Description

By (author) Vincent Deary; By (author) Deary Vincent

Short /annotation:
We live in small worlds. Conscious change requires deliberate effort, and so, for the most part, we avoid it. Drawing on personal stories from everyday lives in transition, and a range of literary and cultural references, this book shows us how we can resist being mere habit machines, and make our acts and our lives more fully our own.

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We are creatures of habit, living most of our lives automatically, in small worlds of more or less comfortable routine. But sometimes outside forces compel us to adjust, and sometimes we must make changes ourselves. What happens when change disrupts our lives? This book is the first in a trilogy which offers an insight unlike any other into the human mind and heart: how we are, how we break, and how we mend. It is about all of us, humbly figuring out how to live.

Review quote:
Exhilarating, lyrical, consoling… His voice is pleasingly sardonic one of a peer who finds this stuff as difficult and disorientating as the rest of us

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A book about human nature. It”s crammed with ideas. It makes your head spin, in a good way

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Fascinating, profound, wonderfully well-observed… [How We Are] could change lives

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An honest, self-searching voice, rich in images and characters” stories

Biographical note:
Vincent Deary is professor of applied health psychology at Northumbria University, where his research focuses on the development of new psychosocial interventions for people with a variety of health complaints, including cancer survivors and fear of falling in older adults. As a clinician he works in the UK”s first trans-diagnostic Fatigue Clinic, to help people for whom fatigue is a disabling symptom. He is the author of How We Are.

Promotional headline:
We are creatures of habit, and we live in small worlds. But what happens when change disrupts our lives? This book, the first in a trilogy, offers profound insight into the human mind and heart- how we are, how we break, how we mend.