SELF-DEVELOPMENT BOOKS

• Running on Empty: Overcome Your Childhood Emotional Neglect by Jonice Webb - A must read! The first book about Emotional Neglect: an invisible force from your childhood which you can't see, but may be affecting you profoundly to this day. It is about what didn't happen in your childhood, what wasn't said, and what cannot be remembered. Check out Jori's blog post here.

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• The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk - This guy is a total badass and this is such an important book. Even if you don't think you've been affected by trauma, his ideas may still resonate with you. (But psst: we’ve all been affected by trauma). If you can't read the whole book, at least try to read some articles by him. You can start with Jori's blog post here.

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• Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender by David Hawkins- Probably one of the most important books on this list. 

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• The Way of Integrity: Finding the Path to Your True Self by Martha Beck. You know when you find a book exactly at the right time with exactly the right teacher? This book is basically my bible. It's about how much cultural expectations and pressures keep us locked into unhappy lives and how to break free!

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• A Radical Awakening: Turn Pain into Power, Embrace Your Truth, Live Free by Dr. Shefali Tsabary - A feminist manifesto written for women on love, culture, marriage, and sexuality.

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• Tapping In: A Step-by-Step Guide to Activating Your Healing Resources Through Bilateral Stimulation by Laurel Parnell - Curious about EMDR, maybe from one of Jori's previous blog posts? This is how you can begin do it to yourself! Activate your inner power and resilience!

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• In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness by Peter Levine - Memories, experiences, trauma, feelings get stored and stuck in our bodies & brains. Similar to the book above, this book teaches you how to engage your innate capacity for self-regulation and healing. Effective therapy involves more than just talking!

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• In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction by Gabor Mate - Modern, holistic approach to addiction, including many of our “high-status” addictive tendencies. Dr. Mate has also written a lot about the use of psychedelics in healing, including ayahuasca.

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• When the Body Says No: Understanding the Stress-Disease Connection by Gabor Mate - The effect of the mind-body link on illness and health and the role that stress and one's individual emotional makeup play in an array of common diseases, such as Cancer, MS, IBS, Dementia, Auto-Immune Disorders. Click here for link for Dr. Mate's Resources on stress, disease & healing. 

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• The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe by Stephen Porges - Brings an understanding of the autonomic nervous system into therapy & healing. As you can tell, we are very into the idea of how you and your body can support healing on your own. Dr. Porges is a pioneer in this field as he really links our psychological experiences to the physical manifestations in our bodies.

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• Will I Ever Be Good Enough? Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers by Karyl McBride - An insidious form of childhood abuse & neglect, from which you may be suffering and not even be aware. We really like her steps towards healing in this book. There's also a great audio version. You can start with Jori's blog posts here and here.

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• The Empath’s Survival Guide: Life Strategies for Sensitive People by Judith Orloff - Do you feel others’ emotions and energy more than you’d like? Does life feel like too much sometimes? Learn to embrace these gifts, while also developing healthy coping mechanisms to take care of yourself.

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• Inner Bonding: Becoming a Loving Adult to Your Inner Child by Margaret Paul - A little dated, but a good book about how to fill your own emotional holes instead of expecting other people to do it. Jori's blog post here.

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• Facing Codependence: What It Is, Where It Comes From, How It Sabotages Our Lives by Pia Mellody - This word is thrown around a lot, and often misunderstood, but these challenges are very common. Recovery involves clearing up toxic emotions left over from painful childhood experiences.​

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• Leaving Loneliness: A Workbook: Building Relationships with Yourself and Others by David Narang⁣⁣ - Our attachment style has major impacts on our relationships. It influences how balanced and nourished we feel with other people - or how isolated, longing, or trapped we become. But, good news - this workbook helps you change your attachment style.

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• Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed - Better advice than we could ever give. 

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