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EXCERPTS
Introduction Chapter Two Chapter Ten
Introduction
The Culture Code is the unconscious meaning we apply to any given thing — a car, a type of food, a relationship, even a country — via the culture in which we are raised. The American experience with Jeeps is very different from the French and German experience because our cultures evolved differently (we have strong cultural memories of the open frontier; the French and Germans have strong cultural memories of occupation and war). Therefore, the Codes — the meaning we give to the Jeep at an unconscious level — are different as well. The reasons for this are numerous (and I will describe them in the next chapter), but it all comes down to the worlds in which we grew up. It is obvious to everyone that cultures are different from one another. What most people don’t realize, however, is that these differences actually lead to our processing the same information in different ways.
My journey toward the discovery of cultural codes began in the early 1970’s. I was a psychoanalyst in Paris at the time, and my clinical work brought me to the research of the great scientist Henri Laborit, who drew a clear connection between learning and emotion, showing that without the latter the former was impossible. The stronger the emotion, the more clearly an experience is learned. Think of a child told by his parents to avoid a hot pan on a stove. This concept is abstract to the child until he reaches out, touches the pan, and it burns him. In this intensely emotional moment of pain, the child learns what “hot” and “burn” means and is very unlikely ever to forget it.
The combination of the experience and its accompanying emotion create something known widely (and coined as such by Konrad Lorenz) as an imprint. Once an imprint occurs, it strongly conditions our thought processes and shapes our future actions. Each imprint helps make us more of who we are. The combination of these imprints defines us.
One of my most memorable personal imprints came when I was a young boy. I grew up in France, and when I was about four years old, my family received an invitation to a wedding. I’d never been to one before and I had no idea what to expect. What I encountered was remarkable. French weddings are unlike weddings in any other culture I know. The event went on for two days, nearly all of which was spent around a large communal table. People stood at the table to offer toasts. They stood on the table to sing songs. They slept under the table and (as I later learned) even seduced one another under the table. Food was always available. People drank le trou Normand, a glass of Calvados that allowed them to make room for more food. Others simply went to the bathroom to vomit so they could eat more. It was an amazing thing to see as a child and it left a permanent imprint on me. Forever more, I would always associate weddings with gustatory excess. In fact, the first time I went to a wedding in America, I was taken aback by how sedate it was in comparison. Recently, when I remarried, my wife (who also grew up in France) and I held the kind of multi-day feast that meant “wedding” to both of us.
Every imprint influences us on an unconscious level. When the work of Laborit crystallized this for me, I began to incorporate what I learned from him into my clinical work in Paris, most of which was being done with autistic children (in fact, Laborit led me to the theory that autistic children do not learn effectively because they lack the emotion to do so). The subject of imprinting also formed the foundation of the lectures I gave during this time. After one particular lecture at Geneva University, the father of a student approached me.
“Dr. Rapaille, I might have a client for you,” he said.
Always intrigued at the possibilities offered by another case, I nodded with interest. “An autistic child?”
“No,” he said, smiling, “Nestlé.”
At the time, focused on clinical and scholarly work, I barely understood what the word “marketing” meant. I therefore couldn’t possibly imagine what use I would be to a corporation. “Nestlé? What can I do for them?”
“We are trying to sell instant coffee in Japan, but we aren’t having as much success as we would like. Your work on imprints might be very helpful to us.”
We continued to talk and the man made me an extremely attractive offer. Not only were the financial terms considerable, but there was something promising about a project like this. Unlike my work with autistic children, where progress was painfully slow, this offer was a chance to quickly test theories I had developed about imprinting and the unconscious mind. It was an opportunity too good to pass up. I took a sabbatical and went off on my new assignment.
My first meeting with Nestlé executives and their Japanese advertising agency was very instructive. Their strategy, which today seems absurdly wrong but wasn’t as clear-cut in the ‘70s, was to try to convince Japanese consumers to switch from tea to coffee. Having spent some time in Japan previously, I knew that tea meant a great deal to this culture, but I had no sense of what emotions they attached to coffee. I decided to gather several groups of people together to discover how they imprinted the beverage. I believed there was a message there that could open a door for Nestlé.
I structured a three-hour session with each of the groups. In the first hour, I took on the persona of a visitor from another planet, someone who had never seen coffee before and had no idea how one “used” it. I asked for help understanding the product, believing their descriptions would give me insight into what they thought of it.
In the next hour, I had them sit on the floor like elementary school children and use scissors and a pile of magazines to make a collage of words about coffee. The goal here was to get them to tell me stories with these words that would offer me further clues.
In the third hour, I had participants lie on the floor with pillows. There was some hesitation among members of every group, but I convinced them I wasn’t entirely out of my mind. I put on soothing music and asked the participants to relax. What I was doing was calming their active brain waves, getting them to that tranquil point just before sleep. When they reached this state, I took them on a journey back from their adulthood, past their teenage years, to a time when they were very young. Once they arrived, I asked them to think again about coffee and to recall their earliest memory of it, the first time they consciously experienced it and, if it was different, their most significant memory of it.
I designed this process to bring participants back to their first imprint of coffee and the emotion attached to it. In most cases, though, the journey led nowhere. What this signified for Nestlé was very clear. While the Japanese had an extremely strong emotional connection to tea (something I learned without asking in the first hour of the sessions), they had at the most a very superficial imprint of coffee. Most, in fact, had no imprint of coffee at all.
Under these circumstances, Nestlé’s strategy of getting these consumers to switch from tea to coffee could only fail. Coffee could not compete with tea in the Japanese culture if it had such weak emotional resonance. Instead, if Nestlé was going to have any success in this market at all, they needed to start at the beginning. They needed to give the product meaning in this culture. They needed to create an imprint for coffee for the Japanese.
Armed with this information, Nestlé devised a new strategy. Rather than selling instant coffee to a country dedicated to tea, they created desserts for children infused with the flavor of coffee but without the caffeine. The younger generation embraced these desserts. Their first imprint of coffee was a very positive one, one they would carry throughout their lives. Through this, Nestlé gained a meaningful foothold in the Japanese market. Understanding the process of imprinting — and how it related directly to Nestlé’s marketing efforts — unlocked a door to the Japanese culture for them and turned around a floundering business venture.
It did something much more important for me, however. The realization that there was no significant imprint for coffee in Japan underscored for me that early imprinting has a tremendous impact on why people do what they do. In addition, the fact that the Japanese did not have a strong imprint for coffee while the Swiss (Nestlé is a Swiss company) obviously did made it clear that imprints vary from culture to culture. If I could get to the source of these imprints — if I could somehow “decode” elements of culture to discover the emotions and meanings attached to them — I would learn a great deal about human behavior and how it varies across the planet. This set me on the course of my life’s work. I went off in search of the codes hidden within the unconscious of every culture.
Chapter Two
As you will learn throughout this book, the American culture exhibits many of the traits consistent with adolescence: intense focus on “the now,” dramatic mood swings, constant need for exploration and challenge to authority, a fascination with extremes, openness to change and reinvention, and a strong belief that mistakes warrant second chances. As Americans, we feel we know more than our elders do (for instance, we rarely consult France, Germany, Russia, or England on our foreign policy), that their answers are out of date (we pay little heed to the opinions of these cultures when it comes to global matters), and that we must reject their lessons and re-make the world (few of us — including many of our leaders — are students of world history, choosing to make our own mistakes rather than learning from the mistakes these other cultures have already made).
Like all adolescents, we are preoccupied with love, seduction, and sex. We are not unique in this regard. People in many cultures throughout the world are fascinated with these things — perhaps more so than anything else. After all, as human beings, we need sex at the very least to ensure the continuation of our species. The unconscious attitudes we Americans hold about these matters, however, are unique and very much related to our cultural adolescence.
Adolescence is a time of confusion and contradictions. New discoveries are promising one day and disappointing the next. Dreams sprout, flower, and wilt as quickly as daffodils in the spring. Certainties become uncertainties in the blink of an eye. This is as true with adolescent cultures as it is with adolescent children and never is it clearer than in the Codes revealed in this chapter.
Some of you will find the following pages disturbing. Some of you will insist that you don’t see yourself in these Codes in any way. (You might even be right about that. Of course, every individual is different, as he or she is also governed by his or her individual unconscious.) The revelation of the following Codes might be upsetting to you, but please remember that Codes are value-neutral. The Codes themselves do not pass judgment on a particular culture. The American Codes simply reflect our cultural adolescence. This is very good and empowering in many cases, as you will see in subsequent chapters, and explains why we are the best in the world at many things and why we have been such innovators and reformers.
If one were to compile a list of things at which the American culture excels, however, love, seduction, and sex would not be on that list. You know this already. After all, when we consider someone a great ladies’ man, we might call him a “Don Juan” or a “Casanova.” We will never, however, call him a “Joe Smith.” The function of the new set of glasses provided by the Culture Code is to show us why we do the things we do:
Why are American women so concerned with finding “Mr. Right?”
Why does the FCC frown on (and even prosecute) televising a woman breastfeeding, but allow the exhibition of fictionalized bloodbaths during network Prime Time?
Why are American women offended when construction workers whistle at them in New York but flattered when a man does the same in Milan?
The answers are in the Codes.
What’s love got to do with it?
I held imprinting sessions all over the country searching for the Code for love. During these sessions, I asked participants to focus on the word “love” without specifying whether I meant romantic love, parental love, sibling love, love of country, love of pets, or even love of a sports team. When I guided participants back to their first imprint though, a vast majority of them went to the same place.
