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Here are some very good books on family related matters.
Although these books are written by "non-devotees", still they are very useful to understand the basic psychological patterns that drive our human natures.
For example, if we want to cook a cake for Lord Caitanya on His appearance day, but all we have are karmi recipes, we can still use the recipes, leaving out the unofferable items adapting the recipe to make it suitable for offering to the Lord.. Similarly, these books are like recipes for successful relationships in our lives. Why reinvent the wheel when all that is required is a little adaptation...
I highly recommend these books. They have made a significant positive influence in my devotional life and serving the needs of my family, both material and spiritual.
VIDEOS
- The 10 things every child needs by the Robert R. McCormick Tribune Foundation: THIS VIDEO IS A MUST FOR ANYONE WHO PLANS TO BE A PARENT. See Character Development for a synopsis of the video.Visit their website at http://www.rrmtf.org/education/index.htm
BOOKS
- Parenting with Love and Logic by Foster Cline M.D. and Jim Faye: If you want to raise kids who are self-confident, motivated, and ready for the real world, take advantage of this win-win approach to parenting. Your kids will win because they'll learn responsibility and the logic of life by solving their own problems. And you will win because you'll establish healthy control - without resorting to anger, threats, nagging, or exhausting power struggles.
- Parenting Teens with Love and Logic by Foster Cline M.D. and Jim Faye. Preparing adolescents for responsible adulthood. As a parent, you face no greater challenge - and no greater opportunity - than to guide your children through their teen years toward productive, happy, and responsible adulthood. This book will help you meet that challenge and rejoice in that opportunity.
- The five Love Languages of Children by Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell, M.D.. Each child, like an adult, expresses and receives love best through one of five different communications styles. This truth can work against parents who speak different love languages than their children. However, when properly prepared, moms and dads can use this information to help them meet their children's deepest emotional needs.Discover your child's primary love language - Quality time, Words of Affirmation, Gifts, Acts of Service, Physical Touch - and learn what you can do to effectively convey unconditional feelings of respect, affection, and commitment that will resonate in your child's soul.
BOOKS
- Emotional Intelligence by
Daniel Goleman:
"IMPRESSIVE IN ITS SCOPE AND DEPTH, STAGGERING IN ITS IMPLICATIONS, EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE GIVES US AN ENTIRELY NEW WAY OF LOOKING AT THE ROOT CAUSES OF MANY OF THE ILLS OF OUR FAMILIES AND OUR SOCIETY." -Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., author of Wherever You Go, There You Are.
Is IQ destiny? Not nearly as much as we think.
Daniel Goleman's fascinating and persuasive book argues that our view of human intelligence is far too narrow, ignoring a crucial range of abilities that matter immensely in terms of how we do in life.
Drawing on groundbreaking brain and behavioral research, Goleman shows the factors at work when people of high IQ flounder and those of modest IQ do surprisingly well. These factors, which include self-awareness, self-discipline, and empathy, add up to a different way of being smart-one he terms "emotional intelligence." While childhood is a critical time for its development, emotional intelligence is not fixed at birth. It can be nurtured and strengthened throughout adulthood-with immediate benefits to our health, our relationships, and our work.
This eye-opening book offers a new vision of excellence and a vital new curriculum for life that can change the future for us and for our children.
I highly recommend this book. Besides, Daniel Goleman has some very nice comments about chanting Hare Krishna. See the back page of "Chant and Be Happy". Prema Bhakti dasa Adhikari
- Working with Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman . A follow-up book to Emotional Intelligence geared toward the workplace. Highly recommended by anyone who interacts in anyway with others (i.e. everybody except total recluses).
BOOKS
- Men Are From Mars, Women Are From
Venus by John Gray, Ph.D.
John Gray, New York Times bestselling author of Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus, reveals that the key to creating and maintaining successful relationships between men and women lies in accepting our differences. By trying to make our partners over in our own likeness, Dr. Gray reminds us we destroy what we first found so appealing. Writing with the compassionate understanding that is his trademark, Dr. Gray draws on his wealth of experience from twenty years of work in couples therapy, his two megaselling books, as well as his hugely popular national workshops and seminars. In Men, Women and Relationships he ably demonstrates that only through respecting, appreciating, and responding to our natural differences, can we achieve real happiness and fulfillment in our relationships. Discover the simple, practical techniques that can enable all of us to experience the healthy, supportive love we deserve.
Dr. Gray offers valuable insights on:
- How men and women communicate-and how to understand the signals
- How each gender copes with stress and deals with conflict
- Why couples fight during good times
- Why men resist unsolicited advice
- What it means to men and women to feel loved
- How to give unconditional love-and how to accept it
- And much more!
