Reviews with TLC

How Not to Age: The Scientific Approach to Getting Healthier as You Get Older by Michael Greger, M.D., FACLM continues Greger's exploration into the research of how to eat the healthiest diet possible to live the healthiest life possible for the longest healthy life possible. While I understood the need for Greger to refer to videos on his website for further explanation given how long the book already is, I found it distracting at times. How Not to Age isn't a fountain of youth as much as a guide to the benefits of eating healthfully and avoiding unhealthy food. As anyone who has followed Gregor's work knows, the answers are often to follow a plant-based diet still I appreciate that Greger is honest enough to explore even the studies that tangentially point in other directions. How Not to Age debunks myths and explores studies including who paid for the studies and whether the sponsors have a vested interest in the outcome, particularly for their own income at the expen...

The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel Van Der Kolk, M.D. felt like being in therapy and studying the therapy technique at the same time. At about the 20% mark, I think, I texted a psychologist friend and arranged a book discussion for when I finished it.  The research Van De Kolk has participated in over his career is fascinating as is the other research he gathered in this book. I repeatedly wished I'd found this research twenty or thirty years ago. That said, there were several times word choices that made me feel uncomfortable and earlier in my life likely would have been triggering for me. I'm certain the research has continued to evolve as research tends to do, but The Body Keeps the Score made me finally realize that all those times I felt like my body was betraying me was it having a normal reaction to trauma. Several of the life techniques discussed in the book, I discovered through a more painstaking and lonely process of ...

  I read quite a few nonfiction books in 2022 over a relatively wide range of topics. I enjoy learning new things, so I tend to read a lot of nonfiction. This was an interesting year of reading for me in that I was working through my to-be-read piles but couldn't resist a few new releases. I found most of the nonfiction I read in 2022 interesting and informative.   The Grieving Brain: The Surprising Science of How We Learn from Love and Loss  by Mary-Francis O'Connor, PhD offers an interesting perspective on the grieving process. The research O'Connor has done as well as other research she cites offers a glimpse into the functioning of the grieving brain as we move through the process of grief. The idea of the brain needing to relearn habits as part of the grieving process struck me as particularly important and interesting. While much of the research O'Connor discusses is still influx and therefore perhaps not as definitive as some would like, it is still very interest...

I moved a bit more toward workbook style guided journals than I have used in previous years. I found the ones I used this year to each provide some helpful insights as well as to have some less than insightful points. Whether this is because of where I am in my life journey or a fault of the journals is yours to decide should you decide to try them.   52 Lists for Calm  by Moorea Seal is  a list journal with prompts that one fills out weekly rather than daily. Some prompts are better than others. Honestly, I didn't enjoy this list journal as much as I've enjoyed others in past years. I never could quite figure out why. All I know is that instead of making me feel calm, somewhere around the middle of the year it began to feel like a chore. I've really enjoyed list journals in the past, so I'm not so sure if the problem was with the journal or with where I'm at in my life.   52 Lists for Bravery  by Moorea Seal -  This is another list journal I started at the...

  This Can't be Love: The Cabin Trilogy: Book 2  by Joanne Pence was the lighthearted read I needed toward the end of the month. I needed something that carried me along and didn't require me to think too much. The characters were fun to get to know and I fell hard for the cat that kept appearing at  the cabin. While parts of the book were what I think of as typical romance, Pence's play with the tropes was fun. The deeper issue of the characters' insecurities hit me hard a few times as Pence's insights made them come alive. For anyone who enjoys a love story with a hint of a ghost story, This Can't Be Love is a quick but enjoyable read.    The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times by Michelle Obama lifted my spirit and made me feel more hopeful than I have in a while. Honestly, I didn't realize how much I needed that dose of hope until I let out a deep exhale about halfway through the book. Her chapter on friendship brought me to tears as I though...

Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert promises to inspire and empower. Maybe it does for some people. It is well written and easy to understand. Written as part self-help, part memoir, Big Magic explores Gilbert's struggles to challenge her fears and embrace her creativity in a way that aims to help the reader do the same. I found some parts of it interesting, but overall I didn't find it changed anything about my relationship with creativity. To be fair, that might be because I'm pretty happy with my creativity and was before I started reading it. Rising Strong by Brené Brown continues exploring Brown's research into vulnerability and, really, into human interaction and behavior as a whole. Brown's research often pushes her to examine her own life, and she shares those experiences in her books. Sometimes it's easy to get lost in the stories and lose track of her research while reading even though she cites the research often. I always g...