Six years with my knight in shining armor. Four years with my knight in dented armor. Two years with my knight in rusted armor. It is time to make a change. Time to find myself, even if it scares the hell out of me. I, Makenzie Mayfair, am leaving my husband. This is my chance to begin again, to rip my backbone out and yell, "I've found it." It may take time, it may take new friends, a job and even a jerk of a boss who is annoyingly handsome, but I will get there. I'm determined to be who I want to be, and plan to have a whole heap of fun along the way.

Why is it so hard to make lasting changes in our companies, in our communities, and in our own lives? The primary obstacle is a conflict that's built into our brains, say Chip and Dan Heath, authors of the critically acclaimed bestseller Made to Stick. Psychologists have discovered that our minds are ruled by two different systems - the rational mind and the emotional mind—that compete for control. The rational mind wants a great beach body; the emotional mind wants that Oreo cookie. The rational mind wants to change something at work; the emotional mind loves the comfort of the existing routine. This tension can doom a change effort - but if it is overcome, change can come quickly. In Switch, the Heaths show how everyday people - employees and managers, parents and nurses - have united both minds and, as a result, achieved dramatic results: • The lowly medical interns who managed to defeat an entrenched, decades-old medical practice that was endangering patients • The home-organizing guru who developed a simple technique for overcoming the dread of housekeeping • The manager who transformed a lackadaisical customer-support team into service zealots by removing a standard tool of customer service In a compelling, story-driven narrative, the Heaths bring together decades of counterintuitive research in psychology, sociology, and other fields to shed new light on how we can effect transformative change. Switch shows that successful changes follow a pattern, a pattern you can use to make the changes that matter to you, whether your interest is in changing the world or changing your waistline.

'Game-changing. Katy Milkman shows in this book that we can all be a super human' Angela Duckworth, bestselling author of Grit How to Change is a powerful, groundbreaking blueprint to help you - and anyone you manage, teach or coach - to achieve personal and professional goals, from the master of human nature and behaviour change and Choiceology podcast host Professor Katy Milkman. Award-winning Wharton Professor Katy Milkman has devoted her career to the study of behaviour change. An engineer by training, she approaches all challenges as problems to be solved and, with this mind-set, has drilled into the roadblocks that prevent us from achieving our goals and breaking unwanted behaviours. The key to lasting change, she argues, is not to set ever more audacious goals or to foster good habits but to get your strategy right. In How to Change Milkman identifies seven human impulses, or 'problems', that commonly sabotage our attempts to make positive personal and professional change. Then, crucially, instead of getting you to do battle with these impulses she shows you how to harness them and use these as driving forces to help instil new, positive behaviours - better, faster and more efficiently than you could imagine. Drawing her own original research, countless engaging case studies and practical tools throughout to help you put her ideas into action, Milkman reveals a proven, inspiring path that can take you - once and for all - from where you are today to where you want to be.

Celebrating 40 years of the best-selling guide for coping with life's changes, named one of the 50 all-time best books in self-help and personal development -- with a new Discussion Guide for readers, written by Susan Bridges and aimed at today's current people and organizations facing unprecedented change First published in 1980, Transitions was the first book to explore the underlying and universal pattern of transition. Named one of the fifty most important self-help books of all time, Transitions remains the essential guide for coping with the inevitable changes in life. Transitions takes readers step-by-step through the three perilous stages of any transition, explaining how each stage can be understood and embraced. The book offers an elegant, simple, yet profoundly insightful roadmap to navigate change and move into a hopeful future: Endings. Every transition begins with one. Too often we misunderstand them, confuse them with finality -- that's it, all over, finished! Yet the way we think about endings is key to how we can begin anew. The Neutral Zone. The second hurdle: a seemingly unproductive time-out when we feel disconnected from people and things in the past, and emotionally unconnected to the present. Actually, the neutral zone is a time of reorientation. How can we make the most of it? The New Beginning. We come to beginnings only at the end, when we launch new activities. To make a successful new beginning requires more than simply persevering. It requires an understanding of the external signs and inner signals that point the way to the future.

Tired of low pay and boring work, the women of the American Empire Insurance Company decide to take control of their lives. It isn't long until the management finds out their intentions and the confrontation begins. However, the women workers are ready to make changes. Ellen Anderson, a white factory worker from a small town, meets Karen Davis, a college-educated African-American professional and Pia Li, from New York's Chinatown to form a union and win better pay and benefits. The clash of cultures and the struggle against sexism intensifies their conflict, while an ever-worsening economy drives them to do what they must do to earn better pay and respect on the job. If you've ever wanted to try out union organizing to see if you've got what it takes, read this book.

The best-selling guide for coping with changes in life and work, named one of the 50 all-time best books in self-help and personal development Whether you choose it or it is thrust upon you, change brings both opportunities and turmoil. Since Transitions was first published, this supportive guide has helped hundreds of thousands of readers cope with these issues by providing an elegantly simple yet profoundly insightful roadmap of the transition process. With the understanding born of both personal and professional experience, William Bridges takes readers step by step through the three stages of any transition: The Ending, The Neutral Zone, and, eventually, The New Beginning. Bridges explains how each stage can be understood and embraced, leading to meaningful and productive movement into a hopeful future. With a new introduction highlighting how the advice in the book continues to apply and is perhaps even more relevant today, and a new chapter devoted to change in the workplace, Transitions will remain the essential guide for coping with the one constant in life: change.

Based on original research conducted by the author over the past twenty years, this book is a definitive investigation of enduring change. Hundreds of therapists and change agents, in addition to a diverse group of people who have self-initiated experiences, or structured therapy, have been interviewed about their most dramatic growth and the factors that contributed to making their changes last. Written for helping and leadership professionals, as well as the public, this book will give readers the knowledge and tools they need to understand the mechanisms and processes of lasting change.