial privilege can harm not just people of color, but also whites. Using stories instead of stale statistics, Wise weaves a narrative that is at once readable and yet scholarly; analytical and yet accessible.
Download or read book Time Wise written by Amantha Imber and published by Sourcebooks, Inc.. This book was released on 2023-04-25 with total page 243 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover productivity secrets from the world's foremost thinkers, leaders, and entrepreneurs. High achievers most definitely approach their workday differently. This book gives access to the secrets and strategies they've found for making things work. From Wharton Professor Adam Grant's trick to get into flow when he starts work, Google's Executive Productivity Advisor, Laura Mae Martin, and her inbox shape-shifting, to Cal Newport's multiple kaban boards, this isn't your typical productivity book. You know the basics and have heard the swallow-the-frog platitudes. Time Wise goes deeper and unveils some of the more counterintuitive but effective time management methods that boost your productivity. Some of the high achievers featured, along with their personal strategies, include Adam Alter setting systems instead of goals, Rita McGrath who consults her own personal board of directors, Jake Knapp who focuses on the one important thing of the day and Oliver Burkeman's approach to beating the to-do list. This book will allow you to master the superpower of using your time wisely to achieve success in business, life, and beyond. Praise for Time Wise: "This charming book will save you more time than it takes to read." —Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Think Again "A must-read. This book will transform how you approach your workday." —Greg McKeown, New York Times bestselling author of Effortless and Essentialism "Read this book!" —Jake Knapp, bestselling author of Sprint and Make Time "Bursting with actionable ideas on how to use your time better." —Nir Eyal, author of Indistractable
Download or read book Time Wise written by Amantha Imber and published by Random House. This book was released on 2022-10-06 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The instant international bestseller 'This charming book will save you more time than it takes to read.' Adam Grant 'A must-read. This book will transform how you approach your workday.' Greg McKeown 'Read this book!' Jake Knapp High achievers most definitely approach their workday differently. This book gives access to the secrets and strategies they've found for making things work. From Wharton Professor Adam Grant's trick to get into flow when he starts work, Google's Executive Productivity Advisor, Laura Mae Martin, and her inbox shape-shifting, to Cal Newport's multiple kaban boards, this isn't your typical productivity book. You know the basics and have heard the swallow-the-frog platitudes. Time Wise goes deeper and unveils some of the more counterintuitive but effective methods that boost your productivity. Some of the high achievers featured, along with their personal strategies, include Adam Alter setting systems instead of goals, Rita McGrath who consults her own personal board of directors, Jake Knapp who focuses on the one important thing of the day and Oliver Burkeman's approach to beating the to-do list. This book will allow you to master the superpower of using your time wisely to achieve success in business, life and beyond.
Download or read book Faith Form and Time written by Kurt P. Wise and published by B&H Publishing Group. This book was released on 2002 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Solid biblical and scientific evidence that God created the universe in six twenty-four hour days about 6,000 years ago.
Download or read book Wise Owl s Time Book written by Jane Belk Moncure and published by Regensteiner Publishing Enterprises, Incorporated. This book was released on 1982 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Full-color guide • Make your trip to Southern California unforgettable with illustrated features, 50 maps, and 220 color photos. Customize your trip with simple planning tools • Top experiences & attractions • Best bets for local dining • Easy-to-read color regional maps Explore San Diego, Big Sur, Yosemite National Park, and beyond • Discerning Fodor’s Choice picks for hotels, restaurants, sights, and more • “Word of Mouth” tips from fellow Fodor’s travelers • Illustrated features on Hollywood, Balboa Park, and the California Missions • Best coastal driving excursions, beaches, and desert resorts Opinions from destination experts • Fodor’s California-based writers reveal their favorite local haunts • Revised annually to provide the latest information
Download or read book Meeting Wise written by Kathryn Parker Boudett and published by Harvard Education Press. This book was released on 2014-08-01 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book, by two editors of Data Wise: A Step-by-Step Guide to Using Assessment Results to Improve Teaching and Learning, attempts to bring about a fundamental shift in how educators think about the meetings we attend. They make the case that these gatherings are potentially the most important venue where adult and organizational learning can take place in schools, and that making more effective use of this time is the key to increasing student achievement. In Meeting Wise, the authors show why meeting planning is a high-leverage strategy for changing how people work together in the service of school improvement. To this end, they have created a meeting-planning “checklist” to develop a common language for discussing and improving the quality of meetings. In addition, they provide guidelines for readers on “wise facilitating” and “wise participating,” and also include “top tips” and common dilemmas. Simple, succinct, and practical, Meeting Wise is designed to be read and applied at every level of the educational enterprise: district leadership meetings with central office staff, charter-school management summits, principals’ meetings with teachers, professional development sessions, teacher-team meetings, and even teachers’ meetings with parents and students.
