#1 NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • From authors of Lean In and Originals: a powerful, inspiring, and practical book about building resilience and moving forward after life’s inevitable setbacks After the sudden death of her husband, Sheryl Sandberg felt certain that she and her children would never feel pure joy again. “I was in ‘the void,’” she writes, “a vast emptiness that fills your heart and lungs and restricts your ability to think or even breathe.” Her friend Adam Grant, a psychologist at Wharton, told her there are concrete steps people can take to recover and rebound from life-shattering experiences. We are not born with a fixed amount of resilience. It is a muscle that everyone can build. Option B combines Sheryl’s personal insights with Adam’s eye-opening research on finding strength in the face of adversity. Beginning with the gut-wrenching moment when she finds her husband, Dave Goldberg, collapsed on a gym floor, Sheryl opens up her heart—and her journal—to describe the acute grief and isolation she felt in the wake of his death. But Option B goes beyond Sheryl’s loss to explore how a broad range of people have overcome hardships including illness, job loss, sexual assault, natural disasters, and the violence of war. Their stories reveal the capacity of the human spirit to persevere . . . and to rediscover joy. Resilience comes from deep within us and from support outside us. Even after the most devastating events, it is possible to grow by finding deeper meaning and gaining greater appreciation in our lives. Option B illuminates how to help others in crisis, develop compassion for ourselves, raise strong children, and create resilient families, communities, and workplaces. Many of these lessons can be applied to everyday struggles, allowing us to brave whatever lies ahead. Two weeks after losing her husband, Sheryl was preparing for a father-child activity. “I want Dave,” she cried. Her friend replied, “Option A is not available,” and then promised to help her make the most of Option B. We all live some form of Option B. This book will help us all make the most of it.

While preparing to deploy with the U.S. Army Marcus suffered a severe spinal injurythat left him paralyzed. After dying on the operating table twice, the surgeons saved his life, but told himhe'd never walk again. Having no other option, Marcus started doing some brutally honest soul searching, looking for the lesson to be learned from his injury. Once he started seeing his Adversity as a gift instead of a curse, something miraculous began to happen..."The Gift of Adversity" tells the inspiring story and lessons learned from overcoming pain and paralysis to find purpose. Based on Marcus Aurelius Anderson's life and TEDx talk, "The Gift of Adversity" gives functional and inspiring wisdom that can be applied in personal development, motivation, and achievement.

Adversity's Child By: Bettye Sweet, M.S. "This book shows the author's and the other six females' resilience. The transparency of their stories, their passions and their redemption are felt in each and every chapter. This book took me on a roller coaster of emotions, but once I finished it, I better understood how precious life truly is. I fully understand now that life is too short to hold onto pain, resentment and unforgiveness." -Shelby Alvarez, screenwriter and actress "If you're looking for fuel to help you power up and overcome adversities that you're experiencing, Adversity's Child is the book for you. This self-help book shares many stories of women who have overcome traumatic experiences and have turned those tribulations into triumphant testimonies." -Robin Sweet-Ransom, author of Taboo and motivational speaker "I was amazed about how little I knew of Bettye's early life. The other six females' incredible stories are also as riveting, constructed around their real-life experiences. You will travel with them all on their amazing journey towards redemption. A must-read." -Mary Ann Brevidoro, BFF Adversity's Child tells the story of seven females-three victims and four murderers-and their journey toward redemption. All of these women's stories involve childhood traumas. Each of them begins with Dr. Nadine Burke Harris' Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) questionnaire. Bettye Sweet's story of molestation pales in comparison to that of her niece, Robin. Cheryl suffers extensive abuse and torture at the hands of her schizophrenic mother. Eight-year-old Carla watches her mother murder her twelve-year-old sister and then is raised by an incestuous father. There's Rita, who's serving a twenty-five-to-life sentence for murdering her boyfriend, and Kierra-serving the same for robbing and killing the neighborhood storekeeper. Finally, there's Danielle, an entitled girl whose jealously takes the life of her boyfriend's baby daughter. But with all of these challenges, can the power of love and forgiveness lead all seven to redemption? You will be riveted to these ladies' life-changing narratives.

Adversity can teach as well as torment. It forces us to become introspective. It tests the length and breadth of our will, our inventive spirit, and our drive to thrive. It is the clay that shapes character. With the hope of illuminating a thoughtful way forward, Bill Heitland shares nine short stories that offer a glimpse into the lives of diverse characters navigating their way through loss, health issues, heartache, separation, and much more. A father reunites with his estranged daughter with help from a running club whose members hail from India and the US. A handicapped boy wishing for a silver tongue finds a more golden gift on Christmas day. An individual learns that his brother’s life, though fraught with complex issues, held redeemable value. A young man fearing his maturation process is being stunted pushes toward the threshold of adulthood amid a key rite of passage. A married couple coping with the loss of their daughter find a way to rekindle the ardent love that marked their courtship. In this volume of short tales, individuals and families who must deal with tests of their strength of character find something rich—a light that translates into hope.

Dr. Arku takes readers from the passage of pain to their promise in God in order to help them deal with crisis victoriously. (Christian)

Americans have a gift for coining proverbs. "A picture is worth a thousand words" was not, as you might imagine, the product of ancient Chinese wisdom -- it was actually minted by advertising executive Fred Barnard in a 1921 advertisement for Printer's Ink magazine. After all, Americans are first and foremost a practical people and proverbs can be loosely defined as pithy statements that are generally accepted as true and useful. The next logical step would be to gather all of this wisdom together for a truly American celebration of shrewd advice.A Dictionary of American Proverbs is the first major collection of proverbs in the English language based on oral sources rather than written ones. Listed alphabetically according to their most significant key word, it features over 15,000 entries including uniquely American proverbs that have never before been recorded, as well as thousands of traditional proverbs that have found their way into American speech from classical, biblical, British, continental European, and American literature. Based on the fieldwork conducted over thirty years by the American Dialect Society, this volume is complete with historical references to the earliest written sources, and supplies variants and recorded geographical distribution after each proverb.Many surprised await the reader in this vast treasure trove of wit and wisdom. Collected here are nuggets of popular wisdom on all aspects of American life: weather, agriculture, travel, money, business, food, neighbors, friends, manners, government, politics, law, health, education, religion, music, song, and dance. And, to further enhance browsing pleasure, the editors have provided a detailed guide to the use of the work. While it's true that many of our best known proverbs have been supplied by the ever-present "Anonymous," many more can be attributed to some very famous Americans, like Ernest Hemingway, Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin, Mark Twain, J. Pierpont Morgan, Thomas Alva Edison, Abigail Adams, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, to name but a few offered in this fascinating collection.Who wouldn't want to know the origin of "the opera ain't over till the fat lady sings?" This uniquely American proverb and many more are gathered together in A Dictionary of American Proverbs. A great resource for students and scholars of literature, psychology, folklore, linguistics, anthropology, and cultural history, this endlessly intriguing volume is also a delightful companion for anyone with an interest in American culture.