19 Best Books on Stress and Health

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “This book is a gift! I’ve been practicing their strategies, and it’s a total game-changer.”—Brené Brown, Ph.D., author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Dare to Lead

This groundbreaking book explains why women experience burnout differently than men—and provides a simple, science-based plan to help women minimize stress, manage emotions, and live a more joyful life.

Burnout. Many women in America have experienced it. What’s expected of women and what it’s really like to be a woman in today’s world are two very different things—and women exhaust themselves trying to close the gap between them. How can you “love your body” when every magazine cover has ten diet tips for becoming “your best self”? How do you “lean in” at work when you’re already operating at 110 percent and aren’t recognized for it? How can you live happily and healthily in a sexist world that is constantly telling you you’re too fat, too needy, too noisy, and too selfish?

Sisters Emily Nagoski, PhD, and Amelia Nagoski, DMA, are here to help end the cycle of feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. Instead of asking us to ignore the very real obstacles and societal pressures that stand between women and well-being, they explain with compassion and optimism what we’re up against—and show us how to fight back. In these pages you’ll learn

• what you can do to complete the biological stress cycle—and return your body to a state of relaxation
• how to manage the “monitor” in your brain that regulates the emotion of frustration
• how the Bikini Industrial Complex makes it difficult for women to love their bodies—and how to defend yourself against it
• why rest, human connection, and befriending your inner critic are keys to recovering and preventing burnout

With the help of eye-opening science, prescriptive advice, and helpful worksheets and exercises, all women will find something transformative in these pages—and will be empowered to create positive change. Emily and Amelia aren’t here to preach the broad platitudes of expensive self-care or insist that we strive for the impossible goal of “having it all.” Instead, they tell us that we are enough, just as we are—and that wellness, true wellness, is within our reach.

The landmark work on mindfulness, meditation, and healing, now revised and updated after twenty-five years
 
Stress. It can sap our energy, undermine our health if we let it, even shorten our lives. It makes us more vulnerable to anxiety and depression, disconnection, and disease. Based on Jon Kabat-Zinn’s renowned mindfulness-based stress reduction program, this classic, groundbreaking work—which gave rise to a whole new field in medicine and psychology—shows you how to use medically proven mind-body approaches derived from meditation and yoga to counteract stress, establish greater balance of body and mind, and stimulate well-being and healing. By engaging in these mindfulness practices and integrating them into your life from moment to moment and from day to day, you can learn to manage chronic pain, promote optimal healing, reduce anxiety and feelings of panic, and improve the overall quality of your life, relationships, and social networks. This second edition features results from recent studies on the science of mindfulness, a new Introduction, up-to-date statistics, and an extensive updated reading list. Full Catastrophe Living is a book for the young and the old, the well and the ill, and anyone trying to live a healthier and saner life in our fast-paced world.

Featured in Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: The Kristine Carlson Story starring Heather Locklear, premiering on Lifetime

Put challenges in perspective, reduce stress and anxiety through small daily changes and find the path to achieving your goals with this groundbreaking inspirational guide—a self-help classic.
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Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff…and It’s All Small Stuff is a book that tells you how to keep from letting the little things in life drive you crazy. In thoughtful and insightful language, author Richard Carlson reveals ways to calm down in the midst of your incredibly hurried, stress-filled life.

You can learn to put things into perspective by making the small daily changes Dr. Carlson suggests, including advice such as “Choose your battles wisely”; “Remind yourself that when you die, your ‘in’ box won’t be empty”; and “Make peace with imperfection”. With Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff… you’ll also learn how to:

• Live in the present moment
• Let others have the glory at times
• Lower your tolerance to stress
• Trust your intuitions
• Live each day as it might be your last

With gentle, supportive suggestions, Dr. Carlson reveals ways to make your actions more peaceful and caring, with the added benefit of making your life calmer and stress-free.

Toxic thoughts, depression, anxiety–our mental mess is frequently aggravated by a chaotic world and sustained by an inability to manage our runaway thoughts. But we shouldn’t settle into this mental mess as if it’s just our new normal. There’s hope and help available to us–and the road to healthier thoughts and peak happiness may actually be shorter than you think.

Backed by clinical research and illustrated with compelling case studies, Dr. Caroline Leaf provides a scientifically proven five-step plan to find and eliminate the root of anxiety, depression, and intrusive thoughts in your life so you can experience dramatically improved mental and physical health. In just 21 days, you can start to clean up your mental mess and be on the road to wholeness, peace, and happiness.