“My first experience with the word love, or related to love, was when I was four or five. In the kitchen, mother was preparing a cake, my favorite cake, a cheesecake. The smell was the smell of love. She opened the oven and I told her, ‘I love you!’ She closed the oven, came to give me a kiss, and told me, ‘I love you, too.’ Then she gave me a big portion of the cake and I knew she really meant it when she said, ‘I love you’.”-- 40-year-old man
“Mother loved us so much, she cooked all Thanksgiving day. She was so happy to see her family all together again, around the table, eating…so much love around the table, so much food. We could not stop eating.”-- 36-year-old woman
“When you are little, parents are there to care for and protect you. You have no care or worries. If something bad happens, your family is there for you. I miss this protection.”-- 58-year-old woman
“The best way to describe my parents’ room is a nest. The carpet was light brown and the walls were blue. The bed was in the center of the room and had a huge white comforter. It was on this bed that I sat with my mother as a child and asked her about the world.”-- 21-year-old man
“I remember lying in my mother’s lap in my early years. I remember talking with my mother and sharing caresses.”-- 65-year-old man
Consistently, participants related their first experience of love to their mother’s care — feeding them, holding them, making them feel safe. This is entirely understandable. After all, for nine months, our mothers provide us with the most perfect “resort hotel” imaginable. The room service is first-rate and available immediately upon demand, the space is neither too hot nor too cold, transportation is free, and there’s even a musical backdrop (her heartbeat) for entertainment. And even though we ultimately must leave this vacation paradise, our mothers are there for us to guide us through the transition, feeding us with their bodies, keeping us coddled and warm, taking us out to see the world, and providing numerous ways for us to occupy our time and delight in the act of learning.
The nature of these responses was very consistent with the thinking of an adolescent culture. Adolescents, after all, flit from pressing for independence to acting like children throughout this period of their lives. When in the latter mode, they seek the succor (inwardly if not outwardly) of their mothers, the safe harbor provided by that all-encompassing love.
Then there is the former mode, the mode that demands a rejection of home and the right to make one’s own mistakes. When I asked participants to recall their most powerful memories of love, different stories emerged.
“I went to college. I was so happy. Free at last. But it did not go so well. First time I started drinking, I could not stop. Then I don’t know what happened next, I was so sick. None of the boys who were after me the night before were there to help me.”-- 50-year-old woman
“I was 13 and I liked a boy but he liked someone else. This taught me a big lesson because I thought that I was prettier than her and she was fat, but I was spoiled and sometimes mean.” -- 24-year-old woman
“My most powerful experience is when my parents decided to separate. I found out eavesdropping on their discussions late at night. Things were tense, but everyone wanted to be normal.”-- 37-year-old man
“I have an image of a white beautiful horse and a blonde beautiful woman in a flowing crepe-like dress with a lush green forest and waterfall and a handsome man meeting and embracing her. I long to be that woman.”-- 38-year-old woman
This was a different component of the adolescent experience: the part where experimentation leads to exhilaration and disappointment, to success and failure. The vast majority of these stories expressed some level of discomfort, of uneasiness with the events described, much in the way an adolescent describes experiences he doesn’t like and doesn’t understand. Remember, these stories were about the most powerful memory of love.
Perhaps the most significant element of the adolescent experience, however, is the loss of innocence. There comes a point in every adolescent’s life when he realizes his ideals aren’t as gilded as they once seemed. This realization usually leads to new maturity and the acquisition of new coping tools. It also often comes, though, with a sense of disillusionment. When participants wrote of their most recent memory of love, they repeatedly told the story of lost ideals.
“I know what boys want. They say they love you, but I know what they want.”-- A 35-year-old woman
“I have three children from three different fathers who died in drive-by shootings. Before I die, I want once again to have a baby, to feed him, to love him, and to be loved unconditionally.”-- A 15-year old woman
“I purchased a diamond for my girlfriend. I recall her taking it off in the car while we were arguing and I became infuriated. I took the ring and threw it out the window. I told her since it meant so little to her I threw it away.”-- 31-year-old man
These three sets of stories — the first imprint, the most powerful memory, and the most recent memory — revealed a distinctly American pattern. Participants spoke repeatedly about the desire for love, the need for love, the belief in something called “True Love,” but they also spoke consistently about being disappointed in this quest. A very large percentage of the “most recent memory” stories spoke of loss, bitterness, and sadness. When it comes to love, Americans — regardless of their ages — view love the way an adolescent views the world: as an exciting dream that rarely reaches fulfillment.
The American Culture Code for love is FALSE EXPECTATION.
Without question, losing at love is an international experience. Even in cultures where marriages are arranged and courtship is rare, there are tales of forbidden love and the sad consequences when that love dies. In older cultures, though — ones that passed through adolescence centuries ago — the unconscious message about the expectations for love are very different.
In France, the concepts of love and pleasure are intertwined. The French consider the notions of true love and “Mr. Right” irrelevant. The refinement of pleasure is paramount and romance is a highly sophisticated process. Love means helping your partner achieve as much pleasure as possible, even if this requires finding someone else to provide some of this pleasure. French couples can of course be devoted to one another, but their definition of devotion differs greatly from the American definition (fidelity, for instance, is not paramount) and their expectations are set accordingly.
The Italians believe that life is a comedy rather than a tragedy and that one should laugh whenever possible. They expect love to contain strong dimensions of pleasure, beauty, and, above all, fun. If love becomes too dramatic or too hard, it is unsatisfying. The Italian culture centers very strongly on family and Italians put their mothers up on pedestals. To them, true love is maternal love. Therefore, their expectations for romantic love are lower. Men romance women, but seek true love from their mothers. Women believe that the best way to express and experience love is by becoming mothers. A man is “Mr. Right” as long as he provides a child.
The Japanese offer perhaps the best illustration of the differences in attitudes toward love between an adolescent culture and an older culture. Japanese men and women often ask me to describe how westerners marry. I tell them that a young man meets a young woman (often one younger than he is himself) and they begin the process of getting to know one another. If he happens to fall deeply in love, the man will ask the woman to marry him, and if she loves him as well, she will say yes. (Obviously, it’s more complicated that this in practice, but I get the main points across this way.)
Stunned expressions always meet this description. “The man is young?” the Japanese questioner will say. “If he is young, how can he possibly have enough experience to make a decision of this type? Only his parents can know what kind of marriage is appropriate for him and will allow him to raise the best family. And you say the woman is younger. That means she is even less experienced than he is!”
They save their greatest contempt, though, for the notion that westerners marry for love. “Love is a temporary disease,” they tell me. “It is foolish to base something as important as the creation of a family on something so temporary.” This is still the prevalent sensibility in Japan today, even though the “content” of the Japanese culture has changed. While Japanese teens might date more often than their parents did and might spend more time meeting up at clubs, most marriages are still arranged, and few have anything to do with romance. While this all might sound terribly harsh to American ears, there is at least some logic in this sentiment. While nearly half of all American marriages end in divorce, the Japanese divorce rate is less than 2%.
This is not to suggest that older cultures automatically have a clearer vision of the world. In fact, as you will see over the course of this book, there are many instances where the “adolescent” approach is the more effective one. When it comes to love, however, it is obvious that the American culture is currently in an uneasy place. A woman searches for “Mr. Right” because she believes the stories she reads in books or watches at the movies, finds someone she believes she can “change” into her ideal man, and disappointedly sees her efforts fail. A man searches for “Ms. Perfect” for many of the same reasons, finds a woman who excites him, believes it will stay this way forever, and becomes disappointed when motherhood takes her interests elsewhere.
This quest for perfection is, of course, on Code — our cultural unconscious compels us to have unrealistically high standards for love. However, as that 50% divorce rate indicates, the Code isn’t making our lives easier. Here is a case where an understanding of the Code can help those frustrated by love to go off Code in a productive manner. If you realize your unconscious expects you to fail, you can begin to look at love with more sensible goals. While understanding and respecting the tug to find “Mr. Right” or “Ms. Perfect,” one can look for someone who can be a partner, a friend, and a caring lover who can’t possibly fulfill all of one’s needs.
A prominent diamond company deals with the Code in a distinctive fashion. One component of its marketing focuses on the “false expectations” the American subconscious feels about love: its ads feature couples using diamonds to profess their forever love or to confirm their commitment after years together. Another component of its marketing, however, deals with the consequences of false expectations in a clever manner: highlighting the investment and re-sale value of diamonds. Both campaigns are strongly on Code, addressing our undying belief in the permanence of romantic love and providing a useful benefit when that belief fails to pan out.
Chapter Ten
The German Code for Germany is perhaps best illustrated in a story.
Lego, the Danish toy company, found instant success with their interlocking blocks in the German market, while sales foundered in the U.S. Why?
The company’s management believed that one of the primary reasons for their success was the quality of the instructions they provided inside each box that helped children build the specific item (a car, a spaceship) that a particular box of blocks was meant to build. The instructions were quite a breakthrough in the field: precise, colorful, and refreshingly self-explanatory. They made construction with Lego blocks not only simple, but in some ways magical. If one followed the path through the instructions, tiny plastic pieces methodically turned into something grander.
American children could not have cared less. They would tear into the boxes, glance fleetingly at the instructions (if they glanced at them at all), and immediately set to a construction project on their own. They seemed to be having a wonderful time, but they were as likely to build, say, a fort, as they were to build the automobile for which the blocks were intended. And when they were done, they would tear their fort apart and start over from scratch. Once purchased, to Lego’s dismay, a single box of Lego could last for years.
In Germany, however, Lego’s strategy worked exactly as intended. German children opened a box of Legos, sought out the instructions, read them carefully, and then sorted the pieces by color. They set to building, comparing their assembly progress to the crisp, helpful illustrations in the instruction booklet. When they were finished, they had an exact duplicate of the product shown on the cover of the box. They showed it to Mother who clapped approvingly and put the model on a shelf. Now the children needed another box.
Without even knowing it, Lego had tapped into the Culture Code for Germany itself: ORDER. Over many generations, Germans perfected bureaucracy in an effort to stave off the chaos that came to them in wave after wave, and Germans are imprinted early on with this most powerful of codes. It is that imprint which makes children reach dutifully for the instructions, and it is that code which prevents them from immediately destroying their neat construction in order to build it anew. Lego’s elegant, full-color instructions had tapped into the German code in a way that assured repeat sales.
Excerpted from The Culture Code by Clotaire Rapaille Copyright © 2006 by Clotaire Rapaille. Excerpted by permission of Broadway, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
“This book is just plain astonishing!... If you want to understand customers, constituencies, and crowds, this book is required reading.” --Warren Bennis, author of On Becoming a Leader
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domingo, 19 de outubro de 2008
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Made to Stick www.audible.com
Publisher's Summary
Mark Twain once observed, "A lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can even get its boots on." His observation rings true: Urban legends, conspiracy theories, and bogus public-health scares circulate effortlessly. Meanwhile, people with important ideas (business people, teachers, politicians, journalists, and others) struggle to make their ideas "stick".