Download or read book Wise Mind Open Mind written by Ronald Alexander and published by New Harbinger Publications. This book was released on 2009-09-01 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Though it's nearly impossible to imagine, times of personal crisis and upheaval are opportunities for self-reinvention and heightened artistic expression. Whether you are healing from a severed relationship, experiencing a job loss, or coping with another traumatic life transition, you can renew your strength and find new passion and purpose after things fall apart. Wise Mind, Open Mind offers a powerful three-step mindfulness approach to help you navigate times of unwanted change, rediscover your inner well of creativity, and move forward with passion and purpose. This book combines techniques drawn from contemporary mind-body approaches, Buddhist psychology, mindfulness, creative thinking, and positive psychology to show you how to tap into your gifts and create a practical plan for personal transformation that will help you move through the challenges you face. You'll learn to overcome the five common hindrances that may be keeping you from true fulfillment and happiness. Finally, you'll be able to embrace your circumstances, utilizing them to create a renewed personal vision and welcome new possibilities and greater creativity into your life.
Download or read book The Tech Wise Family written by Andy Crouch and published by Baker Books. This book was released on 2017-04-18 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Making conscientious choices about technology in our families is more than just using internet filters and determining screen time limits for our children. It's about developing wisdom, character, and courage in the way we use digital media rather than accepting technology's promises of ease, instant gratification, and the world's knowledge at our fingertips. And it's definitely not just about the kids. Drawing on in-depth original research from the Barna Group, Andy Crouch shows readers that the choices we make about technology have consequences we may never have considered. He takes readers beyond the typical questions of what, where, and when and instead challenges them to answer provocative questions like, Who do we want to be as a family? and How does our use of a particular technology move us closer or farther away from that goal? Anyone who has felt their family relationships suffer or their time slip away amid technology's distractions will find in this book a path forward to reclaiming their real life in a world of devices.
Download or read book Dispatches from the Race War written by Tim Wise and published by City Lights Books. This book was released on 2020-12-01 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Essays on racial flashpoints, white denial, violence, and the manipulation of fear in America today. "Drawing on events from the killing of Trayvon Martin to the Black Lives Matter protests last summer, Wise calls to account his fellow white citizens and exhorts them to combat racist power structures."—The New York Times “What Tim Wise has brilliantly done is to challenge white folks' truth to see that they have a responsibility to do more than sit back and watch, but to recognize their own role in co-creating a fair, inclusive, truly democratic society.”—Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow "Tim Wise's new book gives us the tools we need to reach people whose understanding of our country is white instead of right. And without pissing them off!"—James W. Loewen, author, Lies My Teacher Told Me "Tim Wise's latest is more urgent than ever. "—Heather Ann Thompson, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and its Legacy "A white social justice advocate clearly shows how racism is America's core crisis. A trenchant assessment of our nation’s ills."—*Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review " [Dispatches from the Race War] is a bracing call to action in a moment of social unrest."—Publishers Weekly "Dispatches from the Race War exhorts white Americans to join the struggle for a fairer society."—Chapter 16 In this collection of essays, renowned social-justice advocate Tim Wise confronts racism in contemporary America. Seen through the lens of major flashpoints during the Obama and Trump years, Dispatches from the Race War faces the consequences of white supremacy in all its forms. This includes a discussion of the bigoted undertones of the Tea Party’s backlash, the killing of Trayvon Martin, current day anti-immigrant hysteria, the rise of openly avowed white nationalism, the violent policing of African Americans, and more. Wise devotes a substantial portion of the book to explore the racial ramifications of COVID-19, and the widespread protests which followed the police murder of George Floyd. Concise, accessible chapters, most written in first-person, offer an excellent source for those engaged in the anti-racism struggle. Tim Wise’s proactive approach asks white allies to contend with—and take responsibility for—their own role in perpetuating racism against Blacks and people of color. Dispatches from the Race War reminds us that the story of our country is the history of racial conflict, and that our future may depend on how—or if—we can resolve it. “To accept racism is quintessentially American,” writes Wise, “to rebel against it is human. Be human.”
