NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A meditation on sense-making when there’s no sense to be made, on letting go when we can’t hold on, and on being unafraid even when we’re terrified.”—Lucy Kalanithi “Belongs on the shelf alongside other terrific books about this difficult subject, like Paul Kalanithi’s When Breath Becomes Air and Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal.”—Bill Gates NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY REAL SIMPLE Kate Bowler is a professor at Duke Divinity School with a modest Christian upbringing, but she specializes in the study of the prosperity gospel, a creed that sees fortune as a blessing from God and misfortune as a mark of God’s disapproval. At thirty-five, everything in her life seems to point toward “blessing.” She is thriving in her job, married to her high school sweetheart, and loves life with her newborn son. Then she is diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer. The prospect of her own mortality forces Kate to realize that she has been tacitly subscribing to the prosperity gospel, living with the conviction that she can control the shape of her life with “a surge of determination.” Even as this type of Christianity celebrates the American can-do spirit, it implies that if you “can’t do” and succumb to illness or misfortune, you are a failure. Kate is very sick, and no amount of positive thinking will shrink her tumors. What does it mean to die, she wonders, in a society that insists everything happens for a reason? Kate is stripped of this certainty only to discover that without it, life is hard but beautiful in a way it never has been before. Frank and funny, dark and wise, Kate Bowler pulls the reader deeply into her life in an account she populates affectionately with a colorful, often hilarious retinue of friends, mega-church preachers, relatives, and doctors. Everything Happens for a Reason tells her story, offering up her irreverent, hard-won observations on dying and the ways it has taught her to live. Praise for Everything Happens for a Reason “I fell hard and fast for Kate Bowler. Her writing is naked, elegant, and gripping—she’s like a Christian Joan Didion. I left Kate’s story feeling more present, more grateful, and a hell of a lot less alone. And what else is art for?”—Glennon Doyle, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Love Warrior and president of Together Rising

In 1927 in the field of health care an unusual event occurred. Morris Aaron Cohen, M.D. founded the Boston Evening Clinic, an unusual and never before conceived facility for the treatment of the indigent and low-wage earners who could not afford to lose a day s pay. It was an endeavor that achieved success against overwhelming odds: the objections of the Massachusetts Medical Society, major hospitals, banks, and businesses. Often denounced as unethical or even called a liar by an outstanding member of the Society who believed Morris Cohen was taking money from the poor and placing it in his own pockets, the besieged man never surrendered. None of the criticisms was justified and all were proved false. Why? Because Dr. Morris Cohen, as his memoir attests, persisted; because he believed there were many among us who required the kind of care he believed in. Eventually, this humane man who believed in the dignity of human beings, who recognized the needs of people unable to pay for medical care during the day, rose in stature with his clinic until eventual recognition by Presidents of the United States and persons, both medical and lay, within the United States and beyond. Critical Reviews Even though the concept and mission of the Boston Evening Clinic was the first of its kind in the nation, and a model that pre-dated and influenced the sweeping health care laws that ultimately created Medicare and Medicaid, Dr. Cohen s vision was repeatedly thwarted by the myopic business and medical leadership, who apparently failed to grasp the longer term social value of improved health, cost savings, and job preservation that resulted from the Boston Evening Clinic s model of unfettered, timely and preventive care. - Roseanna H. Means, M.D. President and Chief Medical Officer, Women of Means, Inc. Internal Medicine, Brigham & Women's Hospital Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School Healing After Dark is an inspiration for the next generation of health care reformers. It is a reminder to the current ones that the requirements of perseverance, hard work, with little financial remuneration and movement to overcome the inertia of status quo are practically a guarantee that you are on to something of great importance. - Margaret A. Caudill-Slosberg, MD, PhD, MPH Dr. Cohen gives readers an exciting insight into the founding and operation of a unique medical facility that still serves a model for these times, as well as an evocation of the life and culture of early twentieth-century Boston. - Bernard M. Hyatt, publisher emeritus of "The Jewish Advocate," Boston

