Andrea Brandt

Don't let the ominous perception of "aging" - a lack of purpose, feeling irrelevant and under-used, having nothing to do - take control of you and your life. You have the power to change how you grow older. This book will show you how. Renowned psychotherapist and aging expert Andrea Brandt, PhD, MFT, helps you throw out the old stereotypes about getting older and move toward the welcoming new evidence that your future is alive with possibility, providing steps to thrive today and into your golden years. The acclaimed Mindful Aging is full of exercises and tools to help you embrace a new mindset and blaze a new trail in your life fueled by passion, purpose, and creativity. Through research, inspiring stories of real people, and Dr. Brandt's psychological insight, you'll be able to claim the immense joy and love that are yours to have, the deep wisdom that is yours to share, and the exciting self-discoveries and contributions that are uniquely yours to make. Join the millions who are becoming mindful about aging, and discover the secrets to creating a life that doesn't wane as the years go by. Mindful Aging will forever change how you view - and embrace - your life as you age.

Anger is one the most common human emotions, so if you’re not feeling it, then you’re probably unconsciously burying it. But anger that is buried isn’t actually gone. In fact, hidden or covert anger may be just as damaging as the overt, outwardly destructive kind, only it wreaks havoc from the inside-out. All sorts of physical and emotional problems can stem from suppressed anger: headaches, digestive problems, insomnia, just to name a few. Buried anger is expressed in a continuum, with rage and aggression at the top, and frustration, annoyance, irritation at the bottom, and everything in between. Unless this anger is addressed, it is impossible to overcome. This book urges readers to practice mindfulness-deliberately allowing physical sensations and emotions to surface so they can be examined and released. This sort of processing of anger-fully felt in the body as it happens, moved out through appropriate expression, and let go-will allow readers to process anger before it becomes unhealthy. Whether for you or your clients, this book offers simple tools of mindfulness to strengthen your connection with your inner world and learn to explore your anger, paying heed to the important messages it is sending.

Many people often say “yes” to something when they’d rather say “no.” They offer cooperation through words but follow up with how they really feel—in actions that contradict their words. That’s passive-aggression. At its heart, passive-aggression is about being untrue to oneself, which makes it impossible to have a clean relationship with others. Passive-aggression as a communication method doesn’t make someone “bad.” It is simply a strategy learned in childhood as a coping mechanism, a hard-to-break habit. Changing passive-aggressive behavior requires knowledge, tools, and practice, as outlined here. The book offers effective methods for transforming passive-aggression into healthy assertiveness to communicate in constructive ways through eight keys: Recognize Your Hidden Anger; Reconnect Your Emotions to Your Thoughts; Listen to Your Body; Set Healthy Boundaries; Communicate Assertively; Interact Using Mindfulness; Disable the Enabler; and Problem-Solve for Better Outcomes. Hands-on exercises are featured, enabling readers to better understand themselves.