Download or read book In the Time of the Dinosaurs written by William Wise and published by . This book was released on 1987-07 with total page 68 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An easy-to-read story describing the habits and habitats of dinosaurs.
Download or read book Eating Tomorrow written by Timothy A. Wise and published by The New Press. This book was released on 2019-02-05 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A powerful polemic against agricultural technology." —Nature A major new book that shows the world already has the tools to feed itself, without expanding industrial agriculture or adopting genetically modified seeds, from the Small Planet Institute expert Few challenges are more daunting than feeding a global population projected to reach 9.7 billion in 2050—at a time when climate change is making it increasingly difficult to successfully grow crops. In response, corporate and philanthropic leaders have called for major investments in industrial agriculture, including genetically modified seed technologies. Reporting from Africa, Mexico, India, and the United States, Timothy A. Wise's Eating Tomorrow discovers how in country after country agribusiness and its well-heeled philanthropic promoters have hijacked food policies to feed corporate interests. Most of the world, Wise reveals, is fed by hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers, people with few resources and simple tools but a keen understanding of what and how to grow food. These same farmers—who already grow more than 70 percent of the food eaten in developing countries—can show the way forward as the world warms and population increases. Wise takes readers to remote villages to see how farmers are rebuilding soils with ecologically sound practices and nourishing a diversity of native crops without chemicals or imported seeds. They are growing more and healthier food; in the process, they are not just victims in the climate drama but protagonists who have much to teach us all.
Download or read book Speaking Treason Fluently written by Tim Wise and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2008-09-01 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this highly anticipated follow-up to White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son, activist Tim Wise examines the way in which institutional racism continues to shape the contours of daily life in the United States, and the ways in which white Americans reap enormous privileges from it. The essays included in this collection span the last ten years of Wise’s writing and cover all the hottest racial topics of the past decade: affirmative action, Hurricane Katrina, racial tension in the wake of the Duke lacrosse scandal, white school shootings, racial profiling, phony racial unity in the wake of 9/11, and the political rise of Barack Obama. Wise’s commentaries make forceful yet accessible arguments that serve to counter both white denial and complacency—two of the main obstacles to creating a more racially equitable and just society. Speaking Treason Fluently is a superbly crafted collection of Wise’s best work, which reveals the ongoing salience of race in America today and demonstrates that racial privilege is not only a real and persistent problem, but one that ultimately threatens the health and well-being of the entire society.
Download or read book Becoming Wise written by Krista Tippett and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-04-05 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The discourse of our common life inclines towards despair. In my field of journalism, where we presume to write the first draft of history, we summon our deepest critical capacities for investigating what is inadequate, corrupt, catastrophic, and failing. The ‘news’ is defined as the extraordinary events of the day, but it is most often translated as the extraordinarily terrible events of the day. And in an immersive 24/7 news cycle, we internalize the deluge of bad news as the norm—the real truth of who we are and what we’re up against as a species. But my work has shown me that spiritual geniuses of the everyday are everywhere. They are in the margins and do not have publicists. They are below the radar, which is broken.” Peabody Award-winning broadcaster and National Humanities Medalist Krista Tippett has interviewed the most extraordinary voices examining the great questions of meaning for our time. The heart of her work on her national public radio program and podcast, On Being, has been to shine a light on people whose insights kindle in us a sense of wonder and courage. Scientists in a variety of fields; theologians from an array of faiths; poets, activists, and many others have all opened themselves up to Tippett's compassionate yet searching conversation. In Becoming Wise, Tippett distills the insights she has gleaned from this luminous conversation in its many dimensions into a coherent narrative journey, over time and from mind to mind. The book is a master class in living, curated by Tippett and accompanied by a delightfully ecumenical dream team of teaching faculty. The open questions and challenges of our time are intimate and civilizational all at once, Tippett says – definitions of when life begins and when death happens, of the meaning of community and family and identity, of our relationships to technology and through technology. The wisdom we seek emerges through the raw materials of the everyday. And the enduring question of what it means to be human has now become inextricable from the question of who we are to each other. This book offers a grounded and fiercely hopeful vision of humanity for this century – of personal growth but also renewed public life and human spiritual evolution. It insists on the possibility of a common life for this century marked by resilience and redemption, with beauty as a core moral value and civility and love as muscular practice. Krista Tippett's great gift, in her work and in Becoming Wise, is to avoid reductive simplifications but still find the golden threads that weave people and ideas together into a shimmering braid. One powerful common denominator of the lessons imparted to Tippett is the gift of presence, of the exhilaration of engagement with life for its own sake, not as a means to an end. But presence does not mean passivity or acceptance of the status quo. Indeed Tippett and her teachers are people whose work meets, and often drives, powerful forces of change alive in the world today. In the end, perhaps the greatest blessing conveyed by the lessons of spiritual genius Tippett harvests in Becoming Wise is the strength to meet the world where it really is, and then to make it better.