Why do some ideas thrive while others die? And how do we improve the chances of worthy ideas? In Made to Stick, accomplished educators and idea collectors Chip and Dan Heath tackle head-on these vexing questions. Inside, the brothers Heath reveal the anatomy of ideas that stick and explain ways to make ideas stickier, such as applying the "human scale principle", using the "Velcro Theory of Memory", and creating "curiosity gaps".
In this indispensable guide, we discover that sticky messages of all kinds (from the infamous "kidney theft ring" hoax to a coach's lessons on sportsmanship, to a new-product vision at Sony) draw their power from the same six traits.
Made to Stick is a book that will transform the way you communicate ideas. It includes a fast-paced tour of success stories (and failures), such as the Nobel Prize-winning scientist who drank a glass full of bacteria to prove a point about stomach ulcers, the charities who make use of "the Mother Teresa Effect", and the elementary school teacher whose simulation actually prevented racial prejudice. Provocative, eye-opening, and often surprisingly funny, Made to Stick shows us the vital principles of winning ideas and tells us how we can apply these rules to making our own messages stick.
©2006 Chip Heath and Dan Heath; (P)2007 Random House, Inc.
sexta-feira, 10 de outubro de 2008
Manic Depression and Creativity - www.questia.com
One of the best books I have ever read !! A fine blend of art, history, biographies and science.
Marco Rodrigo.
Manic Depression and Creativity
Book by D. Jablow Hershman, Julian Lieb; Prometheus Books, 1998
Subjects:
Genius And Mental Illness, Genius And Mental Illness--Case Studies, Manic-Depressive Illness, Manic-Depressive Illness--Case Studies
Collections: Psychology, Entire Library
From Plato, who originated the idea of inspired mania, to Beethoven, Dickens, Newton, Van Gogh, and today's popular creative artists and scientists who've battled manic depression, this intriguing work examines creativity and madness in mystery, myth, and history.
http://www.questia.com/
Contents
Preface
D. Jablow Hershman
1
1.
A Dissection of Genius
7
2.
Manic-Depression
19
3.
Newton
39
4.
Beethoven
59
5.
Dickens
95
6.
Van Gogh
139
7.
Diminishing Creativity
177
8.
Augmenting Genius
197
Epilogue
Julian Lieb, M.D.
207
Bibliography
217
-v-
Questia Media America, Inc. www.questia.com Publication Information: Book Title: Manic Depression and Creativity. Contributors: D. Jablow Hershman - author, Julian Lieb - author. Publisher: Prometheus Books. Place of Publication: Amherst, NY. Publication Year: 1998. Page Number: v.
Excerpt:
Epilogue
Julian Lieb, M.D.
People ask: "Where are today's geniuses? Where are our Newtons, Beethovens, Einsteins, Edisons, Picassos? Our Byrons, Mozarts, and Verdis? It is an interest- ing question.Perhaps instant commercial success deprives some creative people of motivation. Or might it be that our institutions, in the name of political cor- rectness and in ignoring the adverse effects of academic tenure on the pursuit of truth, suppress genius in the sciences, while overvaluing it in the field of enter- tainment? One need go no further than to examine the intellectual achievements of many who deliver commencement speeches at our colleges and universities for insight into our values as the millennium draws to an end.
Warfare on a massive scale and genocide depleted the twentieth century of legions of potential geniuses. How many of those who fell at the Somme, at Tannenberg, at Verdun, on Guadalcanal, at Midway, on Iwo Jima, at Stalingrad, or in the Sinai, or met their deaths over Hamburg or Berlin would, had they lived, permanently enriched humankind? How many who would have followed in the footsteps of Rubinstein, Horowitz, Oistrakh, Bernstein, Chaplin, Chagall, Sabin, Salk, and Bohr, perished in Auschwitz, Treblinka, and other concentration camps? Will the England of Shakespeare, Keats, Shelley, Blake, Tennyson, Milton, Wordsworth, Dickens, Stevenson, and Churchill ever recover fully from the dreadful drain on its manpower during two world wars? Drawing to a close is a century in which paranoid tyrants in the USSR, Cambodia, and elsewhere made the extinction of intellectuals a matter of state policy, an epoch in which a mon- ster such as Josef Stalin thought nothing of murdering a Maxim Gorky.
This century has produced its geniuses, some in the arts and sciences, many in the field of entertainment. Among the latter are: Irving Berlin, Alan Jay Lerner, Frederick Loewe, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Charlie Parker, Thelonius Monk, Bud Powell, Oscar Peterson, Charles Mingus, John Coltrane, Wes Montgomery, Dave Brubeck, Stevie Wonder, Neil Diamond, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Balanchine, Arturo Toscanini, Richard Burton, Laurence Olivier, George Gershwin, Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, Alfred Hitchcock, Michael Crichton, Walt Disney, and Jim Henson.
Although many have had a powerful impact on society, history will place few of them in the company of Leonardo da Vinci, Beethoven, Newton, van Gogh, Dickens, and other towering creators of the past.Posterity will decide who among them provided humanity with work of supreme and lasting value. As we mentioned earlier, genius is a relationship, and one's reputation as a genius varies in longevity, depending on the field of endeavor. Scientists may wear their crown for millennia; entertainers are quickly forgotten.
Many of the entertainers mentioned above are known to have had episodes of depression or manic-depressive disorder. The lives and careers of Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, and David Helfgott recapitulate, in the twentieth cen- tury, the themes of the lives of manic-depressive geniuses from previous eras. Elvis and Marilyn, after achieving unprecedented artistic and commercial success and international fame, were felled by manic-depression's paradoxical, adverse effects.The same disorder brought David Helfgott fame and commercial success, but deprived him of virtuosity and critical acclaim.
Marilyn Monroe's talent as an actress won her the accolade of genius from no less than Lee Strasberg, the founder of method acting.But while the public elevated Marilyn to legendary status, her private life was marred by frustration, despair, and defeat. Marilyn's biographers collectively portray her as a person with an underlying chronic depression characterized by low self-esteem, persis- tent insomnia, anxiety, panic attacks, paranoia, and impaired memory and con- centration.Not surprisingly, she was often late to arrive on the set, had difficulty memorizing her lines, and often flubbed them.
Marilyn Monroe had a family background of mood disorders and suicide. Her mother, Gladys, was chronically depressed, suffered depressive delusions, and spent much of her life in psychiatric hospitals. Marilyn herself suffered from prodigious mood swings, switching from apparent calm to towering rages which, according to Lee Strasberg's daughter Susan, evaporated quickly.When Marilyn couldn't sleep, she often exceeded the dose of the hypnotic her physician pre- scribed. Strasberg concluded that the medication was ineffective, even in higher doses.While Marilyn lived with the Strasbergs, their pharmacist would call to express his concern about the prescriptions for sleeping pills she kept filling.
Susan describes Marilyn as explosive, impulsive, easily distracted, self-crit- ical, and given to swearing.When nothing was happening in her life to distract her, she became restless and agitated. By contrast, her hypomanic episodes were characterized by "tremendous energy, which came out in herculean bursts of activity." These were followed by "total depletion and depression ... there were more mountains and valleys in her life than in the Himalayas." Marilyn joked about her depression and about suicide, and frequently threatened it.Once, when traveling with the Strasbergs, she suddenly exclaimed, "if it wasn't for the work, I'd throw myself out of the car."
Marilyn spent hundreds of hours in a futile ritual of Freudian psychotherapy. Worn down by the wear and tear of her anxiety, mood swings, chronic insomnia, and sensitivity to stress, she flirted with suicide by self-medicating with barbitu- rates and other sedatives. According to Donald Spoto, author of the biography Marilyn Monroe, Marilyn's chronic use of barbiturates such as Amytal and Nembutal drew her into "a vicious cycle of insomnia, drug-induced sleep, a stu- porous morning, and a vaguely unhappy day endured by taking more pills." Spoto writes that these agents induced chronic constipation, which Marilyn relieved with enemas.
On February 7, 1961, Marilyn accepted her psychoanalyst's advice and admitted herself to the Payne Whitney Clinic in New York City to be withdrawn from barbiturates and to rest.When Marilyn discovered she was in a psychiatric ward with locked doors, she persuaded ex-husband Joe DiMaggio to pressure the hospital into discharging her.After recuperating in a private room at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, Marilyn fired her psychoanalyst who, she believed, duped her into the initial admission, and flew to the West Coast to resume Freudian psy- chotherapy with a former psychoanalyst, Ralph Greenson.
Spoto's biography is unsparing in its condemnation of Greenson, who fos- tered a dependency relationship.He met with Marilyn five to seven times a week, and spoke to her on the phone every day.He failed to keep therapeutic distance, even encouraging Marilyn to have contact with his family.Just as Lee Strasberg had previously blurred the roles of teacher and father, Greenson became a Svengali in Marilyn's life.In the weeks that preceded her death, Marilyn and Greenson were in the process of discussing termination of therapy, an event which for helplessly dependent, depressed people is often hugely stressful and painful.It may help intensify depression and even precipitate an attempt at or suc- cessful suicide. At this stage Marilyn had become so dependent on Greenson that he had to approve virtually everything she did.
Ted Jordan, a former lover of Marilyn who remained her friend, wrote after her death:
Norma Jean Baker, a.k.a. Marilyn Monroe, committed accidental suicide some- time during the late hours of August 4 or the early hours of August 5, 1962.
The death climaxed a period of approximately ten years, in which, for var- ious psychological reasons, she was preparing to kill herself. No one had to mur- der Marilyn Monroe, for she was intent on murdering herself.Toward the end of her life she had become so self-destructive, it was simply a matter of time before she committed the one act that would give her the final release from the tortures that afflicted her mind.
Of Elvis Presley, the musician Scotty Moore said:
He was like a young bull. Never seen the like of energy in one person. We'd do a show, then get out of town a ways before we'd stop to eat. One of us would tell Elvis, "Come on, let's walk." We'd start walking with him down the road, and the car would catch up with us later.Just trying to get him where he'd pass out. He'd stay up all night talkin' and drivin'. He was a good driver, too. But somebody had to stay up with him 'cause he had no sense of direction. He wouldn't read a road map or nothin'. Just drive.