Now in a third edition, Robert M. Sapolsky’s acclaimed and successful Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers features new chapters on how stress affects sleep and addiction, as well as new insights into anxiety and personality disorder and the impact of spirituality on managing stress.

As Sapolsky explains, most of us do not lie awake at night worrying about whether we have leprosy or malaria. Instead, the diseases we fear – and the ones that plague us now – are illnesses brought on by the slow accumulation of damage, such as heart disease and cancer. When we worry or experience stress, our body turns on the same physiological responses that an animal does, but we do not resolve conflict in the same way – through fighting or fleeing. Over time, this activation of a stress response makes us literally sick. Combining cutting-edge research with a healthy dose of good humor and practical advice, Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers explains how prolonged stress causes or intensifies a range of physical and mental afflictions, including depression, ulcers, colitis, heart disease, and more. It also provides essential guidance to controlling our stress responses. This new edition promises to be the most comprehensive and engaging one yet.

Stress and Your Health: From Vulnerability to Resilience presents an evidence-based evaluation of the various effects of stress, along with methods to alleviate distress and stress-related illnesses.

• Examines myriad stressor effects and proven ways to alleviate stress in our lives
• Covers a wide range of stressor-related topics including therapeutic strategies to deal with stress and factors that hinder the treatment of stress
• Makes difficult biochemical and immunological concepts accessible to a non-specialist audience
• Addresses many of the factors that cause individuals to be more vulnerable to the impact of stressors and at increased risk for pathology

The ultimate practical guide to mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR)-with more than 115,000 copies sold-is now available in a fully revised and updated second edition. In A Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Workbook, two MBSR experts present a step-by-step, eleven-week program for effective stress reduction based on the concepts in Jon Kabat-Zinn’s groundbreaking book, Full Catastrophe Living.

In this accessible and groundbreaking book – filled with the moving stories of real people medical doctor and best-selling author Gabor Maté shows that emotion and psychological stress play a powerful role in the onset of chronic illness, including breast cancer, prostate cancer, multiple sclerosis, and many others, even Alzheimer’s disease.

When the Body Says No is an impressive contribution to research on the physiological connection between life’s stresses and emotions and the body systems governing nerves, immune apparatus, and hormones. With great compassion and erudition, Gabor Maté demystifies medical science and, as he did in Scattered Minds, invites us all to be our own health advocates.

Discover simple, science-based strategies for beating stress at its own game

When’s the best time to exercise – and how much is too much? Which foods fortify the brain, and which do the opposite? How can we use music, movement, and motivation to boost our rational brain and keep our cool no matter what life throws our way?

Short bursts of stress are an inevitable part of modern life. But how much is too much? Research is uncovering the delicate balance that can turn a brief stressful episode into systemic overload, eventually leading to inflammation, anxiety, depression, and other chronic health issues.

This practical and groundbreaking guide reveals seven paths to fighting the effects of stress – to strengthen our natural defenses so that our minds remain sharp, and our bodies resilient, no matter what life throws at us.

Each chapter examines a common stress agent – including inflammation, an out-of-sync body clock, cortisol levels, and emotional triggers – and presents simple ways to minimize its harmful effects with changes in diet, exercise, and other daily habits – including surprising hacks involving music, eye movements, body temperature, daily routine, and more. Translating cutting-edge scientific findings into clear and simple advice, Stress-Proof is the ultimate user’s guide for body, mind, and well-being.

Monica Sweeney offers the perfect gift of mindfulness with this beautiful, uplifting guided journal for when you just don’t give a f*ck.

The road to serenity is ahead, and it’s paved with a f*ck-ton of profanity. When quiet meditation and peaceful mantras aren’t enough to cut through the bullsh*t and brighten your day―hold close the pages of Zen as F*ck. On each and every page, you can give the good around you a warm f*cking hug and kick the bad on its ass. Journal your way through positive affirmations and cathartic-as-f*ck activities on your liberating journey toward something pretty close to happiness.

Sprinkle, scatter, or set off a glitter-bomb of happy vibes onto your trail of tranquility with Zen as F*ck!

• Start sparkling like the f*cking gem you are
• Learn how to rise, shine, and kick ass
• Cast your soul-shining light on others and spread some f*cking beauty

Don’t miss the other f*cking amazing titles in this series: Zen as F*ck at Work, Let That Sh*t Go, and Find Your F*cking Happy.e

Real self-care practices to enrich every part of your life

Picture your best life: Where would you work? What would your social calendar look like? What personal interests would you be exploring? This book is your prescription to turn those visions into a reality―with proven self-care strategies for every area of your life.