Download or read book Wise Therapy written by Tim LeBon and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2001-01-30 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Independent on Sunday October 2nd One of the country′s leading philosophical counsellers, and chairman of the Society for Philosophy in Practice (SPP), Tim LeBon, said it typically took around six 50 minute sessions for a client to move from confusion to resolution. Mr LeBon, who has ′published a book on the subject, Wise Therapy, said philosophy was perfectly suited to this type of therapy, dealing as it does with timeless human issues such as love, purpose, happiness and emotional challenges. `Wise Therapy, is part of a series aimed at promoting an integrative attitude as its ethos. Among all the many perspectives of psychotherapists and counselors, philosophy needs to take its place and needs to find its voice. Tim LeBon has provided an effective means by which counselors can bring philosophy into their work with clients′ - APPA journal `Tim Le Bon′s Wise Therapy is a comprehensible and well argued book dealing with the practical therapeutic applications of philosophical research that may well be of interest to philosophers but -- as the author himself intends -- will be of most obvious benefit to therapists and counselors, both by informing their dialogue with clients in new ways and by helping them become more informed about ways to resolve the ethical dilemmas arising within the context of their own work′ - Metapsychology `A fascinating workshop for therapists and clients, backed up a thorough degree if philosophical acuity′ - Journal of the Society for Existential Analysis `I strongly recommend the book for philosophers as well as practitioners, teachers, students and supervisors in counselling and psychotherapy′ - Self and Society `Provides some additional and valuable arrows for the therapist′s quiver′ - Irvin Yalom, author of Love′s Executioner `Like Aristotle, Tim LeBon examines what is said and extracts what is best from it.... There are many fascinating exercises designed to bring out and enlighten the client′s values, conception of the good life, well-being, happiness, pleasure, and the proper place of reason in life.... Wise Therapy is well written and engaging. The case histories are illuminating examples of therapeutic techniques at work, the thought experiments are well designed, and the philosophical position adapted from the internal debates of the philosophers is level headed.... I recommend it highly to philosophers with an interest in counselling, and psychological counsellors with an interest in philosophy′ - Jeff Mason, The Philosophers′ Magazine `Tim LeBon has... authored a text which should become a staple on the philosophical counsellor′s bookshelf.... Wise Therapy is a concise, well-written book.... His ability to relate philosophical concepts to counselling concerns is admirable and attests to the skill and knowledge he possesses as a working counsellor. But, by far the most important part of Tim LeBon′s book to PC is the last chapter, "The Counsellor′s Philosophical Toolbox"′ - Craig Munns in The Examined Life ` Tim LeBon has done a good job of offering practical approaches to some of the most important and vexing issues that arise in counselling.... Tim LeBon′s book contains helpful suggestions, practical information, and useful examples, and would make a good addition to the library of any counsellors willing to allow philosophy to turn mere client sessions into wise therapy′ - Peter Raabe, Practical Philosophy Wise Therapy is an original and practical guide to how philosophy can benefit counselling and psychotherapy. Tim LeBon argues that therapy, informed by philosophy, can help clients make better decision and achieve emotional wisdom. He uses philosophical approaches to explore issues of right and wrong, the emotions and reasons, well-being and the meaning of life, and develops a ′counsellor′s toolbox′ of techniques that can help practitioners apply the wisdom of philosophy to good therapeutic practice. For counsellors who may find philosophical approaches to therapy useful, this work addresses key philosophical topics - the emotions, free will, the meaning of life and ethics. It is jargon-free where possible and assumes no previous philosophical training. From The Independent, 16th November 2004 Plato is my agony aunt It was the end of a love affair that broke her heart. Could the wisdom of the great philosophers show her how to be happy again? Claire Smith tries a novel form of therapy "The unexamined life is not worth living," Socrates said. Nor is the life you′re left with after your boyfriend has left you for another woman - at least, that′s how it felt in October last year when mine broke rank and went off with an art student from Cleveland, Ohio. We