Books
Welcome to ALT’s mental wellness library! Books are organized here according to topic. Just click on the name of the topic to go to that subject’s bookshelf.
Mind-Body Healing
Critics of mainstream Western medicine charge that the discipline acknowledges only mechanical pathologies of the body and doesn’t take into account the contributions of mind, soul, spirit, and being to overall wellness. Alternative healing traditions have much wisdom to offer about a more holisitic approach to health and balance — and, thankfully, some Western practitioners are beginning to take notice.
Pharma/Psychopharmacology
From Greek ψῡχή, psȳkhē, “breath, life, soul”; φάρμακον, pharmakon, “drug”; and -λογία, -logia, this is the study of drug-induced changes in mood, sensation, thinking, and behavior. Psychopharmacology (and its corporate counterpart — big PHARMA) is central to psychiatry as it is practiced professionally in the Western world, although there are many researchers, scientists, psychiatrists, and patients who are questioning its dominance of the field.
Trauma
Psychological trauma is a type of damage to the psyche that occurs as a result of a traumatic event. When that trauma leads to posttraumatic stress disorder, damage may involve physical changes inside the brain and to brain chemistry, which damage the person’s ability to adequately cope with stress. Trauma can be experienced on an individual or societal level, and many argue it is inevitable in modern, coporatist society.
