Frameshifting
David K. Banner, PhD
Loving Healing Press (2008)
ISBN 9781932690552
Nonfiction, Self Help, Inspiration, Lifestyle
Reviewed by Paige Lovitt for Reader Views (6/08)


Synopsis: David K. Banner wants to open us up to the possibilities of life. Too often, we are trapped in a single, fixed set of beliefs and attitudes that operate out of fear. Fear is generated as a weapon by the ego because it fears its own demise. The ego wants to keep us separate from everything else. But when we change our outlook on life, we can overcome the ego and know wholeness with the world around us. Spiritual teachers such as Deepak Chopra, Eckhardt Tolle, and Ken Wilber all emphasize the need to overcome ego. Banner’s Frameshifting lays out a variety of tools to dissolve the dominance of the ego.

Frameshifting is a process we can use to overcome the ego and acquire wholeness. David K. Banner explains that any change of attitude or paradigm is a form of frameshifting. Banner states, “One of the main messages of this book is, that, to gain real happiness, the ego must be transcended and an identity in Spirit must be experientially realized.”

Readers will find Frameshifting a practical, useful, highly readable book. Banner provides tools such as Enneagram work, frameshifting examples and exercises, and stories of how many other teachers affected his own thought processes and ability to overcome his ego. “Frameshifting” will inspire people to transcend the everyday and connect with the spiritual world all around them. Everyone will benefit from the tools Banner offers.
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Visit author's website http://www.davidkbanner.com/

The Handyman’s Promise
Nick Poff
AuthorHouse (2008)
ISBN 9781434370549
Fiction, Gay, Lesbian, Relationships       
Reviewed by Paige Lovitt for Reader Views (6/08)


Synopsis: As the AIDS crisis dawns in the early 1980s, two small town gay men make a commitment to one another. While a good deal of gay fiction focuses on sex, one author takes a closer look at what it means for two men to have a meaningful relationship. That author is Nick Poff, recently awarded the Gold medal in Gay/Lesbian fiction by ForeWord Magazine. In his third novel The Handyman’s Promise, Poff continues the tale of Ed Stephens and Rick Benton.

Readers of The Handyman’s Dream and the The Handyman’s Reality have watched Rick and Ed date, then become a couple. The two men have gone from the euphoria of falling in love, to lovers’ squabbles, and learning how to make their relationship work. Now in The Handyman’s Promise they continue their lives as a married couple, in a time and place where the thought of two men being married is not even a remote possibility. Regardless, their love bonds them together. They are determined to see their relationship through the long-term.

Nick Poff has stated he intended to write a trilogy of Handyman novels, but already fans are asking for more. His domestic emphasis, devoid of sensationalism and erotica, is a breath of fresh air in gay fiction. Poff’s chronicling of the modern gay culture provides a new perspective from two committed small town men. Behind the story is the music soundtrack of the 1980s, so that the novel reads like romantic comedy films from that era. Anyone who loves a good romance, male or female, straight or gay, will love The Handyman’s Promise.
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Visit author's website http://www.nickpoff.com/

Reconciliation (CD)
Nancy Oelklaus
Entrepreneurial Systems (2007)
ISBN 9780979117923
Nonfiction, Spirituality, Inspiration, Self Help
Reviewed by Olivera Baumgartner-Jackson for Reader Views (4/07)


Synopsis: Backed by a 30-year career in education, Nancy Oelklaus is a leader in the fields of organizational development, change, systems thinking, and adult learning. Her national and international experience brings diversity to her work, which is grounded in a knowledge base of the brain and systems.

Dr. Oelklaus has written for “The Systems Thinker,” “Leverage,” “The American School Board Journal,” “Leaders of Learners” and “Austin Business Journal.” Her leadership profile, "The Power of Love," appears in “Appreciative Leaders: In the Eye of the Beholder,” published by the Taos Institute.

When a relationship gets difficult, many of us try not to feel what we’re feeling and just keep things on an “even keel.” This approach, however well intentioned, does not work. Those negative emotions dig in and take root. Our efforts to resist them only make them stronger. Reconciliation contains several stories of breached relationships in work and family, as well as with money. A highlight is the three simple-but-not-easy steps that are required for healing.
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Visit author's website http://www.thesuccessaccelerator.com/

Mindfulness and the Art of Choice: Transform Your Life
Karen H. Sherman, PhD
Loving Healing Press (2008)
ISBN 9781932690514
Reviewed by Irene Watson for Reader Views (2/08)


Synopsis: Mindfulness and the Art of Choice by Karen Sherman offers a set of time-tested tools to help those who feel like negative past experiences are holding them back in their relationships with others or their day-to-day happiness with themselves. Many people don’t realize that their life behavior is the result of patterned responses based on childhood experiences, Sherman says. She readily admits that for a long time, she was one of them, but through the powerful tools presented in her book, she freed herself from the prison of the past. 

The key to transforming your life is mindfulness: an active effort to pay attention to how you react to present situations, Sherman says. The book presents exercises to increase one’s mindfulness and deal with negative past experiences, allowing old wounds to heal and healthy relationships to develop.Mindfulness and the Art of Choice aims to help readers know their lives better and learn how to create the life they want.

“The main message is that no matter what your experiences have been in the past, how you live your life is a choice,” Sherman says. “I truly believe that not only does each person have responsibility for what happens to him or her, but that therein also lies his or her power. This book is about letting people know that they can have the life they want—that it’s actually something they can choose to create.” 
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Visit the author's website http://www.drkarensherman.com/