- Fighting for
Your Marriage by Howard Markman, Scott Stanley and
Susan L. Blumberg
This book is used by Tamohara and Mantrini Prabhus in their marriage seminars in Northern Illinois. Very good techniques for improved communications - Prema Bhakti dasa Adhikari
"Down-to-earth, user-friendly, occasionally humorous advice to couples engaged in the emotional taffy pull of living together." -The Orange County Register
"To learn to fight right, couples can read books like Dr. Markman's Fighting for Your Marriage, which teach such skills as listening without criticizing or interrupting, setting ground rules for discussion, and scheduling meetings to talk about issues calmly." -Woman-s Day
Fighting for Your Marriage can help you and your partner beat the odds and master the skills that can prevent marital distress and divorce. This book presents the widely respected and research-tested PREP (Prevention and Relationship Enhancement Program) approach to improving marriage. Couples learn how to:
- Discuss difficult issues safely and clearly
- Use ground rules to contain destructive arguments and resolve conflicts
- Enhance fun, friendship, commitment, spirituality, and intimacy
"At a time in which so many marriages are falling apart, this researchbased approach that affirms the marriage relationship is a welcomed addition to my library." -The American journal of Family Therapy
The Authors Howard Markman, Ph.D., noted marital expert, is co-director of the Center for Marital and Family Studies at the University of Denver.
Scott Stanley, Ph.D., is co-director of the center and adjunct associate professor of marital and family therapy at Fuller Theological Seminary.
Susan L. Blumberg, Ph.D., is a psychologist who works with families and couples
- The five Love
Languages by Gary Chapman
People express and receive love in different ways. Dr. Gary Chapman identifies these as the five languages of love:
- QUALITY TIME
- WORDS OF AFFIRMATION
- GIFTS
- ACTS OF SERVICE
- PHYSICAL TOUCH
If you express love in a way your spouse doesn't understand, he or she won't realize you've expressed your love at all.The problem is that you're speaking two different languages.
Perhaps your husband needs to hear encouraging words, but you feel cooking a nice dinner will cheer him up.When he still feels down, you're puzzled. Or, maybe your wife craves time with you, time away from the kids and television.The flowers you gave her just don't communicate that you care.
In this new edition of The five Love Languages, you will find a couple's guide to help you work as a team. Before you know it, you'll learn to speak and understand the unique languages of love and effectively express your love as well as feel truly loved in return.
GARY CHAPMAN, Ph.D.,in addition to his church educational responsibilities, directs marriage seminars throughout the country and counsels married couples regularly. He is the author of Toward a Growing Marriage, Hope for the Separated, and Building Relationships.
BOOKS
- Stepparenting by Jeannetter
Lofas, CSW with Dawn B. Sova
Millions of marriages today start out with two peopleand the offspring of a previous relationship. Statistics show that over 50% of children live in a step relationship at some time. Making it all work can be an awesome challenge.
Author Jeannette Lofas provides sane, practical, up-to-the-minute advice for dealing with the many baffling issues that beset today's stepfamilies. From dating to remarriage, from step-sibling rivalry to joint custody, here is an invaluable guide to coping with today's most complex challenge, including:
- Dealing with the grief and anger of death and divorce
- Dating-romance vs. reality
- The wedding...from etiquette to a new notion of family
- Setting up a household-yours, mine, or ours?
- Living together-questions of discipline and belonging
- Holiday conflicts and the rituals of visitation
- The legal rights of stepparents
- Ex-spouses-exorcising the ghosts of the past
- Grandparents-a loving link between the past and the present
...and much more
Discover the techniques, tools, and strategies that break through the barriers. Find creative, satisfying solutions that can lead to happiness and success in step relationships.
JEANNEtTE LOFAS, CSW, is a leading authority on step relationships. In 1975 she founded The Stepfamily Foundation in New York City, the first organization to devote itself solely to the unique dynamics of the stepfamily.
- Stepmotherhood By Cherie
Burns
CHERIE BURNS is a free-lance writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, People, Glamour, Working Woman, Savvy, Us, and other magazines. A mother and a stepmother, she lives in New York.
"As a stepmother, I recognized myself in Stepmotherhood and wished I'd had it when we formed our stepfamily. The wealth of creative ideas given in this realistic, sensitive, and often humorous book can give stepmothers a belief in themselves and the tools to handle their new situations so that the complexity of stepfamily life can become a rich and rewarding experience." -Emily Visher, Founder of The Stepfamily Association of America
A stepmother and mother herself, writer Cherie Burns has interviewed stepmothers across the country and consulted extensively with family counselors to produce this bold and compassionate book on a much neglected subject.
Stepmotherhood covers the entire range of experience that every stepmother faces: from what to do when your stepchildren refuse to look you in the eye, compare your cooking to "Mom's," or pit you against your husband to how to cope with ex-wives, visitation schedules, vacations, guilt, and anger. Money, discipline, housework, sex, and the complications of a two-family holiday are among the subjects explored by Burns, and there are also sections on the special problems of being married to a widower and the stepmother's desire to have her own children.
Most women underestimate the demands (or expect too much) of stepmothering, and Burns' most important advice is to know what you're getting into. Frank, insightful, and eminently practical, she describes the anxieties and frustrations as well as the humor and emotional payoffs involved in this much misunderstand role. An indispensable book for any family that includes a stepmother.
As I used to tell my kids, "Krishna had 8 stepmothers, Devaki's sisters, so you are in good company". Prema Bhakti dasa Adhikari
