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HEALTH ISSUES, SELF-HELP, AND SPIRITUALITY

 

FEATURED PUBLISHERS AND TITLES ON THIS PAGE:

AUTODIDACTIC PRESS
September University

TRUE WIND PUBLISHING
Love and Pornography

 

September University
Summoning Passion for an Unfinished Life

by Charles D. Hayes
Autodidactic Press
ISBN 9780962197970
289 pages, paperback
$16.95

“A high-tide demographic, a huge force of seniors, is set to come ashore,” forecasts Charles D. Hayes in his latest manifesto of lifelong learning, “bringing with them a special brand of wisdom available only through the process of aging.” The question is whether society will be ready to pay attention. Our youth- and profit-oriented culture has historically tended to cast aside the brains-and-experience wealth of its elders, relegating them to death-in-waiting centers where their inherent human worth is devalued because they are seen as no longer contributing to an often gross national product.

But Hayes is not a social revolutionary so much as a Pied Piper for individual self-enrichment. The very name of his press has promoted the ethos of the self-taught since its founding in 1987. Quoting everyone from Nietzsche to Emerson to Karen Armstrong, September University argues persuasively that getting older is no reason to stop exploring the meaning and potential of life. It’s worth noting that Hayes hails from Wasilla, Alaska, and has been “going rogue” with style and independent erudition for years before Sarah Palin somehow made being dense and self-serving into populist campaign issues.

“I offer my own life experience as evidence that blue-collar folks can break the intellectual barrier and appreciate a life of the mind as deeply as anyone who ever tread among the halls of our Ivy League universities," writes Hayes. “The buried truth of the matter is that all of us are more altruistic than corporate elites would have us believe, and we are also starved for learning without pretension.” September University is a clarion call not just for Baby Boomers to claim their mantles of wisdom, but for common folks of all ages to recognize that taking charge of one’s own intellectual assets is the best way to bring “power to the people.”—P.MILLER • 2-11

Love and Pornography
Dealing with Porn and Saving your Relationship

by Victoria and Garry Prater
True Wind Publishing
ISBN 9780981874388
212 pages, paperback
$18.95

Boy meets girl. Boy almost loses girl because of his fascination with online porn, which disgusts her. She’s especially troubled by research revealing that up to 85% of the women in porn have suffered sexual abuse in childhood, and it doesn’t help that when her partner indulges he deprives her not only of his company and potential sex, but also of the truth. Boy and girl decide to make a sincere effort to heal this rift using Dr. Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication technique, also known as Compassionate Communication.

For Victoria and Garry Prater this led to three years of struggle and this book. Though the words “love” and “pornography” appear in its title, the book’s prose is closer to PG and this is more of a relationship-repair close-up, a co-journaling of each partner’s feelings and self-analysis rendered into the language of “core values” and “basic needs.” Garry discovers within porn a playful creativity and freedom he likes and wants. Victoria realizes that some of the panic she feels when her feelings are ignored is a replay of her childhood experience of “not mattering” to her mentally ill mother.

What I found fascinating was the way each partner had the potential to be each other’s missing piece. Each had the power to pour light and comfort into the other’s loneliness. Yin and yang…. together they could become whole. I admire the authors’ integrity in telling the difficult truth about the end result of their efforts.— S.FRIEDMAN 10/10

 

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