Recommendations based on "Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School (Book & DVD)"

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • An engaging, deeply researched guide to flourishing in a world of increasing stress and negativity—the inspiration for one of the most popular TED Talks of all time“Powerful [and] charming . . . A book for just about anyone . . . The philosophies in this book are easily the best wire frames to build a happy and successful life.”—MediumHappiness is not the belief that we don’t need to change; it is the realization that we can.Our most commonly held formula for success is broken. Conventional wisdom holds that once we succeed, we’ll be happy; that once we get that great job, win that next promotion, lose those five pounds, happiness will follow. But the science reveals this formula to be backward: Happiness fuels success, not the other way around.Research shows that happy employees are more productive, more creative, and better problem solvers than their unhappy peers. And positive people are significantly healthier and less stressed and enjoy deeper social interaction than the less positive people around them.Drawing on original research—including one of the largest studies of happiness ever conducted—and work in boardrooms and classrooms across forty-two countries, Shawn Achor shows us how to rewire our brains for positivity and optimism to reap the happiness advantage in our lives, our careers, and even our health. His strategies include:• The Tetris Effect: how to retrain our brains to spot patterns of possibility so we can see and seize opportunities all around us• Social Investment: how to earn the dividends of a strong social support network• The Ripple Effect: how to spread positive change within our teams, companies, and familiesBy turns fascinating, hopeful, and timely, The Happiness Advantage reveals how small shifts in our mind-set and habits can produce big gains at work, at home, and elsewhere.

Believe and be unshakable.The Director of West Point’s influential Performance Psychology Program shares the secrets of mental toughness and self-belief in this definitive guide to mastering confidence, the key to performance in any field.Dr. Nate Zinsser has spent his career training the minds of the U.S. Military Academy’s cadets as they prepare to lead and perform when the stakes are the very highest—on the battlefield. Alongside this work, he has coached world-class athletes including a Super Bowl MVP, numerous Olympic medalists, professional ballerinas, NHL All-Stars, and college All-Americans, teaching them to overcome pressure and succeed on the biggest stages.Dr. Zinsser has come to understand that one single trait above all others makes peak performance possible: confidence, or the belief in oneself. Whether your mission involves leading a platoon into combat, returning an opponent’s serve, or delivering a sales pitch to a roomful of skeptical prospects, you perform best when you are so certain about your abilities that your flow of fear, doubts, and confusion slows to the barest minimum. What’s more, Dr. Zinsser has come to understand that confidence is a skill that can be taught, improved, and applied by anyone to enhance nearly every aspect of our lives and careers.Now, for the first time, Dr. Zinsser distills his research and years of experience, offering a fascinating guide to the science of confidence and providing readers with a practical, step-by-step program to best harness their belief in themselves to achieve success in any field. The Confident Mind is a complete guide to confidence: how to understand it, how to build it, how to protect it, and how to rely upon it when your performance matters most.

What if you could change your life, simply by changing the way you see it? Ignite your inner magnetism and attract the successful, vibrant life you deserve with this powerful guide to becoming your most magnetic self.We each hold the power to attract the life we want, the one we deserve, the one we dream of. Yet so many of us get stuck in a cycle of self-doubt, insecurities, and old patterns of behavior that hold us back.Through simple guiding principles and practical exercises, Amber Lyon shows you how to embrace your true worth, surrender the doubts that have held you back and enhance your inner magnetism.You are a Magnet shares powerful magnetic mindset shifts, that will change your perspective on yourself, your life and what’s possible for you. With each principle you will learn how to navigate self doubt, set a clear vision for whats next and learn how to make that vision a tangible reality.What if you could change your life, simply by changing the way you see it?Through her four-part framework: Alchemizing Fear, Cultivating Courage, The Magnetic Mindset, and Living Through Joy — you will be guided along the journey of seeing your life through new eyes and learn to align your thoughts and behaviors with your untapped potential.

In today's world, yesterday's methods just don't work. In Getting Things Done, veteran coach and management consultant David Allen shares the breakthrough methods for stress-free performance that he has introduced to tens of thousands of people across the country. Allen's premise is simple: our productivity is directly proportional to our ability to relax. Only when our minds are clear and our thoughts are organized can we achieve effective productivity and unleash our creative potential. In Getting Things Done Allen shows how to:* Apply the "do it, delegate it, defer it, drop it" rule to get your in-box to empty* Reassess goals and stay focused in changing situations* Plan projects as well as get them unstuck* Overcome feelings of confusion, anxiety, and being overwhelmed* Feel fine about what you're not doingFrom core principles to proven tricks, Getting Things Done can transform the way you work, showing you how to pick up the pace without wearing yourself down.