were over there for the opening of his new art exhibition. He′d flown over four days before me and had met her at a party. Supposedly, they "connected". The five months that followed were a roller-coaster of confusion, vitriol and despair. I knew there′d been problems in our relationship. We saw the world very differently; he delighted in the charm of the ordinary, I wanted maximum divinity. He walked; I galloped. He drank tea; I loathed the stuff. But, along the banks of the Thames, we′d made a promise to always stick together. Our love was something unique: "transcendental", I called it. And besides, we recycled. Surely a commitment to save the world would save our relationship? Alas, no. So there I was, a woman scorned. Hell truly hath no greater fury. And what made it worse was that I still believed in our transcendental love. If I wanted to change the way I was feeling, I needed to alter the way I was thinking. But how? A few bottles of wine and a sharp blow to the head might have done the trick. Fortunately, there′s an older, more trusted way of turning your head on its head that counsellors are starting to use: philosophy. The idea of employing Plato as an agony aunt was begun in 1981 by the German philosopher Gerd Achenbach. Although philosophy spends a lot of its time asking real-life questions that affect real-life people - What is happiness? And is it always wrong to lie? - most of the debate goes on in ivory towers. What Achenbach and subsequent philosophers including Tim LeBon, the chairman of the UK′s Society for Philosophy in Practice, wanted to do was "give practical application" to this gigantic library of great thoughts. So how does it work? Like most types of therapy, you sign up for a set of sessions. "Two would give you a new perspective on one issue; six would help you to make a major life-decision, like a career change; with 12 you can start to rethink your entire life philosophy," explains LeBon. Each session lasts 50 minutes and costs £50 - and, no, you don′t have to have any previous knowledge of philosophy. "If you think of Friends, it would suit Ross and Chandler more than Joey," LeBon says. "It′s for anyone who wants to make their emotions more intelligent. Or for those who have tried other kinds of therapy, and want something more cerebral." The first session begins with the patient venting off about whatever′s troubling them. The rant over, the counsellor then picks out some key concepts that are crucial to the problem - in the case of heartbreak, it is love and happiness that come hurtling to the fore - and then gets the patient to define what they mean. So, what is love? What is happiness? To kick-start the patient′s thinking, LeBon describes what a great philosopher had to say about it. In my case, he tells me what Plato wrote about love in his Symposium: that to stop man fighting the gods, Zeus decided to cut each human in two, so they would lose their strength. "This, then, is the source of our desire to love each other," Plato said. "Each of us is a ′matching half′ of a human whole, because each was sliced like a flatfish, two out of one, and each of us is always seeking the half that matches him." This method of probing what we might think are "obvious" ideas, such as love and happiness, was devised by Socrates in the squares of Athens. "The only I thing I know is that I know nothing at all," he boasted. What Socrates showed was that although many of the thinkers of his time thought they knew what justice, happiness and goodness meant, their understanding was tied in to their personal agenda and world view, and, what′s more, when pushed, their ideas often contradicted themselves. A bit like me on love. Whereas part of my understanding of love was something that gave life meaning, made it worth living and bound us together, I also believed that true love was "transcendental": that it was out of this world, and it didn′t matter if the two people who loved each other couldn′t get along in the day-to-day. Love was bigger than the mundane. But when it came to the next stage of the therapy, critical thinking - "to check out whether your assumptions stand up to examination" - I walked head first into a contradiction. If I think love′s purpose is to make life worth living, but then say it′s irrelevant to daily life, surely my two ideas of love are not compatible? As the cogs in my brain start to creak into motion, I feel myself taking a step back from my predicament: thinking about how I′ve been thinking. This idea I had of transcendental love might have started off as a romantic dream. But when the relationship stopped working, and I found myself feeling trapped and frustrated, I used it to justify the mechanics of a relationship that just didn′t work in the daily grind. I used it to lie to myself. In the final