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Whole Brain Living

The Anatomy of Choice and the Four Characters That Drive Our Life

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Whole Brain Living

By: Jill Bolte Taylor PhD
Narrated by: Jill Bolte Taylor PhD
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About this listen

 For half a century we have been trained to believe that our right brain hemisphere is our emotional brain, while our left brain houses our rational thinking. Now neuroscience shows that it's not that simple: in fact, our emotional limbic tissue is evenly divided between our two hemispheres. Consequently, each hemisphere has both an emotional brain and a thinking brain. In this groundbreaking new book, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor presents these four distinct modules of cells as four characters that make up who we are: Character 1, Left Thinking; Character 2, Left Emotion; Character 3, Right Emotion; and Character 4, Right Thinking.Everything we think, feel, or do is dependent upon brain cells to perform that function. Since each of the Four Characters stems from specific groups of cells that feel unique inside of our body, they each display particular skills, feel specific emotions, or think distinctive thoughts. In Whole Brain Living, Dr. Taylor shows us how to get acquainted with our own Four Characters, observe how they show up in our daily life, and learn to identify and relate to them in others as well. And she introduces a practice called the Brain Huddle--a tool for bringing our Four Characters into conversation with one another so we can tap their respective strengths and choose which one to embody in any situation.The more we become familiar with each of the characters in ourselves and others, the more power we gain over our thoughts, our feelings, our relationships, and our lives. Indeed, we discover that we have the power to choose who and how we want to be in every moment. And when our Four Characters work together and balance one another as a whole brain, we gain a radical new road map to deep inner peace.Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor is a Harvard-trained and published neuroanatomist. In 1996 she experienced a severe hemorrhage in the left hemisphere of her brain causing her to lose the ability to walk, talk, read, write, or recall any of her life. Her memoir, My Stroke of Insight, documenting her experience with stroke and eight-year recovery, spent 63 weeks on the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list and is still routinely the #1 book about stroke on Amazon.This audio product contains a PDF with supporting material, and the PDF is available to download Brain & Nervous System Neuroscience & Neuropsychology Personal Development Physical Illness & Disease Psychology Psychology & Mental Health Stress Management Emotions Human Brain Inspiring
All stars
Most relevant
A totally fantastic, life affirming book. I cried big fat happy tears through much of it.

Wonderful

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I would especially recommend this book for the ones interested in the topic of how neuroscience and spirituality interact, how the consciousness works, what is meditation (spoiler: it’s nothing but a silence of the left hemisphere). I lived the book and it’s a missing piece of the puzzle of my picture of the universe and our place in it.

A great read

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Gave me a good insight into my own troubles, through her own heartfelt experience and objective analysis.

Self reflection

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I loved this book and I also loved Jill's previous book My Stroke of Insight. In Whole Brain Living, I really enjoyed learning about the 4 characters in our brains. I was particularly excited to find out about Character 4, present and peaceful and connected with everyone and everything and IN MY HEAD all the time. A book which has given me a helpful new way to look at myself and fresh tools with which to manage myself.

A new way of looking at ourselves

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I’ve been going through a big awakening in middle age and was recommended this book by a friend and therapist. I’m from a background of work addiction and high achieving, high functioning depression, so to finally understand what had gone wrong and how to put it right has been nothing short of a revelation for me. The story of the author’s stroke and recovery is moving and the insights garnered from it explained perfectly, so a layman like myself can understand how we are who we are and how we can teach ourselves to turn up better, to heal and to be authentic.

Life changing and afforming

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