Transforming Anger: The HeartMath Solution for Letting Go of Rage, Frustration, and Irritation by Doc Childre and Deborah Rozman, Ph.D.
ISBN: 1-57224-352-X, $10.95
Available in Bookstores or from the Publisher
800-748-6273, www.newharbinger.com

"Think with your head, not with your heart" is sound advice if you don't know that the heart is profoundly--and literally--connected to the brain. Literally, because researchers have revealed that there are more nerves going from heart to brain than from brain to heart. Profoundly, because they've also showed that thoughts and feelings are generated by a complex bio-machinery that involves the brain, the nervous system, and various hormonal reactions. The heart plays a vital role in regulating this machinery and creating mind-body harmony.

In the early 1990s studies at the Institute of HeartMath revealed a critical link between emotion and rhythms of the heart. Researchers were able to use computer technology to show, in real-time, how the rhythmic pattern of the heart changes as feelings change. When displayed on a computer screen, the heart rhythm that accompanied anger looked disordered and jagged, while the rhythm that went along with positive emotions looked more ordered and coherent. The HeartMath solution for defusing anger grew out of this research. In Transforming Anger, Doc Childre, the founder of The Institute of HeartMath and Deborah Rozman, a psychologist with thirty-years' experience, show you how to free yourself from anger by shifting your heart rhythm from chaotic to coherent. This allows you to cut short the "anger cascade" before it overwhelms you.

Childre and Rozman arm you with potent, yet simple, techniques for taking control of your anger anytime, anywhere it threatens to throw you off balance. Throughout Transforming Anger you'll find exercises that help you become more aware of your heart rhythm and how it mirrors and contributes to angry thoughts and feelings. You'll also find simple breathing and cognitive exercises to help you readjust your heart rhythm, de-escalate your anger, and disarm your anger triggers. Cardiologists, psychologists, and stress management experts have used these exercises in their practices, and now for the first time they have been adapted for a self-help program. Transforming Anger provides a breakthrough book that shows you how to reclaim your life from anger.

Suggested Interview Questions

1. Can you give us a nutshell explanation of how the heart is connected to the brain and how this affects emotions, particularly anger?

2. What is the difference between the heart rhythms associated with positive emotions like love and compassion and those associated with negative ones, like anger and can you give us an example of each?

3. How can knowledge of heart rhythms help us control anger?

4. Your program is based largely on studies conducted at the HeartMath Institute. What is this and what is your role there?

5. What is "Intelligent Love" and how does it relate to the HeartMath technique?

6. You talk about the need to stop emotional triggers, but for many of use these are deeply ingrained. What do you recommend to someone who feels programmed to get angry at a particular situation or thought?

7. Chapter two of Transforming Anger is called "Why Are We So Mad?" How do you answer this question?

8. What is the Freeze-Frame technique and why do you recommend it?

9. What role does compassion play in your program for anger management?

10. You talk about "developing a business heart" in your book. What do you mean by this?

About the Authors of Transforming Anger

Doc Childre is the founder and chairman of the scientific advisory board of the Institute of HeartMath, the chairman of HeartMath LLC, and the chairman and CEO of Quantum Intech. He is the author of seven books and a consultant to business leaders, scientists, educators, and the entertainment industry on Intui-Technology®. His HeartMath System and proprietary heart rhythm technology for coherence building called emWave®, has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Harvard Business Review, New York Newsday, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News, and on NBC's Today Show, ABC Good Morning America, ABC World News Tonight, CNN Headline News, CNN.com, as well as numerous other publications and television programs around the world.

He and his coauthor, Deborah Rozman, Ph.D., wrote Overcoming Emotional Chaos. He also wrote The How-To-Book of Teen Self-Discovery and coauthored The HeartMath Solution and From Chaos to Coherence.

Deborah Rozman, Ph.D., is a psychologist and author with thirty years of experience as an educator and business executive. She is President of Quantum Intech, overseeing strategic alliances and the expansion of HeartMath technologies worldwide. Dr. Rozman is a key spokesperson for the HeartMath system, giving media interviews and keynote addresses on heart intelligence and Intui-Technologies for executives, scientists, and health professionals throughout the world. She is the author of four books and is listed in Who's Who in California.

What's Been Said about Transforming Anger

"Transforming Anger is an important book for our time. Using solid research, Childre and Rozman make it clear that when it comes to dealing with anger, our most powerful asset is our heart. By using their simple, fast-acting exercises, you'll learn to respond to stressful life situations with clarity, intelligence, and maturity. This book in not only about transforming your anger; it's about transforming your life."

--Cheryl Richardson, author of Take Time for Your Life and Stand Up for Your Life

"The relationship between anger, heart attacks, and other adverse health effects is well documented. Studies also suggest that individuals who are unable to express anger and 'get things off their chest' are at the greatest risk. This book shows not only how to defuse this deadly emotion, but how you can transform it into positive feelings that will make you more productive rather than self-destructive."

--Paul Rosch, MD, president, The American Institute of Stress, clinical professor of medicine and psychiatry, New York Medical College, author of The Doctor's Guide to Instant Stress Relief, and editor of Stress Medicine

"Transforming Anger points out that this powerful negative emotion can not only affect our health, but also impair our ability to think and reason clearly. I have been teaching the tools discussed in this book since 1997. These tools, proven effective in breaking the cycle of anger and all of its consequences, are extremely easy to learn and based on elegant scientific research that has taught us how the heart and brain communicate."

--Bruce C. Wilson, MD, chairman, board of directors, Heart Hospital of Milwaukee, former director, University of Pittsburgh Heart Institute

"This new book, Transforming Anger, is excellent. Refreshingly simple and easy to read, the book offers profound insights into the most critical issue of our day: our violence toward self, world, and other. Surely the work is pertinent to our times and fills a serious personal-social need."

--Joseph Chilton Pearce, author, The Crack in the Cosmic Egg, Magical Child, and The Biology of Transcendence

"In these days when both health professionals and the public are apt to turn to medication whenever anything goes wrong, Transforming Anger is a welcome breath of fresh air. Here is a technique and scientifically based method for developing self-control that does not short-circuit normal biological regulatory processes."

--Karl H. Pribram, MD, Ph.D., (Hon. Multi), distinguished research professor, Georgetown and George Mason Universities; professor emeritus, Stanford and Radford Universities, author, Language of the Brain and Brain and Perception; and coauthor, Freud's Project Reassessed and Plans and the Structure of Behavior

"How much energy do you waste being angry during your average day? What effects does that have on those you care about? In Transforming Anger, Doc Childre and Rozman give you a series of easy-to-learn, highly effective tools and the science behind them, showing you how to prevent that loss of energy and heal those relationships. A much needed fix for our fast-paced, often overwhelming lives."

--Lee Lipsenthal, MD, medical director, Lifestyle Advantage and The Dean Ornish Program for

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