Despite his impressive academic qualifications, Wall (Physiology/St. Thomas’s Medical School; Fellow/Royal Society) writes...
Pain is a universal experience, so everyone has strong beliefs on the subject. Wall (Defeating Pain, not reviewed) delivers an expert’s account for the general reader.
Aside from sensitive areas like politics and religion, most intelligent people enjoy discovering everything they believe is wrong. Wall overturns many popular beliefs, but he plays no favorites, and he insists that the medical profession must also rethink its ideas. We learned in medical school that pain occurs when nerve signals from injured tissue stimulate the pain center in the brain, but this turns out to be wrong. Frequently injured tissue is pain-free, but normal tissue hurts (no one suffering a backache believes his back is healthy, for example, but 85 percent of painful backs show no evidence of injury—and for headaches, this number approaches 100 percent). Yet these victims suffer genuine pain. No study reveals a single pain center in the brain; half-a-dozen areas become active when something hurts (areas that govern attention, orientation, planning for action, and bodily processes such as blood pressure and heart rate), but nothing hurts until the brain gives it a thorough evaluation. After explaining the mechanism of pain, the author turns to its relief, and, again, surprises come thick and fast. Morphine is a natural herbal remedy. Not only is it derived from a plant, but its action mimics a natural narcotic-like substance produced by the brain to modulate pain. The chapter on placebos is an eye-opener: they are, in fact, powerful remedies with significant side effects. Reacting to placebos, therefore, is not a sign that one is suggestible or weak-minded, but rather that one expects a certain outcome. Every human reacts to placebos, as do dogs and rats.
Despite his impressive academic qualifications, Wall (Physiology/St. Thomas’s Medical School; Fellow/Royal Society) writes lucidly, using vivid examples, stories from his own life, and a generous dose of personal opinions. Readers may find they know more about pain than those who should be experts—such as their doctors.Pub Date: Aug. 5, 2000
ISBN: 0-231-12006-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Columbia Univ.
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2000
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.
A follow-on to the author’s garbled but popular 48 Laws of Power, promising that readers will learn how to win friends and influence people, to say nothing of outfoxing all those “toxic types” out in the world.
Greene (Mastery, 2012, etc.) begins with a big sell, averring that his book “is designed to immerse you in all aspects of human behavior and illuminate its root causes.” To gauge by this fat compendium, human behavior is mostly rotten, a presumption that fits with the author’s neo-Machiavellian program of self-validation and eventual strategic supremacy. The author works to formula: First, state a “law,” such as “confront your dark side” or “know your limits,” the latter of which seems pale compared to the Delphic oracle’s “nothing in excess.” Next, elaborate on that law with what might seem to be as plain as day: “Losing contact with reality, we make irrational decisions. That is why our success often does not last.” One imagines there might be other reasons for the evanescence of glory, but there you go. Finally, spin out a long tutelary yarn, seemingly the longer the better, to shore up the truism—in this case, the cometary rise and fall of one-time Disney CEO Michael Eisner, with the warning, “his fate could easily be yours, albeit most likely on a smaller scale,” which ranks right up there with the fortuneteller’s “I sense that someone you know has died" in orders of probability. It’s enough to inspire a new law: Beware of those who spend too much time telling you what you already know, even when it’s dressed up in fresh-sounding terms. “Continually mix the visceral with the analytic” is the language of a consultant’s report, more important-sounding than “go with your gut but use your head, too.”
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-42814-5
Page Count: 580
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An intriguing approach to identifying and relating to one’s emotions.
An analysis of our emotions and the skills required to understand them.
We all have emotions, but how many of us have the vocabulary to accurately describe our experiences or to understand how our emotions affect the way we act? In this guide to help readers with their emotions, Brackett, the founding director of Yale University’s Center for Emotional Intelligence, presents a five-step method he calls R.U.L.E.R.: We need to recognize our emotions, understand what has caused them, be able to label them with precise terms and descriptions, know how to safely and effectively express them, and be able to regulate them in productive ways. The author walks readers through each step and provides an intriguing tool to use to help identify a specific emotion. Brackett introduces a four-square grid called a Mood Meter, which allows one to define where an emotion falls based on pleasantness and energy. He also uses four colors for each quadrant: yellow for high pleasantness and high energy, red for low pleasantness and high energy, green for high pleasantness and low energy, and blue for low pleasantness and low energy. The idea is to identify where an emotion lies in this grid in order to put the R.U.L.E.R. method to good use. The author’s research is wide-ranging, and his interweaving of his personal story with the data helps make the book less academic and more accessible to general readers. It’s particularly useful for parents and teachers who want to help children learn to handle difficult emotions so that they can thrive rather than be overwhelmed by them. The author’s system will also find use in the workplace. “Emotions are the most powerful force inside the workplace—as they are in every human endeavor,” writes Brackett. “They influence everything from leadership effectiveness to building and maintaining complex relationships, from innovation to customer relations.”
An intriguing approach to identifying and relating to one’s emotions.Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-21284-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
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