The Book Shelf

You may have missed some helpful information. After 3 years of working on this project, we are now ready to create a list of people who would like to receive 4 emails per month (1 x week) with a summary of articles, postings, videos, and resources with links that are put up each week on the website and blog. Share in the love. 

Please Note: The LoveMore Institute is a 501(c)(3) Nonprofit and our work is made possible by the generosity of people like you, and charitable donations can be made here through PayPal's Giving Fund Program. Purchases made from product links result in a small affiliate commission to The LoveMore Institute paid by Amazon.com. Thank you for this. Learn more about The LoveMore Institute’s work visit:

Most books listed below are available with links to Amazon.com

This is our selection of highly recommended books that are written about or referred to in our articles. The books listed below are not indicative of any particular ideology, faith or viewpoint, other than they all offer us a glimpse of the mysterious and greatness of becoming more fully human through the path and practice of love. Purchases of these offerings through the Amazon link brings a small donation to The LoveMore Institute. Thank you for this. These, as are all of our material, are intended to encourage you to think, question, and dig deeper into this experience we call being human. 

***New recommendations***

The Whole-Brain Child by Daniel Siegel

The authors of No-Drama Discipline and The Yes Brain explain the new science of how a child’s brain is wired and how it matures in this pioneering, practical book.

“Simple, smart, and effective solutions to your child’s struggles.” -Harvey Karp, M.D.

In this pioneering, practical book, Daniel J. Siegel, neuropsychiatrist and author of the bestselling Mindsight, and parenting expert Tina Payne Bryson offer a revolutionary approach to child rearing with twelve key strategies that foster healthy brain development, leading to calmer, happier children. The authors explain - and make accessible - the new science of how a child’s brain is wired and how it matures. The “upstairs brain,” which makes decisions and balances emotions, is under construction until the mid-twenties. And especially in young children, the right brain and its emotions tend to rule over the logic of the left brain. No wonder kids throw tantrums, fight, or sulk in silence. By applying these discoveries to everyday parenting, you can turn any outburst, argument, or fear into a chance to integrate your child’s brain and foster vital growth. 

Complete with age-appropriate strategies for dealing with day-to-day struggles, The Whole-Brain Child shows you how to cultivate healthy emotional and intellectual development so that your children can lead balanced, meaningful, and connected lives. Read more → Amazon | $10.79

Parenting From The Inside Out by Daniel Siegel

Parenting from the Inside Out: How a Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive: 10th Anniversary Edition

An updated edition—with a new preface—of the bestselling parenting classic by the author of "BRAINSTORM: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain"

In this book, child psychiatrist Daniel J. Siegel, M.D., and early childhood expert Mary Hartzell, M.Ed., explore the extent to which our childhood experiences shape the way we parent. Drawing on stunning new findings in neurobiology and attachment research, they explain how interpersonal relationships directly impact the development of the brain, and offer parents a step-by-step approach to forming a deeper understanding of their own life stories, which will help them raise compassionate and resilient children.

Born out of a series of parents' workshops that combined Siegel's cutting-edge research on how communication impacts brain development with Hartzell's decades of experience as a child-development specialist and parent educator, this book guides parents through creating the necessary foundations for loving and secure relationships with their children. Read more → Amazon | $13.79

The Now Effect by Dr. Elisha Goldstein


Alleviate stress, ease pain, cultivate emotional freedom, create a healthier brain, and find enlightenment with cutting-edge mindfulness techniques from The Now Effect.

You can calm your anxious mind, have greater focus at work and home, feel more empathy toward yourself and others, approach difficulties with more grace and less stress, and be aware of what is most important to you. The secret is in the spaces.

A leader in mindfulness psychology, Dr. Elisha Goldstein demonstrates how to use the space between stimulus and response to break free from habitual beliefs and thoughts that don’t serve you. Offering practical techniques to make deep, permanent life changes, Dr. Goldstein’s techniques will allow you to connect to the present moment to make deep, permanent life changes and to connect with the good in life and with what really matters. In essence, this book teaches the foundation for how the now—this very moment—can change the rest of your life.

Read more → Amazon | $16.99

A much needed lifeline. It takes parents on a step by step journey for transforming relationships with their adopted and foster children. It is a healing path not only for the children, but for the parents as well!.  Carrie Kitze, author, adoptive parent, publisher EMK Press. 