Elvis Presley's mood swings were recognizable in early adulthood.After his relationship with his girlfriend Dixie dissolved, he entered a deep, protracted depression.According to biographers Earl Greenwood and Kathleen Tracy,
His reactions were extreme, because he'd been such an extreme outcast all his life. The hurt was so strong in him that he resembled a mental patient who'd had one too many electroshock treatments. His senses were deadened, and his body sagged inward. I'm sure he was clinically depressed, but psychiatric help wasn't well accepted then.
In his heyday Elvis was the consummate entertainer, whose singing and erot- ic dancing appealed not only to teenagers and young adults, but to people of all ages.There were few countries in which people didn't hum Elvis's songs, dance to his recordings, or see his movies.Proper, refined matrons who shunned popu- lar music fell for Elvis.His performances were characterized by their high ener- gy; the quality of the singing and the songs; and the frenetic, suggestive body movements.
A telltale sign of Elvis's manic-depressive disorder was his overt paranoia. According to Greenwood and Tracy, " Elvis was suspicious of any new person in his life and ready to believe at the slightest provocation that they were only around him because they wanted something from him, prestige, or a job." Intermingled with Elvis's manic restlessness and promiscuity was his depressive, phobic obsession of not having sex with anyone who was a mother.
In public, Presley appeared carefree and a man who was on top of the world. According to Greenwood and Tracy, this image was orchestrated by Presley's manager, Colonel Parker, to hide the real Presley who at home was moody and depressed.Eventually, Presley became totally dependent on the adoration of his fans for his self-esteem.
As he aged, Presley became increasingly paranoid, especially of the press and, having developed the delusion that people were out to get him, began carry- ing a gun.In similar fashion to billionaire J. Paul Getty, Presley developed the delusion of being poor, a symptom which may emerge in the deepest levels of depression.
Elvis's career and death typify those of a talented, untreated manic-depres- sive performer.By the time of Elvis's death he was obese and had various diges- tive and cardiovascular disorders which often accompany mood disorders.He self-medicated, to a prodigious degree, with opiates, amphetamines, and sleeping pills, which he obtained from obliging physicians and pharmacists. Based on the toxicology reports and retrieval of copies of prescriptions, Elvis, during the months leading up to his death, was taking as many as fourteen stimulating, sedating, pain-killing, and sleep-inducing drugs.Many combinations of these drugs could have caused death from cardiorespiratory collapse. Nonetheless, the official ruling was that Elvis died from heart disease.
Creative composers, authors, and some performers with mood disorders can hide when impaired by depression, as Vladimir Horowitz did when he did not per- form, for mysterious reasons, for ten years.By contrast, high-energy performers who appear in front of live audiences night after night may, when depressed, lapse into a pattern of using stimulants to enliven them for a show, and barbiturates after- ward. Such was the fate of Elvis.And someone did recognize the depression, as the toxicology report showed traces of the antidepressants Elavil® (amitriptyline) and Aventyl® (nortiptyline) in Elvis's liver.Antidepressants can remit a variety of gastrointestinal disorders, ranging from peptic ulcers to irritable bowel syndrome. And research shows that depression is associated with a variety of potentially lethal arrhythmias of the heart, some of which respond to antidepressants.
A combination of drugs may well have caused Elvis's death, but to interpret it as a suicide, as some have done, is pure speculation.However, Elvis was ipso facto self-destructive.Sound judgment, a strong ego, and the drive for self‐ preservation would have guided the singer into an institution or the hands of a psychiatrist specializing in chemical dependency.
There is a temptation to do a psychological postmortem when deaths such as Elvis's occur.Who among his intimates was aware of his mood disorder? Did anyone knowing of his drug dependency attempt to place him in the care of a hos- pital for detoxification and treatment? Did Elvis refuse treatment, or did his inti- mates undermine it? Was the court correct in absolving of negligence and crimi- nal conduct the physician who prescribed most of the drugs?
Such questions can satisfy our thirst for accountability, but they tend to obscure the identity of the real culprit: it is manic-depressive disorder, and it alone, which can elevate a person to the pinnacles of success, and then send him crashing to destruction.
Today, psychiatrists are better armed to treat manic-depressive disorder than they were in the lifetimes of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley.They have at their disposal lithium carbonate and other drugs with antimanic properties, and a range of antidepressants. However, there are many patients whose symptoms are so severe that their treatment becomes difficult, at times impossible, to manage. Broken appointments, suicide threats or attempts, self-medication, noncompliance, sub- stance abuse, legal problems, family crises, hostility, rage, psychosis, and violence may create problems for patients, people close to them, and their psychiatrists.
Fame or celebrity may pose additional unique problems. Celebrities are used to having their wishes and desires catered to. If the psychiatrist lacks strength of character and is charmed by the patient's fame and wealth, he may forsake his training and better judgment and make concessions he would normally not make. Marilyn's and Elvis's physicians made concessions that ultimately led to reverse compliance; the patient was now in control and the physician complied.
The psychiatrist may wish to impress his family with the celebrity's presence in his home, and nourish his ego with his patient's fame. He may find her sexual allure irresistible, and take advantage of his power to draw her into a sexual rela- tionship, which, he rationalizes, she initiated by her seductive behavior.
Even with successful treatment the psychiatrist's job is not over, as he needs to be wary of the ominous signs of relapse, due to the development of immunity to lithium and/or antidepressants. This phenomenon is referred to as tachyphy- laxis, from the Greek "tachy," meaning rapid, and "phylaxis," meaning the erec- tion of a guard or barrier.It is a huge, largely unrecognized problem in the treat- ment of patients with mood disorders, and it has received virtually no attention by the pharmaceutical industry and little interest by academic psychiatry.
Tachyphylaxis is linked to paradox, in which a drug has an effect directly opposite to what was intended.In a paradoxical reaction to an antidepressant, a patient may become more rather than less depressed, to the point of becoming suicidal or homicidal. Paradox is at play when a drug induces weight gain, dimin- ished libido, and insomnia in some patients and weight loss, increased libido, and excessive sleep in others. It is a problem in treating mood disorders which has likewise attracted scant interest from academics and the pharmaceutical industry.
There are patients with mood disorders who, despite all efforts, do not respond to mood-regulating drugs or to electroshock therapy, and appear to be treatment resistant. With perseverance, sometimes over a span of years, some will eventually find an effective medication. Unfortunately, after failing to respond to one or a few trial drug trials, many patients give up and drop out of treatment.
The hero of the hit movie Shine is the Australian pianist David Helfgott.In the film Helfgott is portrayed as a prodigy who suddenly, and with no prior evidence of mental illness, breaks down during a performance of the Rachmaninoff Third Piano Concerto at the Royal School of Music in London. Helfgott returns to Australia where he is institutionalized.Eventually, he recovers enough of his musical prowess to be able to give a recital.
In reality, Helfgott had his breakdown in Australia after returning from London and, according to his publicist, "spent many years under treatment." What type of treatment, and whether inpatient or outpatient, was not specified.As to the nature of Helfgott's illness, his handlers have at various times declared him to be schizophrenic, schizoaffective (i.e., suffering from a combination of schiz- ophrenia and manic-depressive disorder), or suffering from nothing more than a "nerve disorder."
In her book, Love You to Bits, Helfgott's wife, Gillian, documents his inco- herence, agitation, extreme mood swings, self-hatred, sadness, fear, whimsical word games, alliterations, and "mercurial metaphors." She describes Helfgott's "near permanent state of elation" and his "slight" manic tendencies, his rapid speech and his distractibility.She notes that he was quieter and calmer on lithi- um, but when he became "flat" and stopped playing in the middle of a concert, his psychiatrist switched him to a combination of the major tranquilizer Serenace® and the mood-stabilizing anticonvulsant Tegretol®. In an appendix at the end of her book she lists some of the "special words" her husband uses liber- ally.Some are based on French, Russian, Polish, or Yiddish, while "others appear to be entirely of his own making." Such neologisms are numbered among the symptoms of schizophrenia and manic-depressive disorder, and are generally associated with chronic, severe illness.
In playing the role of David Helfgott in Shine, Jeffrey Rush imitates a the- saurus of manic symptoms: racing thoughts, flight of ideas, clang association (i.e., association of words by sound rather than meaning), pressured speech, excitabili- ty, gregariousness, familiarity, charm, witty remarks, hyperactivity, playfulness, mischievousness, lack of inhibition, restlessness, punning, rhyming, and infectious gaiety.When the real David Helfgott was interviewed by a cable TV channel, much of what we saw was a repeat of the psychopathology we observed in Shine. Helfgott's manic, infectious gaiety had the interviewer in stitches.His speech was pressured, his ideas took flight, he rambled, he echoed the interviewer's words, and his mood was merry. He was excitable and restless, childish, and had the "vivacious movements of expression" referred to by Emil Kraepelin, including floods of words, joking, and muttering.Frequently he closed his eyes and assumed what Kraepelin referred to as a "posture of exaltation."
To the seasoned eye, Helfgott suffers from manic-depressive disorder, and of a severity seldom seen today.We are left wondering whether he has failed to respond to medication or whether the treatment he has received is adequate. And one won- ders, if Helfgott's symptoms were less severe or his response to treatment optimal, whether he would have reached the virtuosity which has thus far eluded him.
The prevalence of manic-depressive disorder is a mystery. Epidemiologists cite a figure of 1 percent, a figure which I cannot reconcile with my twenty-nine years of experience of treating the disorder.Many people do not know that they or their close ones are manic-depressives, and many people obscure the disorder by drug or alcohol abuse, gambling, or violence. Many manic-depressives are offended when told that some people with their disorder are predisposed to violence; the fact remains that our prisons are filled with nonviolent and violent depressives and manic-depressives who are not included in epidemiological studies.
Manic-depressive disorder has been a recognized entity for the past 6,500 years. Over the past three decades Freudian psychiatrists have developed new diag- nostic entities, such as borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder.The borderline concept includes fluctuations in self-image, fears, mood swings, self-mutilating or suicidal behavior, fear of abandonment, anger, impulsivity, unstable relationships, and transient paranoid thoughts. The narcissistic person- ality is said to have grandiose self-importance, is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, believes that he is special, is arrogant and haughty, takes advan- tage of others, requires admiration, lacks empathy, and is envious.