stage, LeBon gets me to start thinking about how to go forward. "You can′t change what has happened," he says. "You can′t change that he′s left you, or how you behaved in the relationship. So, as the Stoics did, let′s work on controlling the controllables: the things that you can change." To work out what can be changed, he gets me to try out a thought experiment, a method often used in philosophy to imagine other worlds where people can have different codes of behaviour. Thought experiments shatter your preconceived ideas of how the world should be and let your imagination run wild to how the world could be. "I find Viktor Frankl very useful here, the Austrian psychiatrist and concentration-camp survivor who actually believed that everything in life happens for a purpose," LeBon says. "Suppose this break-up did happen for a reason that will work to your benefit," he suggests. "What might that be? The answer might be that you can now focus on something important that was denied in the relationship. Or - the Hollywood version - so you′ll meet someone who is really right for you." Temporarily freed of any sense of responsibility for the relationship that was, and its sorry demise, the list came fast. I could now travel more; he didn′t like me travelling on my own, but too often he didn′t want to go anywhere, preferring to stay in his studio and make art. I′d love to meet someone with a similar sense of adventure to mine. For the first time in two years, I was being honest with myself about what I really wanted - listening to those voices that we all have inside our heads, and too often try to muzzle. So did philosophy save me? Well, I′m now dating a travel writer I have to run to keep up with. I still haven′t got over the fact that my replacement came from Cleveland, Ohio. But I guess I never will. Tim LeBon can be reached by e-mail at [email protected] A FEW WORDS FROM THE WISE Compiled by Ed Caesar · "At the touch of love, everyone becomes a poet" - Plato · "There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness" - Friedrich Nietzsche · "That man shall live as his own master and in happiness who can say each day ′I have lived′" - Horace · "The good of man is the active exercise of his soul′s faculties in conformity with excellence or virtue... Moreover this activity must occupy a complete lifetime; for one swallow does not make spring, nor does one fine day; and similarly one day or a brief period of happiness does not make a man supremely blessed and happy" - Aristotle · "There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than friendship" - Thomas Aquinas · "Whatever you do... love those who love you" - Voltaire · "Happiness is not an ideal of reason but of imagination" - Immanuel Kant · "Happiness is a state of which you are unconscious. The moment you are aware that you are happy, you cease to be happy" - Jiddu Krishnamurti · "Love is an ideal thing. Marriage is a real thing" - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe I shrink, therefore I am Therapy has many answers, but some questions require the help of a philosopher, says Clint Witchalls Sunday November 21, 2004 The Observer Danny had worked in the City of London for 10 years. As a research analyst, stockbroker and fund manager, he′d made a lot of valuable contacts, earnt a lot of cash, and learnt some important business skills. However, as he approached his mid-thirties, he no longer felt good about himself or what he did for a living, and he found his colleagues cold and unfriendly. A chronic illness made him realise his mortality, and he began to reassess his priorities. Danny had been struggling with his career conundrum for nearly five years when he met David Arnaud, a philosophical counsellor. After a few soul-searching sessions, Danny arrived at a decision. Today, he teaches economics to sixth-formers, and he loves it. ′It′s a much better lifestyle,′ he says. Many people are turning to philosophical counsellors to get answers to questions such as: ′How do I make sense of myself?′ ′What is important to me?′ ′Where am I going?′ These are perhaps not the sort of questions that require psychiatric intervention, but Arnaud, who recently completed the first empirical study of philosophical counselling in the UK, has found that within just five sessions the majority of clients, with important decisions to make, tend to move from a state of concern and confusion to a resolution. Modern philosophical counselling can be traced back to 1981, when the philosopher Gerd Achenbach opened the first practice near Cologne. Achenbach referred to the new discipline as ′therapy for the sane.