Provides new and highly effective techniques for parents dealing with behavioral challenges with their children. Intended for parents, adoptive parents, foster parents and caretakers of at-risk, ADD/ADHD/RAD,ODD, adopted children and children with behavioral and emotional challenges.

Bryan Post helps parents understand the impact of early life trauma and the impact of interruptions in the attachment process. In his compassion for parents and children he offers hope and solutions for the challenges families face. Many parents of adopted children express their fear not only for their child's present behaviors, but for what will become of them in the future. Bryan's straightforward, clear-cut approach has created peace and healing for hundreds of families; families who once operated in fear, are now experiencing love. Read more →Amazon | $14.95 

A much needed lifeline. It takes parents on a step by step journey for transforming relationships with their adopted and foster children. It is a healing path not only for the children, but for the parents as well!.  Carrie Kitze, author, adoptive parent, publisher EMK Press. 

Provides new and highly effective techniques for parents dealing with behavioral challenges with their children. Intended for parents, adoptive parents, foster parents and caretakers of at-risk, ADD/ADHD/RAD,ODD, adopted children and children with behavioral and emotional challenges.

Bryan Post helps parents understand the impact of early life trauma and the impact of interruptions in the attachment process. In his compassion for parents and children he offers hope and solutions for the challenges families face. Many parents of adopted children express their fear not only for their child's present behaviors, but for what will become of them in the future. Bryan's straightforward, clear-cut approach has created peace and healing for hundreds of families; families who once operated in fear, are now experiencing love. Read more →Amazon | $14.95 

The Great Behavior Breakdown by Bryan Post Amazon | $19.95 — Highly Recommended

“This book takes the foundation of attachment theory and brings it alive in the face of the most challenging behaviors that parents may face when parenting children with early attachment disruption histories. Rather than focusing on behaviors, Post goes into the very root of the cause and gives parents simple and concise guidance on how to respond in a manner that will help re-establish secure attachment where it may once have been lost.” — Sir Richard Bowlby

“The Great Behavior Breakdown addresses the most difficult behaviors that parents can face. It gives parents an eye- opening and heart-opening understanding of the causes of these behaviors and a practical way to work with them that puts the focus on strengthening the relationship rather than trying to control the behavior. Like the best medicine, it addresses the root problems and not just the symptoms. We all love our children, but making that love real in the eye of the storm can be extremely challenging. This book will teach you about your own stress reactions, and how you can respond more effectively to your children from your own inner strength with compassionate understanding, rather than reacting out of your fear.” — Myla Kabat-Zinn, co-author of Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting. 

The adoption of a child is always a joyous moment in the life of a family. Some adoptions, though, present unique challenges. Welcoming these children into your family--and addressing their special needs--requires care, consideration, and compassion.

Written by two research psychologists specializing in adoption and attachment, The Connected Child will help you: 

"The Connected Child is the literary equivalent of an airline oxygen mask and instructions:  place the mask over your own face first, then over the nose of your child. This book first assists the parent, saying, in effect,  'Calm down, you're not the first mom or dad in the world to face this hurdle, breathe deeply, then follow these simple steps.'  The sense of not facing these issues alone--the relief that your child's behavior is not off the charts--is hugely comforting. Other children have behaved this way; other parents have responded thusly; welcome to the community of therapeutic and joyful adoptive families." 

--Melissa Fay Greene, author of There is No Me Without You: One Woman's Odyssey to Rescue Africa's Children   Read more→ Amazon | $10.89

The Great Behavior Breakdown identifies 27 of the most problematic, serious, and challenging behaviors that parents face, broken them down, and provided step-by-step guidance and insight for transforming your family conflict immediately. This is a must-read book for any parent or professional working with children who have seemingly uncontrollable behavior. Common diagnoses for such children are Reactive Attachment Disorder, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Bi-Polar Disorder, Conduct Disorder, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Depressive Disorder, and Autism Spectrum Disorder. This book, a follow-up to the groundbreaking audio program of the same title, is guaranteed to change the way you view these behaviors. Read more →Amazon | $19.95 

Transforming Stress: The HeartMath Solution for Relieving Worry, Fatigue, and Tension by Doc Childre and Deborah Rozman, Ph.D. Amazon | $12.39 — Highly Recommended by The LoveMore Institute