All the symptoms of borderline and narcissistic personality disorders occur in manic-depression. And Freudian psychiatrists, with few exceptions, have never offered a cogent argument as to why these entities should be regarded as separate from manic-depressive disorder.To the skeptic, borderline and narcissistic disor- ders were spun off from manic-depressive disorder to create entities to be regard- ed as personality disorders, and thus amenable to treatment with intensive, long‐ term psychotherapy rather than with mood stabilizers or antidepressants.
In the United States many people suffering from the severer forms of manic‐ depressive disorder are diagnosed as schizophrenic. Paranoia occurs in both phas- es of manic-depression, yet the presence of paranoia is automatically associated, by many psychiatrists, with schizophrenia. Violence may occur in depression and in mania, yet the association of violence and psychosis will, in the United States, generally earn a patient the diagnosis of schizophrenia.
In the July 1978 issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, Harrison Pope, M.D., and Joseph Lipinsky, M.D., of the Harvard Medical School, published a study examining the specificity of "schizophrenic symptoms." Pope and Lipinsky reviewed studies on the phenomenology of psychotic illness, outcome, family his- tory, response to treatment with lithium carbonate, and cross-national and historic diagnostic comparisons.They found that most so-called schizophrenic symptoms, taken alone and collectively, have remarkably little, if any, demonstrated validity in determining diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment response in psychosis. They con- cluded that the result is an overdiagnosis of schizophrenia, and an underdiagnosis of mood disorders. These findings, however, have had little impact on American psychiatry, and it is not difficult to find reasons why: Unlike the treatment for schiz- ophrenia, American psychiatrists have never developed a rationale for treating manic-depressive disorder with psychotherapy; there is a tendency throughout medicine to ignore research which challenges prevailing dogmas; and all too few clinicians have read Eil Krapelin's epic Manic-Depressive Insanity and Paranoia.
Creative people often worry that taking an antimanic-drug such as lithium will strip them of their creativity. Mogens Schou, the researcher who pioneered the use of lithium in manic-depressive disorder, once did a study in which he interviewed twenty-four highly creative people on maintenance lithium therapy. Twelve felt that lithium had not influenced their creativity; six reported that their creativity had been diminished; and six felt that their creativity had been enhanced.Assuming that this study is valid, it can be said that one cannot predict with confidence the effect of long-term lithium therapy on an individual's cre- ativity. In one person lithium therapy may slow mental processes so that he can- not write or compose, while in another reduction of restlessness, excitability, and irritability may enhance the ability to create. Today, as when this book was first published, we do not have all the facts to explain the relationship of manic-depressive disorder to creativity and genius. Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence explores the role of emotion in learn- ing and achieving, and Kay Jamison's Touched by Fire: Manic Depression and the Artistic Temperament examines, as does this volume, the relationship between manic-depressive disorder and creativity.Other workers in this field who have done important work include Nancy Andreasen, M.D., Ph.D.; Hagop Akiskal, M.D.; Arnold Ludwig, M.D.; and Ruth Richards, M.D. Between us we have forged a new understanding of the relationship of creativity and genius to manic‐ depressive disorder.
But there is much that none of us can fully explain, notably the outer limits of creativity plumbed by manic-depressives, such as the invention of calculus by Newton, the discovery of natural selection by Darwin, Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, Verdi's Aida, and Michelangelo's David.
It remains a challenge to explain, with known physiological principles, the experiences of Nikola Tesla, the Yugoslavian genius of electricity.He was a sci- entific genius of the first rank, and belongs in the company of Newton and other immortals.A brilliant innovator in the laboratory, Tesla was no match in the boardroom for the likes of Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, and other inventor/entrepreneurs, and died in obscurity and poverty.According to his biog- rapher, Margaret Cheney,
Tesla's senses had always been abnormally acute.He claimed that several times in boyhood he had saved neighbors from fires in their own homes when he was awakened by the crackling of flames. When he was past forty and carrying on his lightning research in Colorado, he would claim to hear thunderclaps at a dis- tance of 550 miles....
But what happened during his breakdown was astonishing even by Tesla standards.He could hear the ticking of a watch from three rooms away. A fly landing on a table in his room caused a dull thud in his ear. A carriage passing a few miles away seemed to shake his whole body. A train whistle twenty miles distant made the chair on which he sat vibrate so strongly that the pain became unbearable. The ground under his feet was constantly trembling.
"The roaring noises from near and far," he wrote, "often produced the effects of spoken words which would have frightened me had I not been able to resolve them into their accidental components." During this period Tesla's pulse fluctuated from subnormal to 240.
Later in his life, Tesla learned to tame electricity as if it were a living organism. Nightly, after his highly ritualistic dinner at the Waldorf, he compulsively walked the identical route to his laboratory, where he performed the most amazing elec- trical experiments, accompanied by his assistant and often witnessed by Mark Twain. Tesla, who invented alternating and direct current and contributed to the development of the radio and radar, played with electricity as a snake charmer does with a hooded cobra.The electricity generated by many of his experiments would have felled a team of oxen, but in his hands it was harmless.
The intellectual/emotional depths necessary to perform the feats of a Tesla may be reserved for people with mood disorders. Michael Faraday, who suffered from recurrent depression, defined the nature of light and electromagnetic forces while in a state of intuitive visions, and thereby developed one of the foundations of physics although lacking any formal training in mathematics.Such altered states may be a prerequisite for great creative advances, and limited to the states of elation and exaltation only manics experience.
The collective work on the relationship of manic-depressive disorder to creativi- ty and genius has attracted interest in the media. However, it has not penetrated the area where it is most needed, and that is education. Manic-depressive disor- der can have damaging effects on learning, and it can strike people of all ages, even children. Depressed children don't learn. They don't learn because they can't concentrate; they lack initiative; they are too timid to ask questions or vol- unteer; they are easily discouraged; they are distracted by anxiety, phobias, or compulsions; they cannot organize their activities; and they may be chronically fatigued. In extreme cases they may be so phobic that they refuse to go to school. For many of these children, school is hell. For such children who respond to an antidepressant, school becomes a pleasant, rewarding, and affirming experience.
Over the past decade some psychiatrists have remained unconvinced about the validity of the broad concept of "attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder," viewing it as often the cognitive and behavioral expression of manic-depressive disorder or major depression in childhood.Preliminary research by Dr. Joseph Biederman at Harvard now suggests that between one-fifth and one-quarter of children with ADHD have manic-depressive disorder, or will go on to develop it. It falls on educators at all levels to consider depression and manic-depressive dis- order in students who are failing or underachieving.
The signs and symptoms of syphilis can imitate so many diseases that, earli- er this century, it was named the "great masquerader." When the objective phe- nomena of mood disorders overtake the romance with Sigmund Freud, depres- sion and manic-depressive disorder will take their place as the masqueraders of the twentieth century, the invisible force behind humankind's greatest achieve- ments and failures.
Marco Rodrigo.
Manic Depression and Creativity
Book by D. Jablow Hershman, Julian Lieb; Prometheus Books, 1998
Subjects:
Genius And Mental Illness, Genius And Mental Illness--Case Studies, Manic-Depressive Illness, Manic-Depressive Illness--Case Studies
Collections: Psychology, Entire Library
From Plato, who originated the idea of inspired mania, to Beethoven, Dickens, Newton, Van Gogh, and today's popular creative artists and scientists who've battled manic depression, this intriguing work examines creativity and madness in mystery, myth, and history.
http://www.questia.com/
Contents
Preface
D. Jablow Hershman
1
1.
A Dissection of Genius
7
2.
Manic-Depression
19
3.
Newton
39
4.
Beethoven
59
5.
Dickens
95
6.
Van Gogh
139
7.
Diminishing Creativity
177
8.
Augmenting Genius
197
Epilogue
Julian Lieb, M.D.
207
Bibliography
217
-v-
Questia Media America, Inc. www.questia.com Publication Information: Book Title: Manic Depression and Creativity. Contributors: D. Jablow Hershman - author, Julian Lieb - author. Publisher: Prometheus Books. Place of Publication: Amherst, NY. Publication Year: 1998. Page Number: v.
Excerpt:
Epilogue
Julian Lieb, M.D.
People ask: "Where are today's geniuses? Where are our Newtons, Beethovens, Einsteins, Edisons, Picassos? Our Byrons, Mozarts, and Verdis? It is an interest- ing question.Perhaps instant commercial success deprives some creative people of motivation. Or might it be that our institutions, in the name of political cor- rectness and in ignoring the adverse effects of academic tenure on the pursuit of truth, suppress genius in the sciences, while overvaluing it in the field of enter- tainment? One need go no further than to examine the intellectual achievements of many who deliver commencement speeches at our colleges and universities for insight into our values as the millennium draws to an end.
Warfare on a massive scale and genocide depleted the twentieth century of legions of potential geniuses. How many of those who fell at the Somme, at Tannenberg, at Verdun, on Guadalcanal, at Midway, on Iwo Jima, at Stalingrad, or in the Sinai, or met their deaths over Hamburg or Berlin would, had they lived, permanently enriched humankind? How many who would have followed in the footsteps of Rubinstein, Horowitz, Oistrakh, Bernstein, Chaplin, Chagall, Sabin, Salk, and Bohr, perished in Auschwitz, Treblinka, and other concentration camps? Will the England of Shakespeare, Keats, Shelley, Blake, Tennyson, Milton, Wordsworth, Dickens, Stevenson, and Churchill ever recover fully from the dreadful drain on its manpower during two world wars? Drawing to a close is a century in which paranoid tyrants in the USSR, Cambodia, and elsewhere made the extinction of intellectuals a matter of state policy, an epoch in which a mon- ster such as Josef Stalin thought nothing of murdering a Maxim Gorky.
This century has produced its geniuses, some in the arts and sciences, many in the field of entertainment. Among the latter are: Irving Berlin, Alan Jay Lerner, Frederick Loewe, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Charlie Parker, Thelonius Monk, Bud Powell, Oscar Peterson, Charles Mingus, John Coltrane, Wes Montgomery, Dave Brubeck, Stevie Wonder, Neil Diamond, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Balanchine, Arturo Toscanini, Richard Burton, Laurence Olivier, George Gershwin, Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, Alfred Hitchcock, Michael Crichton, Walt Disney, and Jim Henson.
