Finding Freedom in Illness

Finding Freedom in Illness PDF Author: Peter Fernando
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
ISBN: 1611802636
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
Buddhist wisdom for finding freedom and insight through spiritual practice in the midst of illness and pain. "Let your illness be your spiritual teacher!" Make a statement like that to someone who's struggled for years with, say, rheumatoid arthritis, and be prepared for an eyeroll (at best). To Peter Fernando's credit, he makes that statement, and no such impulse arises. We believe him because he's been there himself and because he backs up the statements with his own real experiences and with real wisdom from the Buddhist teachings. Peter starts by defusing the pernicious belief that anyone is somehow responsible for their illness: You're not "wrong" for being sick. Then, having gotten past self-blame, one can begin to learn self-kindness. From there, one moves to mindfulness practices and cultivating body awareness--even if body awareness is distasteful when the body isn't behaving the way you like. Further topics include getting intimate with dark emotions (fear, despair, the scary future, frustration, grief, etc.), learning equanimity (rejoicing in the good fortune of those who don't share your suffering), cultivating healthy relationships in the midst of everything, and practical advice for living with pain. Each chapter comes with one or more practices or guided meditations for putting the teachings into practice.

Sick from Freedom

Sick from Freedom PDF Author: Jim Downs
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199911541
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 279

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Book Description
Bondspeople who fled from slavery during and after the Civil War did not expect that their flight toward freedom would lead to sickness, disease, suffering, and death. But the war produced the largest biological crisis of the nineteenth century, and as historian Jim Downs reveals in this groundbreaking volume, it had deadly consequences for hundreds of thousands of freed people. In Sick from Freedom, Downs recovers the untold story of one of the bitterest ironies in American history--that the emancipation of the slaves, seen as one of the great turning points in U.S. history, had devastating consequences for innumerable freed people. Drawing on massive new research into the records of the Medical Division of the Freedmen's Bureau-a nascent national health system that cared for more than one million freed slaves-he shows how the collapse of the plantation economy released a plague of lethal diseases. With emancipation, African Americans seized the chance to move, migrating as never before. But in their journey to freedom, they also encountered yellow fever, smallpox, cholera, dysentery, malnutrition, and exposure. To address this crisis, the Medical Division hired more than 120 physicians, establishing some forty underfinanced and understaffed hospitals scattered throughout the South, largely in response to medical emergencies. Downs shows that the goal of the Medical Division was to promote a healthy workforce, an aim which often excluded a wide range of freedpeople, including women, the elderly, the physically disabled, and children. Downs concludes by tracing how the Reconstruction policy was then implemented in the American West, where it was disastrously applied to Native Americans. The widespread medical calamity sparked by emancipation is an overlooked episode of the Civil War and its aftermath, poignantly revealed in Sick from Freedom.

Finding Freedom

Finding Freedom PDF Author: Raelan Agle
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781707010196
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 324

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Book Description
Raelan Agle is an impeccable storyteller whose journey of desperate struggle and eventual triumph over chronic fatigue syndrome is as candid as it is heartfelt.. With startling wisdom and frank humor, she shares her life-altering encounter with chronic illness that took her on an emotional rollercoaster ride around the globe. Raelan's captivating and hopeful voice permeates this insightful and engaging book filled with helpful information and practical advice not only for fellow CFS sufferers but for anyone who simply wants to be living the best possible version of their lives. In addition to revealing the specific strategies and steps that led to her complete recovery from her decade-long battle with chronic fatigue syndrome, she also created an instruction manual for everyone for living a happy and healthy life. Her deeply personal yet universally felt story is not only inspirational but also details the actions you can take today to start recovering from chronic fatigue syndrome and changing your life for the better. In Finding Freedom, Raelan takes you by the hand and challenges you to not accept the status quo. With her approach to chronic fatigue syndrome treatment, she shows you how you can positively change your life while empowering you to never again accept anything less than the absolute healthiest and happiest life possible.

How to Be Sick

How to Be Sick PDF Author: Toni Bernhard
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0861719263
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 217

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Book Description
This life-affirming, instructive, and thoroughly inspiring book is a must-read for anyone who is - or who might one day be - sick. It can also be the perfect gift of guidance, encouragement, and uplifting inspiration to family, friends, and loved ones struggling with the many terrifying or disheartening life changes that come so close on the heels of a diagnosis of a chronic condition or life-threatening illness. Authentic and graceful, How to be Sick reminds us of our limitless inner freedom, even under high degrees of suffering and pain. The author - who became ill while a university law professor in the prime of her career - tells the reader how she got sick and, to her and her partner's bewilderment, stayed that way. Toni had been a longtime meditator, going on long meditation retreats and spending many hours rigorously practicing, but soon discovered that she simply could no longer engage in those difficult and taxing forms. She had to learn ways to make "being sick" the heart of her spiritual practice - and through truly learning how to be sick, she learned how, even with many physical and energetic limitations, to live a life of equanimity, compassion, and joy. And whether we ourselves are ill or not, we can learn these vital arts from Bernhard's generous wisdom in How to Be Sick.

Finding Freedom from Anxiety and Worry

Finding Freedom from Anxiety and Worry PDF Author: Dr. William Backus
Publisher: Baker Books
ISBN: 144124090X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 214

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Book Description
Thousands of people have seen their lives improve with the help of Dr. William Backus. Here he explains how misbelief therapy can be used to replace worry-producing thoughts with peace-giving truth. Practical and realistic, this book doesn't promise a worry-free life, but it does show readers how to ease and reduce anxiety and even use it to become the person God wants them to be.