At the core of the HeartMath method of emotional regulation is the idea that, by focusing on positive feelings such as appreciation, care, or compassion, anyone can create dramatic changes in his or her heart rhythms. These changes precipitate a series of neural, hormonal, and biochemical events that dissipate stress and anger and lead to greater well-being. The benefits from using this system are remarkable and far-reaching: blood pressure drops, stress hormone levels fall, immune system activity increases, and anti-aging hormone levels rise. Through its interactive learning system, this book teaches readers to use the HeartMath method, enabling them to see and experience in real time how thoughts and emotions affect their heart rhythms. It teaches them how to engage their hearts to bring emotion, body, and mind into balance, and helps them stay in a zone of focused clarity, optimal health, and high performance. Changes brought about through this method are fast-acting and long-lasting, the perfect antidote to our chaotic and fast-paced lives. To view 6 short videos on the science of the heart, visit our Movie/Video ShelfAmazon | $12.39

Can One Message Change a Life? A City? The World?

Messenger tells the story of twenty-something journalist, Alana Peterson, who is convinced she's found her big break when she meets Messenger, a mysterious old woman who delivers life-changing messages to seemingly random people all over New York City.

Alana investigates, trying to determine if Messenger is a crazy homeless woman, a shaman, an angel, or the prophet the planet needs to save it. Messenger channels her messages and knows exactly to whom to deliver them. How? Alana realizes it's not always the content of the message but the timing in a person's life that creates the Clinamen-- the slight swerve-that changes everything. Can a few words change a life? A city? The world?

Through a series of mistakes, Alana bends the trajectory of the story to tragic results. Finally, Alana discovers what her journey with Messenger has really been all about.  Read more → | Amazon $17.95

Learn to free yourself from destructive habits and live a life of courage and compassion with these heart-to-heart teachings from "one of the world's wisest women" (O, the Oprah Magazine). 

Ever feel trapped in the same old habits and painful emotions time and time again? These are patterns we all face, and sometimes they feel impossible to shake. So how can we get unstuck? Drawing on time-honored Buddhist teachings on shenpa (all the attachments and compulsions that cause us suffering), Pema Chödrön shows how certain habits of mind tend to “hook” us and get us stuck in states of anger, blame, self-hatred, addiction, and so much more—and, most of all, how we can liberate ourselves from them. “This path entails uncovering three basic human qualities,” explains Pema. “They are natural intelligence, natural warmth, and natural openness. Everyone, everywhere, all over the globe, has these qualities and can call on them to help themselves and others.” Pema shares insights and exercises from her lifetime of practice that we can immediately put to use in our lives to awaken these essential qualities and help us to take a bold leap toward a new way of living—one that will bring about positive transformation for ourselves and for our troubled world. Read Blog Post → Read more →Amazon | $16.95

Tilling the Sacred Soil of Sorrow: Tools for Living Joyfully from a Broken-Open Heart $17.95 by Robyn DeLong. If you have lost a loved one, whether it was long ago or recent, you will learn much from this book. — Highly Recommended

If you or someone you love needs hope and help moving through their grief, this book offers tools for both hope and healing. The sacred soil of sorrow can be rich with blessings, but only if you use it to grow. If you are willing to embrace your broken-open heart, you’ll find wholeness, joy, and laughter await you. You will be lifted into a state of grace and gratitude which may seem impossible and out of reach at the beginning of the journey.On July 25, 2013, Robyn DeLong's son Resh Michael Ortego, age 36, died in a tragic auto accident. This is Robyn’s story of moving from grief to grace to transformation. She invites you into your own hero’s journey. She teaches you to build a new normal—one in which you happily share stories of your loved one who has passed—a world where painful triggers have been reset into treasures, and forgiveness is possible. Embrace your broken-open heart. Build a world in which you are feeling grateful, engaged, ready to contribute and make a difference for others on this path.  Amazon | $17.95

LMI: "I had the honor and privilege of participating in a writing program with Robyn DeLong as she finished her latest book on transforming sorrow and grief due to the loss of her son from a tragic accident.

Being able to critique her chapters each week, I was deeply moved by her insight into one of those things that a parent should never have to witness, but so often happens as we all know — the death of one of our children.

If we are so blessed as to avoid this, there is always the death of close friends, other family members, spouse, or other intimate relationships. There is no way around this and it cannot be prayed away.