Although many have had a powerful impact on society, history will place few of them in the company of Leonardo da Vinci, Beethoven, Newton, van Gogh, Dickens, and other towering creators of the past.Posterity will decide who among them provided humanity with work of supreme and lasting value. As we mentioned earlier, genius is a relationship, and one's reputation as a genius varies in longevity, depending on the field of endeavor. Scientists may wear their crown for millennia; entertainers are quickly forgotten.
Many of the entertainers mentioned above are known to have had episodes of depression or manic-depressive disorder. The lives and careers of Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, and David Helfgott recapitulate, in the twentieth cen- tury, the themes of the lives of manic-depressive geniuses from previous eras. Elvis and Marilyn, after achieving unprecedented artistic and commercial success and international fame, were felled by manic-depression's paradoxical, adverse effects.The same disorder brought David Helfgott fame and commercial success, but deprived him of virtuosity and critical acclaim.
Marilyn Monroe's talent as an actress won her the accolade of genius from no less than Lee Strasberg, the founder of method acting.But while the public elevated Marilyn to legendary status, her private life was marred by frustration, despair, and defeat. Marilyn's biographers collectively portray her as a person with an underlying chronic depression characterized by low self-esteem, persis- tent insomnia, anxiety, panic attacks, paranoia, and impaired memory and con- centration.Not surprisingly, she was often late to arrive on the set, had difficulty memorizing her lines, and often flubbed them.
Marilyn Monroe had a family background of mood disorders and suicide. Her mother, Gladys, was chronically depressed, suffered depressive delusions, and spent much of her life in psychiatric hospitals. Marilyn herself suffered from prodigious mood swings, switching from apparent calm to towering rages which, according to Lee Strasberg's daughter Susan, evaporated quickly.When Marilyn couldn't sleep, she often exceeded the dose of the hypnotic her physician pre- scribed. Strasberg concluded that the medication was ineffective, even in higher doses.While Marilyn lived with the Strasbergs, their pharmacist would call to express his concern about the prescriptions for sleeping pills she kept filling.
Susan describes Marilyn as explosive, impulsive, easily distracted, self-crit- ical, and given to swearing.When nothing was happening in her life to distract her, she became restless and agitated. By contrast, her hypomanic episodes were characterized by "tremendous energy, which came out in herculean bursts of activity." These were followed by "total depletion and depression ... there were more mountains and valleys in her life than in the Himalayas." Marilyn joked about her depression and about suicide, and frequently threatened it.Once, when traveling with the Strasbergs, she suddenly exclaimed, "if it wasn't for the work, I'd throw myself out of the car."
Marilyn spent hundreds of hours in a futile ritual of Freudian psychotherapy. Worn down by the wear and tear of her anxiety, mood swings, chronic insomnia, and sensitivity to stress, she flirted with suicide by self-medicating with barbitu- rates and other sedatives. According to Donald Spoto, author of the biography Marilyn Monroe, Marilyn's chronic use of barbiturates such as Amytal and Nembutal drew her into "a vicious cycle of insomnia, drug-induced sleep, a stu- porous morning, and a vaguely unhappy day endured by taking more pills." Spoto writes that these agents induced chronic constipation, which Marilyn relieved with enemas.
On February 7, 1961, Marilyn accepted her psychoanalyst's advice and admitted herself to the Payne Whitney Clinic in New York City to be withdrawn from barbiturates and to rest.When Marilyn discovered she was in a psychiatric ward with locked doors, she persuaded ex-husband Joe DiMaggio to pressure the hospital into discharging her.After recuperating in a private room at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, Marilyn fired her psychoanalyst who, she believed, duped her into the initial admission, and flew to the West Coast to resume Freudian psy- chotherapy with a former psychoanalyst, Ralph Greenson.
Spoto's biography is unsparing in its condemnation of Greenson, who fos- tered a dependency relationship.He met with Marilyn five to seven times a week, and spoke to her on the phone every day.He failed to keep therapeutic distance, even encouraging Marilyn to have contact with his family.Just as Lee Strasberg had previously blurred the roles of teacher and father, Greenson became a Svengali in Marilyn's life.In the weeks that preceded her death, Marilyn and Greenson were in the process of discussing termination of therapy, an event which for helplessly dependent, depressed people is often hugely stressful and painful.It may help intensify depression and even precipitate an attempt at or suc- cessful suicide. At this stage Marilyn had become so dependent on Greenson that he had to approve virtually everything she did.
Ted Jordan, a former lover of Marilyn who remained her friend, wrote after her death:
Norma Jean Baker, a.k.a. Marilyn Monroe, committed accidental suicide some- time during the late hours of August 4 or the early hours of August 5, 1962.
The death climaxed a period of approximately ten years, in which, for var- ious psychological reasons, she was preparing to kill herself. No one had to mur- der Marilyn Monroe, for she was intent on murdering herself.Toward the end of her life she had become so self-destructive, it was simply a matter of time before she committed the one act that would give her the final release from the tortures that afflicted her mind.
Of Elvis Presley, the musician Scotty Moore said:
He was like a young bull. Never seen the like of energy in one person. We'd do a show, then get out of town a ways before we'd stop to eat. One of us would tell Elvis, "Come on, let's walk." We'd start walking with him down the road, and the car would catch up with us later.Just trying to get him where he'd pass out. He'd stay up all night talkin' and drivin'. He was a good driver, too. But somebody had to stay up with him 'cause he had no sense of direction. He wouldn't read a road map or nothin'. Just drive.
Elvis Presley's mood swings were recognizable in early adulthood.After his relationship with his girlfriend Dixie dissolved, he entered a deep, protracted depression.According to biographers Earl Greenwood and Kathleen Tracy,
His reactions were extreme, because he'd been such an extreme outcast all his life. The hurt was so strong in him that he resembled a mental patient who'd had one too many electroshock treatments. His senses were deadened, and his body sagged inward. I'm sure he was clinically depressed, but psychiatric help wasn't well accepted then.
In his heyday Elvis was the consummate entertainer, whose singing and erot- ic dancing appealed not only to teenagers and young adults, but to people of all ages.There were few countries in which people didn't hum Elvis's songs, dance to his recordings, or see his movies.Proper, refined matrons who shunned popu- lar music fell for Elvis.His performances were characterized by their high ener- gy; the quality of the singing and the songs; and the frenetic, suggestive body movements.
A telltale sign of Elvis's manic-depressive disorder was his overt paranoia. According to Greenwood and Tracy, " Elvis was suspicious of any new person in his life and ready to believe at the slightest provocation that they were only around him because they wanted something from him, prestige, or a job." Intermingled with Elvis's manic restlessness and promiscuity was his depressive, phobic obsession of not having sex with anyone who was a mother.
In public, Presley appeared carefree and a man who was on top of the world. According to Greenwood and Tracy, this image was orchestrated by Presley's manager, Colonel Parker, to hide the real Presley who at home was moody and depressed.Eventually, Presley became totally dependent on the adoration of his fans for his self-esteem.
As he aged, Presley became increasingly paranoid, especially of the press and, having developed the delusion that people were out to get him, began carry- ing a gun.In similar fashion to billionaire J. Paul Getty, Presley developed the delusion of being poor, a symptom which may emerge in the deepest levels of depression.
Elvis's career and death typify those of a talented, untreated manic-depres- sive performer.By the time of Elvis's death he was obese and had various diges- tive and cardiovascular disorders which often accompany mood disorders.He self-medicated, to a prodigious degree, with opiates, amphetamines, and sleeping pills, which he obtained from obliging physicians and pharmacists. Based on the toxicology reports and retrieval of copies of prescriptions, Elvis, during the months leading up to his death, was taking as many as fourteen stimulating, sedating, pain-killing, and sleep-inducing drugs.Many combinations of these drugs could have caused death from cardiorespiratory collapse. Nonetheless, the official ruling was that Elvis died from heart disease.
Creative composers, authors, and some performers with mood disorders can hide when impaired by depression, as Vladimir Horowitz did when he did not per- form, for mysterious reasons, for ten years.By contrast, high-energy performers who appear in front of live audiences night after night may, when depressed, lapse into a pattern of using stimulants to enliven them for a show, and barbiturates after- ward. Such was the fate of Elvis.And someone did recognize the depression, as the toxicology report showed traces of the antidepressants Elavil® (amitriptyline) and Aventyl® (nortiptyline) in Elvis's liver.Antidepressants can remit a variety of gastrointestinal disorders, ranging from peptic ulcers to irritable bowel syndrome. And research shows that depression is associated with a variety of potentially lethal arrhythmias of the heart, some of which respond to antidepressants.
A combination of drugs may well have caused Elvis's death, but to interpret it as a suicide, as some have done, is pure speculation.However, Elvis was ipso facto self-destructive.Sound judgment, a strong ego, and the drive for self‐ preservation would have guided the singer into an institution or the hands of a psychiatrist specializing in chemical dependency.
There is a temptation to do a psychological postmortem when deaths such as Elvis's occur.Who among his intimates was aware of his mood disorder? Did anyone knowing of his drug dependency attempt to place him in the care of a hos- pital for detoxification and treatment? Did Elvis refuse treatment, or did his inti- mates undermine it? Was the court correct in absolving of negligence and crimi- nal conduct the physician who prescribed most of the drugs?
Such questions can satisfy our thirst for accountability, but they tend to obscure the identity of the real culprit: it is manic-depressive disorder, and it alone, which can elevate a person to the pinnacles of success, and then send him crashing to destruction.
Today, psychiatrists are better armed to treat manic-depressive disorder than they were in the lifetimes of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley.They have at their disposal lithium carbonate and other drugs with antimanic properties, and a range of antidepressants. However, there are many patients whose symptoms are so severe that their treatment becomes difficult, at times impossible, to manage. Broken appointments, suicide threats or attempts, self-medication, noncompliance, sub- stance abuse, legal problems, family crises, hostility, rage, psychosis, and violence may create problems for patients, people close to them, and their psychiatrists.
Fame or celebrity may pose additional unique problems. Celebrities are used to having their wishes and desires catered to. If the psychiatrist lacks strength of character and is charmed by the patient's fame and wealth, he may forsake his training and better judgment and make concessions he would normally not make. Marilyn's and Elvis's physicians made concessions that ultimately led to reverse compliance; the patient was now in control and the physician complied.
