Also available in Hard Cover from amazon.com
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The Immune Power Personality: 7 Traits You Can Develop to Stay Healthy
- By Henry Dreher. Dutton, 1995. Paperback: Plume/Penguin, 1996.
- A selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club, a featured selection of Quality Paperback Book Club.
- Second serial rights obtained by Family Circle, Natural Health, Noetic Science Review.
- Selected for the New York Review of Books’ Reader’s Catalog (The 40,000 best books in print.)
Stress reduction has been the recommended cure-all for all those who tell us that the mind directly impacts the health of the body. But as leading health and medical writer Henry Dreher reveals, the key to mind-body health is not avoiding stress but developing personal strengths for copign with hard times. Drawing on cutting-edge research in the mind-body field, The Immune Power Personality identifies seven traits associated with immunity, and shows how individuals can cultivate them. Readers learn: how to enhance awareness of your mind-body signals; how to develop “hardiness” to protect you from the ravages of stress; how assertiveness helps you resist diseases of dysfunctional immunity, from arthritis to AIDS; how increasing your capacity for love bolsters your defense against illness; and how to stay strong, vigorous, and well in the wake of loss or stressful events.
Review from Booklist
Health and medicine writer Dreher promotes "a leap forward in mind-body medicine" that moves beyond stress reduction. He first chronicles the psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) breakthrough constituted by the discovery that brain chemicals in the bloodstream can alter the behavior of immune cells, then details the research of psychologist Gary Schwartz on the healing power of the "ACE factor" --that is, our capacity to Attend, Connect, and Express. Techniques such as meditation, biofeedback, and guided imagery, Dreher says, engender attention; record-keeping of symptoms can facilitate the opportunity to connect bodily manifestations with corresponding levels of being; a clear understanding of objectives can help people recognize symptoms, seek the best available treatment, procure emotional support from friends and family, and express sadness and anger. Tricked out with ACE exercises and case histories, Dreher's book makes a good case for this "harmony of balanced biochemistry." Whitney Scott
Review from Publisher's Weekly
"Dreher (Your Defense Against Cancer), a proponent of the body-mind connection, suggests that adopting traits that are characteristic of healthy people can lead to improved health. He believes the pivotal psychological factor in illness is not stress itself but how we cope with stress. Drawing on research by psychologists and physicians who have explored mind-body relationships, Dreher offers seven key factors that appear to encourage an improved immune system and better health: the ACE Factor (the ability to attend, connect and express); the capacity to confide; hardiness; assertiveness; the power of love; helping others and self-complexity (having many interests). Dreher cites his own freedom from expected colds and flu resulting from his incorporating these traits into his own lifestyle. Although the mind-body connection still draws much skeptical response, readers may be inclined to experiment to see if a change in attitudes will make them feel better and strengthen their own resistance to disease."
Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., Director, Stress Reduction Clinic, University of Massachusetts Medical Center, author of Wherever You Go, There You Are
"An extremely useful book, loaded with cutting-edge information that could change your life."
Joan Borysenko, author of Minding the Body, Mending the Mind, and A Woman's Book of Life
"One of the finest books on health and healing ever written."
Bernie Siegel, M.D., author of Love, Medicine, and Miracles
"A valuable guide to achieving personal immune power."
Larry Dossey, M.D., author of Healing Words
"This book is a captivating synthesis of cutting-edge insights. Dreher delights in both science and the soul. He has given us a book that is inspiring and utterly trustworthy. I feel healthier having read it!"
Martin Rossman, M.D., author of Healing Yourself
"Henry Dreher has taken the discourse on mind-body health to a new level. At the same time, he ahs expertly transformed a wealth of research and clinical experience into an exciting and practical book."
James S. Gordon, Director, Center for Mind-Body Medicine, author of Manifesto for a New Medicine
"A wonderfully useful book; a generous, thoughtful overview of the clinical implications of immunology research and a superb guide to using these research findings to improve immune functioning."
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