But there is a bright side to all this and Robyn has found a way to delve deep into this world of unbearable sorrow and learned to literally transform this into a veritable new dimension of love, relationship, and joy. She has also learned how to share this with others in this easy to ready, likely to inspire, and heart-opening book. It touched me and I have not lost anyone beyond my parents which we were prepared for, and although sorrow accompanied both, it was understood and accepted without any trauma. Losing a child is very different and I thank God we have not had to face that. Robyn has, and she has come out of it in a way that — in the end, has opened her heart rather than broke it"..David Durovy

"We live in a moment in history when the worldview we have held for five hundred years is being upturned by quantum physics. Rethinking Our Story revisits the basic elements of the Christian narrative, framing them in ways that work with our newly emerging sensibilities. The future of the church and the health of our society depend on our willingness to rethink, retell, and live out our story in this newly emerging world. We will either update our instincts and contribute to the earth's well-being - or disappear into oblivion."— From the book cover. Read more →Amazon | $12.49 

LMIDoug Hammack is a courageous unconventional minister leading a non-traditional church, who challenges the traditional two line Christian story; Be good and go to heaven, bad and go to hell. The story he shows is much deeper, and more mysterious. This book is an invitation to re-think churches, Sunday classes, small groups and take up the task of rethinking the story for our children and for this new era. The essence of the story, is and always has been love. Yet the spiritual journey has an order of complexity that can't be reduced to simple, precise answers. If you find the same old, same old, and want something more profound, this book can help. Read Blog Post →

With New York Times bestselling author, Dr. Hanson's four steps, you can counterbalance your brain's negativity bias and learn to hardwire happiness in only a few minutes each day. Ever wonder why is it easier to ruminate over hurt feelings than it is to bask in the warmth of being appreciated? Because your brain evolved to learn quickly from bad experiences and slowly from good ones, but you can change this. Hardwiring Happiness lays out a simple method that uses the hidden power of everyday experiences to build new neural structures full of happiness, love, confidence, and peace. You’ll learn to see through the lies your brain tells you. Dr. Hanson’s four steps build strengths into your brain to make contentment and a powerful sense of resilience the new normal. In just minutes a day, you can transform your brain into a refuge and power center of calm and happiness. Amazon | $12.19

How to Love by Thich Nhat Hanh Amazon | $9.95

The most popular book in the "How To" series: advice, practices, and food for thought from a contemporary Zen Master on our most universal emotion. Appropriate for those practicing in any spiritual tradition.

The third book in the bestselling Mindfulness Essentials series, a back-to-basics collection from a world-renowned Zen Master that introduces everyone to the essentials of mindfulness practice. 

Thich Nhat Hanh brings his signature clarity, compassion, and humor to the thorny question of how to love. He distills one of our strongest emotions down to four essentials: you can only love another when you feel true love for yourself; love is understanding; understanding brings compassion; deep listening and loving speech are key ways of showing our love.

Scientific studies indicate that meditation contributes tremendously to well-being, general health, and longevity. How to Love is a unique gift for those who want a comprehensive yet simple guide to understanding the many different kinds of love, along with meditative practices that can expand the understanding of and capacity for love, appropriate for those practicing in any spiritual tradition, whether seasoned practitioners or new to meditation.

 Read more →Amazon | $9.95 Read Blog Post →

In this series of notes, opinions, experiences, and reflections, Thomas Merton examines some of the most urgent questions of our age. With his characteristic forcefulness and candor, he brings the reader face-to-face with such provocative and controversial issues as the “death of God,” politics, modern life and values, and racial strife–issues that are as relevant today as they were fifty years ago. 

Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander is Merton at his best–detached but not unpassionate, humorous yet sensitive, at all times alive and searching, with a gift for language which has made him one of the most widely read and influential spiritual writers of our time.Merton at his best–detached but not unpassionate, humorous yet sensitive, at all times alive and searching, with a gift for language which has made him one of the most widely read and influential spiritual writers of our time. Merton was an American Trappist monk, writer, theologian, mystic, poet, social activist, and scholar of comparative religion. Amazon | $17.00

Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence $5.95 — Highly Recommended by The LoveMore Institute

Brother Lawrence, a seventeenth century monk who had a dramatic spiritual awakening at the age of eighteen. His soul suddenly opened to the presence of God. A man of humble beginnings who discovered the greatest secret of living in the kingdom of God here on earth. It is the art of "practicing the presence of God in one single act that does not end." He often stated that it is God who paints Himself in the depths of our soul. We must merely open our hearts to receive Him and His loving presence. This book is filled with both blessing and instruction to those who can be content with nothing less than knowing God in all His majesty and feeling His loving presence throughout each simple day. Inspirational classic. Amazon | $5.95