The psychiatrist may wish to impress his family with the celebrity's presence in his home, and nourish his ego with his patient's fame. He may find her sexual allure irresistible, and take advantage of his power to draw her into a sexual rela- tionship, which, he rationalizes, she initiated by her seductive behavior.
Even with successful treatment the psychiatrist's job is not over, as he needs to be wary of the ominous signs of relapse, due to the development of immunity to lithium and/or antidepressants. This phenomenon is referred to as tachyphy- laxis, from the Greek "tachy," meaning rapid, and "phylaxis," meaning the erec- tion of a guard or barrier.It is a huge, largely unrecognized problem in the treat- ment of patients with mood disorders, and it has received virtually no attention by the pharmaceutical industry and little interest by academic psychiatry.
Tachyphylaxis is linked to paradox, in which a drug has an effect directly opposite to what was intended.In a paradoxical reaction to an antidepressant, a patient may become more rather than less depressed, to the point of becoming suicidal or homicidal. Paradox is at play when a drug induces weight gain, dimin- ished libido, and insomnia in some patients and weight loss, increased libido, and excessive sleep in others. It is a problem in treating mood disorders which has likewise attracted scant interest from academics and the pharmaceutical industry.
There are patients with mood disorders who, despite all efforts, do not respond to mood-regulating drugs or to electroshock therapy, and appear to be treatment resistant. With perseverance, sometimes over a span of years, some will eventually find an effective medication. Unfortunately, after failing to respond to one or a few trial drug trials, many patients give up and drop out of treatment.
The hero of the hit movie Shine is the Australian pianist David Helfgott.In the film Helfgott is portrayed as a prodigy who suddenly, and with no prior evidence of mental illness, breaks down during a performance of the Rachmaninoff Third Piano Concerto at the Royal School of Music in London. Helfgott returns to Australia where he is institutionalized.Eventually, he recovers enough of his musical prowess to be able to give a recital.
In reality, Helfgott had his breakdown in Australia after returning from London and, according to his publicist, "spent many years under treatment." What type of treatment, and whether inpatient or outpatient, was not specified.As to the nature of Helfgott's illness, his handlers have at various times declared him to be schizophrenic, schizoaffective (i.e., suffering from a combination of schiz- ophrenia and manic-depressive disorder), or suffering from nothing more than a "nerve disorder."
In her book, Love You to Bits, Helfgott's wife, Gillian, documents his inco- herence, agitation, extreme mood swings, self-hatred, sadness, fear, whimsical word games, alliterations, and "mercurial metaphors." She describes Helfgott's "near permanent state of elation" and his "slight" manic tendencies, his rapid speech and his distractibility.She notes that he was quieter and calmer on lithi- um, but when he became "flat" and stopped playing in the middle of a concert, his psychiatrist switched him to a combination of the major tranquilizer Serenace® and the mood-stabilizing anticonvulsant Tegretol®. In an appendix at the end of her book she lists some of the "special words" her husband uses liber- ally.Some are based on French, Russian, Polish, or Yiddish, while "others appear to be entirely of his own making." Such neologisms are numbered among the symptoms of schizophrenia and manic-depressive disorder, and are generally associated with chronic, severe illness.
In playing the role of David Helfgott in Shine, Jeffrey Rush imitates a the- saurus of manic symptoms: racing thoughts, flight of ideas, clang association (i.e., association of words by sound rather than meaning), pressured speech, excitabili- ty, gregariousness, familiarity, charm, witty remarks, hyperactivity, playfulness, mischievousness, lack of inhibition, restlessness, punning, rhyming, and infectious gaiety.When the real David Helfgott was interviewed by a cable TV channel, much of what we saw was a repeat of the psychopathology we observed in Shine. Helfgott's manic, infectious gaiety had the interviewer in stitches.His speech was pressured, his ideas took flight, he rambled, he echoed the interviewer's words, and his mood was merry. He was excitable and restless, childish, and had the "vivacious movements of expression" referred to by Emil Kraepelin, including floods of words, joking, and muttering.Frequently he closed his eyes and assumed what Kraepelin referred to as a "posture of exaltation."
To the seasoned eye, Helfgott suffers from manic-depressive disorder, and of a severity seldom seen today.We are left wondering whether he has failed to respond to medication or whether the treatment he has received is adequate. And one won- ders, if Helfgott's symptoms were less severe or his response to treatment optimal, whether he would have reached the virtuosity which has thus far eluded him.
The prevalence of manic-depressive disorder is a mystery. Epidemiologists cite a figure of 1 percent, a figure which I cannot reconcile with my twenty-nine years of experience of treating the disorder.Many people do not know that they or their close ones are manic-depressives, and many people obscure the disorder by drug or alcohol abuse, gambling, or violence. Many manic-depressives are offended when told that some people with their disorder are predisposed to violence; the fact remains that our prisons are filled with nonviolent and violent depressives and manic-depressives who are not included in epidemiological studies.
Manic-depressive disorder has been a recognized entity for the past 6,500 years. Over the past three decades Freudian psychiatrists have developed new diag- nostic entities, such as borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder.The borderline concept includes fluctuations in self-image, fears, mood swings, self-mutilating or suicidal behavior, fear of abandonment, anger, impulsivity, unstable relationships, and transient paranoid thoughts. The narcissistic person- ality is said to have grandiose self-importance, is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, believes that he is special, is arrogant and haughty, takes advan- tage of others, requires admiration, lacks empathy, and is envious.
All the symptoms of borderline and narcissistic personality disorders occur in manic-depression. And Freudian psychiatrists, with few exceptions, have never offered a cogent argument as to why these entities should be regarded as separate from manic-depressive disorder.To the skeptic, borderline and narcissistic disor- ders were spun off from manic-depressive disorder to create entities to be regard- ed as personality disorders, and thus amenable to treatment with intensive, long‐ term psychotherapy rather than with mood stabilizers or antidepressants.
In the United States many people suffering from the severer forms of manic‐ depressive disorder are diagnosed as schizophrenic. Paranoia occurs in both phas- es of manic-depression, yet the presence of paranoia is automatically associated, by many psychiatrists, with schizophrenia. Violence may occur in depression and in mania, yet the association of violence and psychosis will, in the United States, generally earn a patient the diagnosis of schizophrenia.
In the July 1978 issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, Harrison Pope, M.D., and Joseph Lipinsky, M.D., of the Harvard Medical School, published a study examining the specificity of "schizophrenic symptoms." Pope and Lipinsky reviewed studies on the phenomenology of psychotic illness, outcome, family his- tory, response to treatment with lithium carbonate, and cross-national and historic diagnostic comparisons.They found that most so-called schizophrenic symptoms, taken alone and collectively, have remarkably little, if any, demonstrated validity in determining diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment response in psychosis. They con- cluded that the result is an overdiagnosis of schizophrenia, and an underdiagnosis of mood disorders. These findings, however, have had little impact on American psychiatry, and it is not difficult to find reasons why: Unlike the treatment for schiz- ophrenia, American psychiatrists have never developed a rationale for treating manic-depressive disorder with psychotherapy; there is a tendency throughout medicine to ignore research which challenges prevailing dogmas; and all too few clinicians have read Eil Krapelin's epic Manic-Depressive Insanity and Paranoia.
Creative people often worry that taking an antimanic-drug such as lithium will strip them of their creativity. Mogens Schou, the researcher who pioneered the use of lithium in manic-depressive disorder, once did a study in which he interviewed twenty-four highly creative people on maintenance lithium therapy. Twelve felt that lithium had not influenced their creativity; six reported that their creativity had been diminished; and six felt that their creativity had been enhanced.Assuming that this study is valid, it can be said that one cannot predict with confidence the effect of long-term lithium therapy on an individual's cre- ativity. In one person lithium therapy may slow mental processes so that he can- not write or compose, while in another reduction of restlessness, excitability, and irritability may enhance the ability to create. Today, as when this book was first published, we do not have all the facts to explain the relationship of manic-depressive disorder to creativity and genius. Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence explores the role of emotion in learn- ing and achieving, and Kay Jamison's Touched by Fire: Manic Depression and the Artistic Temperament examines, as does this volume, the relationship between manic-depressive disorder and creativity.Other workers in this field who have done important work include Nancy Andreasen, M.D., Ph.D.; Hagop Akiskal, M.D.; Arnold Ludwig, M.D.; and Ruth Richards, M.D. Between us we have forged a new understanding of the relationship of creativity and genius to manic‐ depressive disorder.
But there is much that none of us can fully explain, notably the outer limits of creativity plumbed by manic-depressives, such as the invention of calculus by Newton, the discovery of natural selection by Darwin, Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, Verdi's Aida, and Michelangelo's David.
It remains a challenge to explain, with known physiological principles, the experiences of Nikola Tesla, the Yugoslavian genius of electricity.He was a sci- entific genius of the first rank, and belongs in the company of Newton and other immortals.A brilliant innovator in the laboratory, Tesla was no match in the boardroom for the likes of Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, and other inventor/entrepreneurs, and died in obscurity and poverty.According to his biog- rapher, Margaret Cheney,
Tesla's senses had always been abnormally acute.He claimed that several times in boyhood he had saved neighbors from fires in their own homes when he was awakened by the crackling of flames. When he was past forty and carrying on his lightning research in Colorado, he would claim to hear thunderclaps at a dis- tance of 550 miles....
But what happened during his breakdown was astonishing even by Tesla standards.He could hear the ticking of a watch from three rooms away. A fly landing on a table in his room caused a dull thud in his ear. A carriage passing a few miles away seemed to shake his whole body. A train whistle twenty miles distant made the chair on which he sat vibrate so strongly that the pain became unbearable. The ground under his feet was constantly trembling.
"The roaring noises from near and far," he wrote, "often produced the effects of spoken words which would have frightened me had I not been able to resolve them into their accidental components." During this period Tesla's pulse fluctuated from subnormal to 240.