′ Today, there are hundreds of philosophical counsellors around the world, with the movement particularly strong in the US, Britain and the Netherlands. ′The dilemmas people face aren′t always primarily psychological,′ says Alex Howard, a philosophical counsellor from Newcastle. ′If people face problems that are social or economic, it doesn′t make sense to define their problems in purely psychological terms.′ Tim LeBon, a founder member of the Society for Philosophy in Practice (SPP) and author of Wise Therapy, adds: ′We are faced with far more life choices than our grandparents, yet have far fewer resources to deal with them. Our grandparents may have gone to a priest or to other family members for advice; most people don′t trust these solutions any more and so want to make their own well-informed, well thought-out choices. Philosophical counselling can help these people - people in mid-life crises who are wondering how to make the most of the rest of their life. People who want to take stock of their values.′ Where stressed executives might once have been prescribed a course of tranquillisers or antidepressants, they can now get a dose of Bertrand Russell instead: ′Success is too dearly purchased if all the other ingredients have been sacrificed to obtain it.′ While some philosophical counsellors do recommend books for their clients to read, most sessions are about helping the client identify faulty thoughts. For example, a briefing in Aristotelian logic might show a client why their beliefs are erroneous. The person might infer that they′re a screw-up because they′ve screwed up. The counsellor could point out that they′re making an error called ′fallacy of composition′ - that is, what′s true of the part isn′t necessarily true of the whole. In philosophical counselling, problems aren′t pathologised as they are by the psychiatric profession, and the dialogue between client and counsellor is more like a meeting of equals, compared to many therapies where the client is treated like a patient and seen as someone who is, in some way, inadequate. ′Anybody can benefit from philosophical counselling,′ says Howard. ′But it does require someone who is willing to take stock.′ Lou Marinoff, author of international bestseller Plato Not Prozac! has done much to promote philosophical counselling. ′Some people who have stabilised their neurochemistry and validated their emotions now wish to examine or re-examine the criteria of their beliefs, the principles of their conduct, or the meaning of their lives,′ he says. ′With whom shall they do this? Psychologists and psychiatrists can shed light on such issues - as can rabbis, priests, imams and gurus. Philosophers are now rejoining the ranks of helpers.′ LeBon believes certain therapies (such as cognitive behavioural therapy) don′t go far enough in helping their clients. ′For instance, if you are anxious about your relationship, a cognitive therapist would try to dispute your catastrophising and jump to conclusions to make you feel less anxious,′ says LeBon. ′A philosophical counsellor would do this, but would also look for existential meaning in your anxiety - perhaps you really don′t want to be in the relationship and that is what your anxiety is telling you.′ LeBon also gives short shrift to psychoanalysts. ′There′s very little evidence for the Freudian unconscious, and it′s time to move on to more intellectually satisfying and helpful therapies,′ he says. However, Alain de Botton, the man who popularised philosophy as self-help, isn′t ready to bury psychologists and their ilk just yet. ′The truth is that psychoanalysis grew out of philosophy - it′s not some completely new idea, and in fact, done properly, psychoanalysis is philosophical anyway. It may even be dangerous to the mental health of some people to suggest a philosopher rather than a properly trained analyst. The knowledge of analysts when it comes to many emotional problems is now much greater than that of most philosophers.′ Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
Download or read book My Tech Wise Life written by Amy Crouch and published by Baker Books. This book was released on 2020-11-17 with total page 187 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It's time to take our power back We can barely imagine our lives without technology. Tech gives us tools to connect with our friends, listen to our music, document our lives, share our opinions, and keep up with what's going on in the world. Yet it also tempts us to procrastinate, avoid honest conversations, compare ourselves with others, and filter our reality. Sometimes, it feels like our devices have a lot more control over us than we have over them. But it doesn't have to be that way. In fact, we deserve so much more than what technology offers us. And when we're wise about how we use our devices, we can get more--more joy, more connection, more out of life. Tech shouldn't get in the way of a life worth living. Let's get tech-wise.
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