Brave New Mind - The Art of Serene Readiness

We live in stressful times. Some say that this is the most challenging time in history, it is fueled by ego, competition, injustice, and anxiety. Just glancing at news headlines each day is enough to cause alarm.
Mental health experts, psychologists, therapists, and counselors have reported the rising levels of stress, depression, anxiety, worry, and fear, year after year, for the last two decades.We can either wring our hands and doom-scrolling, or we can do something about it.
Brave New Mind offers ways to:

• Handle increasing stress in all areas of our lives. 
• Join the powers of serenity and alertness of oneself. 
• Cope with depression, anxiety, addiction, and other mental illnesses. 
• Find renewed strength and motivation we have lost. 
• Make new meaning and find our life purpose. 
• Create a brave new mind equal to this moment. 

Dr. Eric Maisel’s work as a retired psychotherapist provides ways to deal not only with the extreme tension of today’s existence but a path forward. Instead of relying only on medications, readers are guided to fortify and reinvigorate the mind. His optimistic approach redefines the worry of the world. Dr. Maisel has devised this practical, approachable, and inspiring way to face the struggles with calmness and serenity.

List of contents

Contents
Other Books by Eric Maisel xv
Author’s Note xix
Introduction to Brave New Mind 1
1. Exchanging Minds 5
2. Serene Readiness 8
3. Dante Today 11
4. To the Lighthouse 14
5. That One Monkey 17
6. By the Numbers 20
7. Metaphors and Analogies 24
8. Dynamic Succession 28
9. Monitoring the Succession 32
10. Hall Monitor 36
11. Succession, Attention, and Stimulation 39
12. When You Need a Lot of Neurons 42
13. What controls? 46
14. The Story of Prime Directives 49
15. Your Prime Directive(s) 52
16. Why Now? 55
17. The Shoe Shop Down the Block 58
18. Our Version of Soma 61
19. Poverty, Scarcity, and the Shrinking Middle Class 65
20. Trending Fascism 68
21. Digital Nomads as Mental Model 72
22. Retreat into Mindless Trance 75
23. On Declining Empathy 78
24. The Collapse of Others 82
25. Aristocrats, Mountain Men, and Liberated
Women 85
26. Peaceful Thoughts Abound 88
27. Serenity and the Body 92
28. Ordering Up Serenity 96
29. Four-Legged Stool 99
30. The Zen of Zen 102
31. Stoicism Today 106
32. What Do You Believe? 110
33. Nine Reasons Why 113
34. Your Psychology of Life 117
35. Developed…or Undeveloped? 120
36. Points on a Map 124
37. Social Serenity 128
38. Socrates and You 132
39. The Whole and Its Bits 135
40. Tools for the Van 139
41. Serenity Sooner Rather Than Later 144
42. Serenity as a Practice 147
43. Serenity as Prime Directive 151
44. Ready for Readiness 154
45. Ready or Not 158
46. Getting Ready and Being Ready 162
47. Readiness and Release 165
48. A Shallow Dive 169
49. What Is Readiness? 172
50. High Noon 175
51. Ready to Create 178
52. Entrepreneurial readiness 181
53. Ready to Relate 184
54. Sexual Readiness 187
55. Ready to Resist 190
56. Ready to Steward 193
57. Ready to Leap 196
58. Ready for Red 199
59. The Terrible Diagnosis 202
60. Ready for Freedom 205
61. On Loyalty Oaths 208
62. Ready for surprises 211
63. Some Other You Is Lurking 215
64. Acquiring Serene Readiness 219
65. Safely Not Paying Attention 223
66. The Siren’s Call to Oblivion 226
67. The Ambition to Be Human 229
68. A Certain Hope 232
69. Prime Directives Revisited 235
70. Picture Yourself 239
About Eric Maisel 243
About the Publisher 245

About the author

Eric Maisel is an internationally-recognized diplomat coach, the author of 60+ books in the areas of coaching, creativity, life purpose, meaning, and mental health, and President of the International Association of Creative and Performing Artists. A retired family therapist and active master coach residing in San Francisco, California, Dr. Maisel is the lead editor for the Ethics International Press Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry series, which takes a critical look at the current “mental disorder” paradigm and the influence of psychiatry on society’s institutions. His popular Psychology Today blog “Rethinking Mental Health” has more than 3.5 million views, and, in conjunction with Noble-Manhattan Coaching, he has developed three training programs, a Creativity Coach Certificate Program, an Existential Wellness Coach Certificate Program, and a Relationship Coach Certificate Program.

Product details

• Authors: Eric Maisel
• Publisher: Jim Dandy Publishing
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Release: 01.01.2026
• EAN: 9781963667264
• ISBN: 978-1-963667-26-4
• No. of pages: 266
• Subject: Guides > Self-help, everyday life > Lifestyle, personal development