Later in his life, Tesla learned to tame electricity as if it were a living organism. Nightly, after his highly ritualistic dinner at the Waldorf, he compulsively walked the identical route to his laboratory, where he performed the most amazing elec- trical experiments, accompanied by his assistant and often witnessed by Mark Twain. Tesla, who invented alternating and direct current and contributed to the development of the radio and radar, played with electricity as a snake charmer does with a hooded cobra.The electricity generated by many of his experiments would have felled a team of oxen, but in his hands it was harmless.
The intellectual/emotional depths necessary to perform the feats of a Tesla may be reserved for people with mood disorders. Michael Faraday, who suffered from recurrent depression, defined the nature of light and electromagnetic forces while in a state of intuitive visions, and thereby developed one of the foundations of physics although lacking any formal training in mathematics.Such altered states may be a prerequisite for great creative advances, and limited to the states of elation and exaltation only manics experience.
The collective work on the relationship of manic-depressive disorder to creativi- ty and genius has attracted interest in the media. However, it has not penetrated the area where it is most needed, and that is education. Manic-depressive disor- der can have damaging effects on learning, and it can strike people of all ages, even children. Depressed children don't learn. They don't learn because they can't concentrate; they lack initiative; they are too timid to ask questions or vol- unteer; they are easily discouraged; they are distracted by anxiety, phobias, or compulsions; they cannot organize their activities; and they may be chronically fatigued. In extreme cases they may be so phobic that they refuse to go to school. For many of these children, school is hell. For such children who respond to an antidepressant, school becomes a pleasant, rewarding, and affirming experience.
Over the past decade some psychiatrists have remained unconvinced about the validity of the broad concept of "attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder," viewing it as often the cognitive and behavioral expression of manic-depressive disorder or major depression in childhood.Preliminary research by Dr. Joseph Biederman at Harvard now suggests that between one-fifth and one-quarter of children with ADHD have manic-depressive disorder, or will go on to develop it. It falls on educators at all levels to consider depression and manic-depressive dis- order in students who are failing or underachieving.
The signs and symptoms of syphilis can imitate so many diseases that, earli- er this century, it was named the "great masquerader." When the objective phe- nomena of mood disorders overtake the romance with Sigmund Freud, depres- sion and manic-depressive disorder will take their place as the masqueraders of the twentieth century, the invisible force behind humankind's greatest achieve- ments and failures.
quinta-feira, 9 de outubro de 2008
The Wisdom of Your Cells - The Biology of Belief - Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D.
Available at www.audible.com
The Wisdom of Your Cells
The Biology of Belief
http://www.brucelipton.com/
http://www.brucelipton.com/article/the-wisdom-of-your-cells
Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. in Developmental Cell Biology
http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:1ntGF1LPDbMJ:www.sbgi.edu/cv_pdfs/lipton.cv.pdf+bruce+h+lipton&hl=pt-BR&ct=clnk&cd=6&gl=br
The Wisdom of Your Cells
The Biology of Belief
http://www.brucelipton.com/
http://www.brucelipton.com/article/the-wisdom-of-your-cells
Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. in Developmental Cell Biology
http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:1ntGF1LPDbMJ:www.sbgi.edu/cv_pdfs/lipton.cv.pdf+bruce+h+lipton&hl=pt-BR&ct=clnk&cd=6&gl=br
THE PROMISE OF SLEEP - William C. Dement, MD, PhD
THE PROMISE OF SLEEP A Pioneer in Sleep Medicine Exploresthe Vital Connection between Health, Happiness,and a Good Night's Sleep William C. Dement, MD, PhD, and Christopher Vaughan
http://www.sleephomepages.org/books/promiseofsleep.htm
http://www.sleephomepages.org/books/promiseofsleep.htm
Making A Good Brain Great and Change your Brain, Change Your Life - Daniel G. Amen, M.D.
Making A Good Brain Great
http://amenclinics.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=17
Daniel G. Amen, M.D.
The Ultimate How-To Resource for Healing and Fine-Tuning Your Greatest Asset . . . YOUR BRAIN
Change your Brain, Change Your Life ;the sequel to Making a Good Brain Great
Daniel G. Amen, M.D.
http://amenclinics.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=17
Daniel G. Amen, M.D.
The Ultimate How-To Resource for Healing and Fine-Tuning Your Greatest Asset . . . YOUR BRAIN
Change your Brain, Change Your Life ;the sequel to Making a Good Brain Great
Daniel G. Amen, M.D.
Social Intelligence Daniel Goleman
Social Intelligence Daniel Goleman
http://www.danielgoleman.info/social_intelligence/index.html
http://www.danielgoleman.info/social_intelligence/index.html
Touchstone - A melhor forma de aprender ou melhorar seu inglês
Touchstone - A melhor forma de aprender ou melhorar seu inglês
http://www.cambridge.org/us/esl/touchstone/
http://www.cambridge.org/us/esl/touchstone/
Brain Rules - DR. JOHN J. MEDINA
Brain Rules DR. JOHN J. MEDINA
http://www.brainrules.net/
About Brain Rules
Most of us have no idea what’s really going on inside our heads. Yet brain scientists have uncovered details every business leader, parent, and teacher should know—like the need for physical activity to get your brain working its best.
How do we learn? What exactly do sleep and stress do to our brains? Why is multi-tasking a myth? Why is it so easy to forget—and so important to repeat new knowledge? Is it true that men and women have different brains?
In Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina, a molecular biologist, shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work. In each chapter, he describes a brain rule—what scientists know for sure about how our brains work—and then offers transformative ideas for our daily lives.
Medina’s fascinating stories and infectious sense of humor breathe life into brain science. You’ll learn why Michael Jordan was no good at baseball. You’ll peer over a surgeon’s shoulder as he proves that most of us have a Jennifer Aniston neuron. You’ll meet a boy who has an amazing memory for music but can’t tie his own shoes.
You will discover how:
Every brain is wired differently
Exercise improves cognition
We are designed to never stop learning and exploring
Memories are volatile
Sleep is powerfully linked with the ability to learn
Vision trumps all of the other senses
Stress changes the way we learn
In the end, you’ll understand how your brain really works—and how to get the most out of it.
About the author
DR. JOHN J. MEDINA is a developmental molecular biologist focused on the genes involved in human brain development and the genetics of psychiatric disorders. He has spent most of his professional life as a private research consultant, working primarily in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries on research related to mental health. Medina holds joint affiliate faculty appointments at the University of Washington School of Medicine, in its Department of Bioengineering, and at Seattle Pacific University, where he is the director of the Brain Center for Applied Learning Research.
Medina was the founding director of the Talaris Research Institute, a Seattle-based research center originally focused on how infants encode and process information at the cognitive, cellular, and molecular levels.
In 2004, Medina was appointed to the rank of affiliate scholar at the National Academy of Engineering. He has been named Outstanding Faculty of the Year at the College of Engineering at the University of Washington; the Merrill Dow/Continuing Medical Education National Teacher of the Year; and, twice, the Bioengineering Student Association Teacher of the Year. Medina has been a consultant to the Education Commission of the States and a regular speaker on the relationship between neurology and education. He also writes the "Molecules of the Mind" column for the Psychiatric Times.
Medina’s books include: Brain Rules, The Genetic Inferno, The Clock of Ages, Depression, What You Need to Know About Alzheimer’s, The Outer Limits of Life, Uncovering the Mystery of AIDS, and Of Serotonin, Dopamine and Antipsychotic Medications.
Medina has a lifelong fascination with how the mind reacts to and organizes information. As the father of two boys, he has an interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children. In addition to his research, consulting, and teaching, Medina speaks often to public officials, business and medical professionals, school boards, and nonprofit leaders. He lives in Seattle with his wife and two sons.
http://www.brainrules.net/
About Brain Rules
Most of us have no idea what’s really going on inside our heads. Yet brain scientists have uncovered details every business leader, parent, and teacher should know—like the need for physical activity to get your brain working its best.
How do we learn? What exactly do sleep and stress do to our brains? Why is multi-tasking a myth? Why is it so easy to forget—and so important to repeat new knowledge? Is it true that men and women have different brains?
In Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina, a molecular biologist, shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work. In each chapter, he describes a brain rule—what scientists know for sure about how our brains work—and then offers transformative ideas for our daily lives.
Medina’s fascinating stories and infectious sense of humor breathe life into brain science. You’ll learn why Michael Jordan was no good at baseball. You’ll peer over a surgeon’s shoulder as he proves that most of us have a Jennifer Aniston neuron. You’ll meet a boy who has an amazing memory for music but can’t tie his own shoes.
You will discover how:
Every brain is wired differently
Exercise improves cognition
We are designed to never stop learning and exploring
Memories are volatile
Sleep is powerfully linked with the ability to learn
Vision trumps all of the other senses
Stress changes the way we learn
In the end, you’ll understand how your brain really works—and how to get the most out of it.
About the author
DR. JOHN J. MEDINA is a developmental molecular biologist focused on the genes involved in human brain development and the genetics of psychiatric disorders. He has spent most of his professional life as a private research consultant, working primarily in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries on research related to mental health. Medina holds joint affiliate faculty appointments at the University of Washington School of Medicine, in its Department of Bioengineering, and at Seattle Pacific University, where he is the director of the Brain Center for Applied Learning Research.
Medina was the founding director of the Talaris Research Institute, a Seattle-based research center originally focused on how infants encode and process information at the cognitive, cellular, and molecular levels.
In 2004, Medina was appointed to the rank of affiliate scholar at the National Academy of Engineering. He has been named Outstanding Faculty of the Year at the College of Engineering at the University of Washington; the Merrill Dow/Continuing Medical Education National Teacher of the Year; and, twice, the Bioengineering Student Association Teacher of the Year. Medina has been a consultant to the Education Commission of the States and a regular speaker on the relationship between neurology and education. He also writes the "Molecules of the Mind" column for the Psychiatric Times.
Medina’s books include: Brain Rules, The Genetic Inferno, The Clock of Ages, Depression, What You Need to Know About Alzheimer’s, The Outer Limits of Life, Uncovering the Mystery of AIDS, and Of Serotonin, Dopamine and Antipsychotic Medications.
Medina has a lifelong fascination with how the mind reacts to and organizes information. As the father of two boys, he has an interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children. In addition to his research, consulting, and teaching, Medina speaks often to public officials, business and medical professionals, school boards, and nonprofit leaders. He lives in Seattle with his wife and two sons.
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