Riding Barranca

Riding Barranca PDF Author: Laura Chester
Publisher: Trafalgar Square Books
ISBN: 1570765790
Category : Pets
Languages : en
Pages : 237

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Book Description
In this remarkable one-year journal, skilled horsewoman and adventurer Laura Chester brings us into her world, where we deeply connect with the earth and its seasons, with beauty and sometimes danger. While riding in places as far-reaching as Mexico, Australia, and India, Chester is always grateful to come home to the comforts of her familiar horse. As they cover the borderland of Arizona and the hills of Massachusetts, we get to know Barranca as intimate companion, mediator between soul and nature, whether entering the wilds of Cochise Stronghold or picking Berkshire apples from the saddle. Carried along on waves of memory, released by the gaits of her smooth-moving fox trotter, this literary memoir takes us on a personal exploration as well—where family relationships are fractured by anger, jealousy, illness, and death. With the help of her big-hearted animal, Chester is able to retrieve the past and find forgiveness. For as she says—"Riding Barranca puts me in the moment, which is where I want to live."

No Time Like the Present

No Time Like the Present PDF Author: Jack Kornfield
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1451693710
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
In this landmark work, internationally beloved teacher of meditation and “one of the great spiritual teachers of our time” (Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple) Jack Kornfield reveals that you can be instantly happy with the keys to inner freedom. Through his signature warmhearted, poignant, often funny stories, with their a-ha moments and O. Henry-like outcomes, Jack Kornfield shows how we can free ourselves, wherever we are and whatever our circumstances. Renowned for his mindfulness practices and meditations, Jack provides keys for opening gateways to immediate shifts in perspective and clarity of vision, allowing us to “grapple with difficult emotions” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) and know how to change course, take action, or—when we shouldn’t act—just relax and trust. Each chapter presents a path to a different kind of freedom—freedom from fear, freedom to start over, to love, to be yourself, and to be happy—and guides you into an active process that engages your mind and heart, awakens your spirit, and brings real joy, over and over again. Drawing from his own life as a son, brother, father, and partner, and on his forty years of face-to-face teaching of thousands of people across the country, Jack presents “a consommé of goodness, heart, laughter, tears, and breath, nourishing and delicious” (Anne Lamott, author of Bird by Bird). His keys to life will help us find hope, clarity, relief from past disappointments and guilt, and the courage to go forward.

Biogenealogy: Decoding the Psychic Roots of Illness

Biogenealogy: Decoding the Psychic Roots of Illness PDF Author: Patrick Obissier
Publisher: Inner Traditions / Bear & Co
ISBN: 9781594770890
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
Biogenealogy: Decoding the Psychic Roots of Illness offers protocols for diagnosis and treatment for conflicts that can span generations.

Letting Go ...

Letting Go ... PDF Author: Jodi Peppard-Latocki
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780578809106
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
Letting go is a part of life. Maybe that's where you find yourself right now, having to let go of something, someone, or a situation? It's not an easy process to go through, in fact it can be difficult, emotional, and just plain painful, but you're not alone. Letting Go . . . is a faith-filled devotional that will walk you through the process of letting-go, while inspiring and energizing your trust in God. Life is full of these not-so-glamorous moments, so each chapter takes you through Jodi's personal journey; the good, the bad, the ugly and the humor. It's chalked full of real-life stories of real-life people in God's Word who have also had to face the realities of letting-go. You will be encouraged and challenged as you process through areas of your own life with reflection questions; allowing you to journal through the study, while you discover the freedom of letting go and receiving God's new just for you.

True Refuge

True Refuge PDF Author: Tara Brach
Publisher: Bantam
ISBN: 0553386344
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
How do you cope when facing life-threatening illness, family conflict, faltering relationships, old trauma, obsessive thinking, overwhelming emotion, or inevitable loss? If you’re like most people, chances are you react with fear and confusion, falling back on timeworn strategies: anger, self-judgment, and addictive behaviors. Though these old, conditioned attempts to control our life may offer fleeting relief, ultimately they leave us feeling isolated and mired in pain. There is another way. Beneath the turbulence of our thoughts and emotions exists a profound stillness, a silent awareness capable of limitless love. Tara Brach, author of the award-winning Radical Acceptance, calls this awareness our true refuge, because it is available to every one of us, at any moment, no exceptions. In this book, Brach offers a practical guide to finding our inner sanctuary of peace and wisdom in the midst of difficulty. Based on a fresh interpretation of the three classic Buddhist gateways to freedom—truth, love, and awareness—True Refuge shows us the way not just to heal our suffering, but also to cultivate our capacity for genuine happiness. Through spiritual teachings, guided meditations, and inspirational stories of people who discovered loving presence during times of great struggle, Brach invites us to connect more deeply with our own inner life, one another, and the world around us. True Refuge is essential reading for anyone encountering hardship or crisis, anyone dedicated to a path of spiritual awakening. The book reminds us of our own innate intelligence and goodness, making possible an enduring trust in ourselves and our lives. We realize that what we seek is within us, and regardless of circumstances, “there is always a way to take refuge in a healing and liberating presence.” Praise for True Refuge “Drawing on the latest findings in neuroscience as well as ten more years of personal experience on the path of awakening, Tara Brach’s superb second book brings readers ever more deeply in touch with our true nature. This book is a precious gift, filled with insight, shared from heart to heart.”—Thich Nhat Hanh “True Refuge is a magnificent work of heart. For anyone interested in developing a deeper understanding of the mind and how to improve the quality of their life, this book offers unique insights and easily learned practices that literally can transform your life’s path. Read, explore, and enjoy!”—Daniel J. Siegel, M.D., author of No-Drama Discipline