Books by Gillian Bridge
Cutting its way through the media frenzy and over-sentimentality surrounding the mental health crisis, Sweet Distress puts emotional wellbeing and resilience centre stage while exposing the true cause of the growing mental health crisis: an overemphasis on talking about feelings and emotions.
Author and psycholinguistic consultant Gillian Bridge puts forward a compelling argument that wallowing in emotions and feelings is exactly what we shouldn’t be doing if we want to improve our mental health as it leads to self-indulgence, short-term fixes and a very unhealthy lifestyle.
There is no doubt that people are really suffering but what we need to do to alleviate this suffering is to build resilience, put our brains in charge of our feelings and look outwards, not inwards.
The book covers: stress, loneliness, anxiety, depression, body image (including eating disorders), social media, substance abuse, behavioural disorders, perfectionism, academic pressures and bullying.
Gillian looks at how these issues have led to apparently insurmountable emotional problems, and takes a few potshots at some of the things that have contributed to turning life events that may, at other times or in other places (perhaps more resilient ones?), have been little more than nuisances or inconveniences into sources of genuine psychic pain.
Packed with realistic and effective takeaway strategies for parents and educators, Sweet Distress challenges under-researched but over-promoted ideology and provides real, evidence-based help and advice for anyone wanting to improve the mental health of those they care about.
Suitable for parents, educators, counsellors and therapists.
Today we have everything that previous generations could ever have dreamed of. So why is it that so many people continue to go through life unhappy and unfulfilled, with millions more young people now facing mental health issues? Does it have something to do with the way our brains have developed? Could it be that humans are just essentially delusional?
Now a compelling and insightful new book, The Significance Delusion, draws upon scientific research, ideas, facts and real-life anecdotes to explore the human obsession with meaning. It takes readers on a journey through time, history and the mysterious labyrinth that is the brain, to explore what it really takes for us (and our children) to thrive and survive as individuals and as a society, and even learn the meaning of life.
The author, Gillian Bridge, is a psycholinguistic consultant and expert in empowering people to get the most from their brain, whatever the challenge. The common link in her previous work as a teacher, a lecturer, an addiction therapist, an executive coach and a resilience consultant has been the way brain development and the use of language affect any individual’s behaviour and communication. By understanding brain function and how it makes us behave the way we do, Gillian’s work enables all people, whether they clearly need help or not, to gain better control of their lives.
There are three interweaving strands throughout The Significance Delusion: brain matters, child-rearing matters and self-versus-community matters. By exploring these matters in a challenging, quirky and often humorous way, the book will not only help you answer some age-old questions about yourself (Who am I? What am I? How am I?), but also understand how to better promote the future mental and physical well-being of our children, for the benefit of them individually and society as a whole.
The Significance Delusion provides practical behavioural strategies to improve quality of life, making it a fascinating and invaluable book for parents, teachers, people working in social care, policy makers and anybody else who simply wants to understand themselves, or their relationships better. Published by: Crown House Publishing
Life’s too precious simply to let it slip away. Can there be anyone who doesn’t believe that? Yet today there are so many demands upon our time and attention, that life as it ought to be lived has all but deserted us or been forgotten. This wise, gently humourous text introduces us to what is so special about the Sloths! They have the art of their living so beautifully tuned. Where self-help seldom works as expected, Sloth-help provides great personal strengthening and a stress-free lifestyle. Sloth-help fixes relationships, sex, appearance, work, ambition, success, worry and blame and everything else that shouldn’t disturb life.
Here is an 87 per cent success rate. The approach is individual. There is a questionnaire assessment and self-perception analysis. This title presents a step-by-step plan for giving up, getting through tough times and staying that way. Smokers know full well that their problem is in their minds. There are triggers that the mind uses to reinforce their habit. For some it may be a cup of coffee, for others perhaps the telephone. But every time the trigger is pulled they reach for a cigarette. To overcome this problem they need to pre-empt the mind and have a stronger defence in position before they start to stop! In this book, smokers will learn the unique reasons why they smoke and from there how to tailor a personal step-by-step programme that will help them to give up smoking for good. And it’s a programme that is 87 per cent successful