Are you above average? Is your child an A student? Is your employee an introvert or an extrovert? Every day we are measured against the yardstick of averages, judged according to how closely we come to it or how far we deviate from it.The assumption that metrics comparing us to an average—like GPAs, personality test results, and performance review ratings—reveal something meaningful about our potential is so ingrained in our consciousness that we don’t even question it. That assumption, says Harvard’s Todd Rose, is spectacularly—and scientifically—wrong.In The End of Average, Rose, a rising star in the new field of the science of the individual shows that no one is average. Not you. Not your kids. Not your employees. This isn’t hollow sloganeering—it’s a mathematical fact with enormous practical consequences. But while we know people learn and develop in distinctive ways, these unique patterns of behaviors are lost in our schools and businesses which have been designed around the mythical “average person.” This average-size-fits-all model ignores our differences and fails at recognizing talent. It’s time to change it.Weaving science, history, and his personal experiences as a high school dropout, Rose offers a powerful alternative to understanding individuals through averages: the three principles of individuality. The jaggedness principle (talent is always jagged), the context principle (traits are a myth), and the pathways principle (we all walk the road less traveled) help us understand our true uniqueness—and that of others—and how to take full advantage of individuality to gain an edge in life.Read this powerful manifesto in the ranks of Drive, Quiet, and Mindset—and you won’t see averages or talent in the same way again.

Why is it so hard to make lasting changes in our companies, in our communities, and in our own lives?The primary obstacle is a conflict that’s built into our brains, say Chip and Dan Heath, authors of the critically acclaimed bestseller Made to Stick. Psychologists have discovered that our minds are ruled by two different systems—the rational mind and the emotional mind—that compete for control. The rational mind wants a great beach body; the emotional mind wants that Oreo cookie. The rational mind wants to change something at work; the emotional mind loves the comfort of the existing routine. This tension can doom a change effort—but if it is overcome, change can come quickly.In Switch, the Heaths show how everyday people—employees and managers, parents and nurses—have united both minds and, as a result, achieved dramatic results:● The lowly medical interns who managed to defeat an entrenched, decades-old medical practice that was endangering patients.● The home-organizing guru who developed a simple technique for overcoming the dread of housekeeping.● The manager who transformed a lackadaisical customer-support team into service zealots by removing a standard tool of customer serviceIn a compelling, story-driven narrative, the Heaths bring together decades of counterintuitive research in psychology, sociology, and other fields to shed new light on how we can effect transformative change. Switch shows that successful changes follow a pattern, a pattern you can use to make the changes that matter to you, whether your interest is in changing the world or changing your waistline.

Do you feel awkward at networking events? Do you wonder what your date really thinks of you? Do you wish you could decode people? You need to learn the science of people.As a human behavior hacker, Vanessa Van Edwards created a research lab to study the hidden forces that drive us. And she’s cracked the code. In Captivate, she shares shortcuts, systems, and secrets for taking charge of your interactions at work, at home, and in any social situation. These aren’t the people skills you learned in school. This is the first comprehensive, science backed, real life manual on how to captivate anyone—and a completely new approach to building connections.Just like knowing the formulas to use in a chemistry lab, or the right programming language to build an app, Captivate provides simple ways to solve people problems. You’ll learn, for example…· How to work a room: Every party, networking event, and social situation has a predictable map. Discover the sweet spot for making the most connections.· How to read faces: It’s easier than you think to speed-read facial expressions and use them to predict people’s emotions.· How to talk to anyone: Every conversation can be memorable—once you learn how certain words generate the pleasure hormone dopamine in listeners.When you understand the laws of human behavior, your influence, impact, and income will increase significantly. What’s more, you will improve your interpersonal intelligence, make a killer first impression, and build rapport quickly and authentically in any situation—negotiations, interviews, parties, and pitches. You’ll never interact the same way again.

Life-Changing Spiritual and Practical Strategies for True Transformation. Nothing is more frustrating than knowing you need to change and trying to change, but failing to change. You feel stuck, no matter how hard you try. Craig Groeschel, author of Winning the War in Your Mind, knows what it's like to be caught in that cycle. That was his own story--until he discovered these practical and biblical principles for experiencing lasting change. In The Power to Change, Craig will help you find true change in your relationships, habits, and thoughts by unpacking: How God's power, not your willpower, leads to true transformation The real reasons you do what you do Why falling isn't failure The power of creating small habits that lead to big change How to choose what you want most over what you want now A powerful blend of biblical wisdom and fascinating psychology, The Power to Change includes helpful exercises, real-life stories, and life-changing spiritual insights. Whether you are trying to lose weight, breathe new life into your marriage, read the Bible more, get out of debt, or give up an addiction, Craig's step-by-step, time-tested strategies will equip you to start living the life God wants for you.

The traditional view is that talent is innate - you've either got it or you haven't. But in The Talent Code, award-winning journalist Daniel Coyle reveals that the reality is very different. Drawing on the latest findings of scientists and educationalists, and looking at disciplines ranging from maths to music, he shows how the brain can be physically rewired and developed by training to create a 'talent code'. He identifies how a particular type of trainin, 'deep practice', enhances the development of myelin in the brain. He explains why talent tends to cluster at particular times and in particular places (from Elizabethan drama to Brazilian football). These clusters disprove the theory that talent is random and God-given, and prove that the development of one talented individual often encourages others He demonstrates why some people make the leap while others don't (factors include whether someone who goes on to be talented suffered the early loss of a parent, and whether they are the oldest, middle or youngest child). He shows why some teaching methods work better than others (e.g. why did so many children in the US struggle to learn to read when new practices were introduced). This is a radical and controversial new take on human ability and the nature of genius.

Here is Les Brown's personal formula for success and happiness -- positively charged thoughts, guidance, examples, plus an Action Planner to help you focus your thoughts on specific goals...and achieve them all. The answers are all here in this astonishing book -- with one simple, powerful message: We may not always be able to control what is put in our path, but we can always control what we are...and what we will become.