The mystics are a not so rare breed of people from all walks of life, and all cultures and religious traditions. To enter into the life of one of these is a walk into another realm of being where belief plays a very small part in their conviction and experience shows them things that are almost not humanly possible, but are in becoming more fully human.—LMI

The Homeless Entrepreneur: How to Start a Business When You're Homeless, Poor or Just Plain Broke (HomeoveMoreInstitute@gmail.comss Hacks Book 1)  Don't "get a job," start a business. Yes, even if you are homeless, penniless and destitute and living out of your car or a homeless shelter you CAN start a business. Thousands of homeless people have done it (I did). You can too. This book tells you what to do, how to do it, gives you dozens of businesses you can start for $5 to $50 and lists the resources you'll need or find helpful to get started. The author started two businesses while homeless, and is currently running a third. She quit her first business, a therapeutic massage practice, to take care of her mother. She sold her second business, a newspaper she started with no money, and sold four months later for $15,000. She currently has a small publishing and ghostwriting business and writes books and copy for Fortune 500 companies. Her ghostwriting has appeared (under her client's byline) on OPEN, The Wall Street Journal, The Jerusalem Press, and The New York Times. She now coaches authors to write their own books:   Amazon | $12.95

Becky has lived this life and knows firsthand the ups and downs, and the way out. This book is for anyone with little resources who wants to start a business. — LMI

Private reflections of the Emperor of Rome, on how one is to exist in a world of chaos.  and in the most accepted translation by George Long, is a book that belongs on everyone’s shelf. A favorite of Bill Clinton and John Steinbeck, and influencer of many others for 2,000 years, it is as relevant today to those in power struggles over empires and boardrooms as it was when it was first written.

Meditations is a series of personal writings by Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor from 161 to 180 AD, recording his private notes to himself and ideas on Stoic philosophy. Marcus Aurelius wrote the 12 books of the Meditations in Koine Greek as a source for his own guidance and self-improvement. It is possible that large portions of the work were written at Sirmium, where he spent much time planning military campaigns from 170 to 180. 

Famous quotes from this edition of Meditations

We can not raise a happy child if we are constantly screaming threats at them. No parent sets out to hurt their child, but this type of parenting does just that. To raise a happy child that wants to behave, you need to retrain yourself first. You need to change the way you think and react to their behavior. You need to understand your triggers and heal yourself. Only then you can begin to heal your relationship with your children.

Making the decision to be a positive parent will benefit your whole family. You will find that your children want to behave and follow your rules. You will be less stressed out by the end of the day. Your house will not feel like a battle zone. Instead, you can create a home full of peace and love for the whole family.

This book will show you why strict and permissive parenting do not work. You will learn just how easy it is to embrace a positive parenting style. While learning how to be a positive parent, you will not only heal the relationship with your children but heal yourself along the way. Amazon | $12.99

Into the Magic Shop: A Neurosurgeon's Quest to Discover the Mysteries of the Brain and the Secrets of the Heart by James R. Doty, MD. Professor of Neurosurgery at Stanford University, 

The award-winning New York Times bestseller about the extraordinary things that can happen when we harness the power of both the brain and the heart

Growing up in the high desert of California, Jim Doty was poor, with an alcoholic father and a mother chronically depressed and paralyzed by a stroke. Today he is the director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University, of which the Dalai Lama is a founding benefactor. But back then his life was at a dead end until at twelve he wandered into a magic shop looking for a plastic thumb. Instead he met Ruth, a woman who taught him a series of exercises to ease his own suffering and manifest his greatest desires. Her final mandate was that he keep his heart open and teach these techniques to others. She gave him his first glimpse of the unique relationship between the brain and the heart.

Doty would go on to put Ruth’s practices to work with extraordinary results—power and wealth that he could only imagine as a twelve-year-old, riding his orange Sting-Ray bike. But he neglects Ruth’s most important lesson, to keep his heart open, with disastrous results—until he has the opportunity to make a spectacular charitable contribution that will virtually ruin him. Part memoir, part science, part inspiration, and part practical instruction, Into the Magic Shop shows us how we can fundamentally change our lives by first changing our brains and our hearts. Read more →Amazon | $14.95