The Self-Care Prescription empowers you to find balance and purpose in your relationships, work, and life. From creating a plan to spend more time with family and friends, to zeroing in on a career that you can feel good about, the book will help you create a personalized self-care plan. You’ll also learn actionable techniques to fight anxiety, demotivation, or whatever else is holding you back from building the life you want to live.

The Self-Care Prescription includes:

Self-care 101―Learn what “self-care” really means, and how you can start practicing it every day. A full-spectrum plan―Bring self-care to the physical, spiritual, emotional, intellectual, vocational, and social areas of your life. Best-life strategies―Unwind with mindfulness breathing practices or start eating right with healthy meal planning―you’ll find tons of actionable self-care techniques to help you reach your goals.

Be the friend you want to be to yourself and others. Be engaged with what you do. Whatever self-care means to you, you’ll find your own personal practice in this book.

The author of The Willpower Instinct delivers a controversial and groundbreaking new book that overturns long-held beliefs about stress.

More than 44 percent of Americans admit to losing sleep over stress. And while most of us do everything we can to reduce it, Stanford psychologist and best-selling author Kelly McGonigal, Ph.D., delivers a startling message: Stress isn’t bad. In The Upside of Stress, McGonigal highlights new research indicating that stress can, in fact, make us stronger, smarter, and happier – if we learn how to embrace it.

The Upside of Stress is the first audiobook to bring together cutting-edge discoveries on the correlation between resilience – the human capacity for stress-related growth – and mindset, the power of beliefs to shape reality. As she did in The Willpower Instinct, McGonigal combines science, stories, and exercises into an engaging and practical book that is both entertaining and life-changing, showing you:

• How to cultivate a mindset to embrace stress
• How stress can provide focus and energy
• How stress can help people connect and strengthen close relationships
• Why your brain is built to learn from stress and how to increase its ability to learn from challenging experiences

McGonigal’s TED talk on the subject has already received more than seven million views. Her message resonates with people who know they can’t eliminate the stress in their lives and want to learn to take advantage of it. The Upside of Stress is not a guide to getting rid of stress but a guide to getting better at stress by understanding it, embracing it, and using it.

townships, and every aspect of your life.

ARE YOU A HIGHLY SENSITIVE PERSON?

Do you have a keen imagination and vivid dreams? Is time alone each day as essential to you as food and water? Are you noted for your empathy?  Your conscientiousness? Do noise and confusion quickly overwhelm you? If your answers are yes, you may be a highly sensitive person (HSP) and Dr. Elaine Aron’s The Highly Sensitive Person is the life-changing guide you’ll want in your toolbox.

Over twenty percent of people have this amazing, innate trait.  Maybe you are one of them.  A similar percentage is found in over 100 species because high sensitivity is a survival strategy.  It is also a way of life for HSPs.

In this 25th anniversary edition of the groundbreaking classic, Dr. Elaine Aron, a research and clinical psychologist as well as an HSP herself, helps you grasp the reality of your wonderful trait, understand your past in the light of it, and make the most of it in your future. Drawing on her many years of study and face-to-face time spent with thousands of HSPs, she explains the changes you will need to make in order to lead a fuller, richer life.

Along with a new Author’s Note, the latest scientific research, and a fresh discussion of anti-depressants, this edition of The Highly Sensitive Person is more essential than ever for creating the sense of self-worth and empowerment every HSP deserves and our planet needs.

“Elaine Aron has not only validated and scientifically corroborated high sensitivity as a trait—she has given a level of empowerment and understanding to a large group of the planet’s population. I thank Dr. Aron every day for her having brought this awareness to the world.”
—Alanis Morissette, artist, activist, teacher

Relieve stress, increase mindfulness, and discover calm and clarity wherever you go with this beautiful guided journal.

A fluttering in the chest, constant worrying, sleepless nights with your breath squeezed from you. One in four people suffers from anxiety, and the symptoms can feel overwhelming. But you can take control. Let psychologist Corinne Sweet help you on your way to eliminating anxiety with this journal full of:

• Inspiring quotes for when you need a quick fix of motivation
• Grounding facts about anxiety that work as much-needed coping mechanisms
• Soothing exercises to enhance mindfulness
• Writing prompts grounded in cognitive behavioral therapy to help identify the causes of your anxiety for long-term peace of mind
• Lined pages to record your thoughts and track your progress
• A heavy cover designed to survive wear and tear through repeated use

Practical and uplifting, the perfect size to carry around with you, this journal is an indispensable companion on your journey to a peaceful mind.