Gordon Livingston MD

Dr Gordon Livingston's national bestseller, TOO SOON OLD, TOO LATE SMART, has drawn tens of thousands of readers who have embraced its thirty bedrock truths about life and how best to live it. Now, in AND NEVER STOP DANCING, Dr Livingston - a Vietnam War veteran, psychiatrist, and parent twice bereaved - offers thirty more true things we need to know now. Among the fresh truths Dr Livingston identifies and explores are: 'Paradox governs our lives. Forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves. Marriage ruins a lot of good relationships. We are defined by what we fear. We all live downstream. One of life's most difficult tasks is to see ourselves as others see us. As we grow old, the beauty steals inward. Most people die with the music still inside of them.' Once again, here are Dr Livingston's sterling qualities: a deep understanding of the emotional tumult that courses through our lives - our hidden hypocrisies, desires, and evasions an unerring sense of what is important (he does not waste a single moment writing about unimportant things) and his own ability to persevere 'to hope ' in a world he knows to be capable of inflicting unjustifiable and lifelong suffering. These qualities, plus his perfectly pitched sense of humour, add up to another extraordinary book, one which, like its predecessor, offers a gentle, generous, and unusual alternative to the trial-and-error learning that makes wisdom such an expensive commodity.

Thirty more true things you need to know now

And Never Stop Dancing

We live in a time when so many fears— of terrorism, war, disease—are all magnified, it seems, by media and the internet. How are we to find the courage to live, and live well, despite the constant threat of fear? Dr Livingston identifies the fears we have as individuals and as a society. Once he has named those fears he turns to the courage we each show or are capable of showing in our daily lives. Then he presents this as a tool to help us overcome our fears on every level in order to free up our lives.

Thirty true things about fear and courage

The Thing You Think You Cannot Do

Out of a lifetime of experience psychologist Gordon Livingston has extracted 30 bedrock truths. For everyone who feels a sense of urgency that the clock ticks and we still aren’t the person we’d like to be, it offers solace, guidance and hope. From a psychiatrist who has spent the past thirty years listening to other people’s most intimate secrets and troubles—an eloquent, incisive, and deeply perceptive book about the things we all share—and which every one of us grapples with as we strive to make the most of the life we have left. After service in Vietnam as a surgeon for the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment in 1968-69, at the height of the war—Dr Gordon Livingston returned to the US and began work as a psychiatrist. In that capacity, he has listened to people talk about their lives—what works, what doesn’t, and the limitless ways (most of them self-inflicted) that we have found to be unhappy. He is also a parent twice bereaved—in one thirteen-month period,he lost his eldest son to suicide, his youngest to leukaemia. Out of a lifetime of experience, Livingston has extracted thirty bedrock truths: We are what we do. Any relationship is under the control of the person who cares the least. The perfect is the enemy of the good. Only bad things happen quickly. Forgiveness is a form of letting go, but they are not the same thing. The statute of limitations has expired on most of our childhood traumas. 'Gordon Livingston has been through many kinds of hell and come back with wisdom and kindness that are to be revered. To read him is to trust him and to learn, for his life has been touched by fire, and his motives are absolutely pure' - Mark Helprin, author of A Soldier of the Great War and Winter’s Tale Author Biography Gordon Livingston, MD, a graduate of West Point and the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, has been a physician since 1967. He is a psychiatrist and writer who frequently contributes to the Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Baltimore Sun and Reader’s Digest. Awarded the Bronze Star for valour for his service in the Vietnam War, he is the author of Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart, And Never Stop Dancing and Only Spring: On Mourning the Death of My Son. He lives and works in Columbia, Maryland, USA.

Gordon Livingston MD

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