Recent scandals of clergy sexual abuse have brought attention to the victims and their responses to and recovery from their abuse. But few have considered the effect of the abuse on a victim's soul and religious outlook and beliefs. Healing the Soul after Religious Abuse, offers a unique perspective of recovery and restoration of the soul after religious abuse. The author argues that religious abuse often stops not only psychological growth, but also inward development. The effect is not simply emotional, because the devastation reaches to the core of the spirit. Often there is no place for a God of love or a love of what once was divine. Through a series of personal interviews with persons from the five major religions, Rauch considers various ways that religion can do harm. The stories told in this book include the road to restoration in the wake of institutional abuse and how inner experience is sometimes confused with religious training; the sacred task of spiritual leadership and how to restore trust when there has been a violation; an exploration of sacrifice and a clarification of the notion of shame; a look at the impact of religious bigotry in the areas of race, sexuality, and tolerance; an overview of sexuality and the place it holds in both celibate and family life; the pernicious issue of clergy sexual abuse and the signs of spiritual trauma in response to such violation; a roadmap for restoration and a challenge to religious institutions; and, lastly, ways to reclaim the sacred and rewire the spirit. Through interviews, research, and personal stories, the author tells a story of recovery of the most delicate kind, offering pathways through the dark night of religious violation to a restoration of the soul and its immense possibilities.

From Michelle Knight-Cleveland kidnapping survivor and #1 New York Times bestselling author of Finding Me comes an inspirational book about healing and resilience, on the five-year anniversary of her escape. Michelle Knight -- now known as Lily Rose Lee -- captured the world's attention in May 2013, when she and two fellow kidnapping victims were found and freed after being held for more than a decade by notorious Cleveland kidnapper Ariel Castro. But many people are still asking: What happened after her escape? How do you re-enter society after years of abuse and isolation? How do you get past the trauma and live a happy and joy filled life? How do you learn to trust again? In Life After Darkness, published on the fifth anniversary of her liberation, Lily describes how she managed to heal the wounds to her body, mind, and soul-wounds, she reveals, that were first inflicted even before her kidnapping. With the help of good friends and anchored by her own inner strength, she takes us with her step by step on her journey out of darkness into the light. An inspiring story -- and for anyone who has dared to hope after suffering, a guidebook to finding new purpose for a meaningful life.

This book is a handbook for increasing your emotional intelligence. Moreover, if you are a survivor of a dysfunctional family, it is a guide for repairing the damage done to your emotional nature in childhood. The Tao of Fully Feeling focuses primarily on the emotional healing level of trauma recovery. It is a safe handbook for grieving losses of childhood. Whether or not you are a childhood trauma survivor, this book is a guide to emotional health. The degree of our mental health is often reflected in the degree to which we love and respect ourselves and others in a myriad of different feeling states. Real self-esteem and real intimacy with others depends on the ability to lovingly be there for oneself and others, whether one's feeling experience is pleasant or unpleasant.

Ready for your spirit to feel whole again? These daily meditations provide trauma survivors with a daily experience of the emotional and spiritual healing that our soul wants for us. Based on years of counseling and spiritual coaching of survivors of all types of traumas, the authors invite readers to a daily healing and empowering connection to their soul and conscious contact with their Higher Power. Peace is an inside job. Deep within you is an indestructible soul whose voice and divine spark can speak the wisdom you need and prove the light to illuminate even the dark places and shadowy paths of your life journey. For many survivors of trauma and abuse, the emotional and spiritual wounds of your trauma can drown out the small, still voice of your soul and block your view of its light. But the dark night of trauma is no match for the inner light of your soul.

Nautilus Book Award Gold Winner A psychotherapist offers “crucial” guidance on how to “alter fundamentally our fearful relationship to deep feelings,” from depression and anxiety to grief and fear (Los Angeles Times) We are all touched at some point by the dark emotions of grief, fear, or despair. In an age of global threat, these emotions have become widespread and overwhelming. While conventional wisdom warns us of the harmful effects of “negative” emotions, this revolutionary book offers a more hopeful view: there is a redemptive power in our worst feelings. Seasoned psychotherapist Miriam Greenspan argues that it’s the avoidance and denial of the dark emotions that results in the escalating psychological disorders of our time: depression, anxiety, addiction, psychic numbing, and irrational violence. And she shows us how to trust the wisdom of the dark emotions to guide, heal, and transform our lives and our world. Drawing on inspiring stories from her psychotherapy practice and personal life, and including a complete set of emotional exercises, Greenspan teaches the art of emotional alchemy by which grief turns to gratitude, fear opens the door to joy, and despair becomes the ground of a more resilient faith in life. “This remarkable book has taught me a whole new way of thinking.” —Harold Kushner, author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People “A beautiful piece of work destined to become a perennial classic.” —Martha Beck, author of The Joy Diet