Whole Brain Living: The Anatomy of Choice and the Four Characters That Drive Our Life

I liked learning how to stop my monkey brain, and get busy living my grateful life. No more binging on media - lots more joyful moments, because I’m living in the NOW. This book was recommended by a friend during the six months I was transitioning from my career of 41 years into retirement. Always a busy person, I became immobile with thoughts of worthlessness (which is far from true - I’ve been blessed in my life with an incredible successful career, lovely friends, and living in the best part of California). Learning how to sync the four parts of my brain got me out of my chair and into living my retirement years eagerly, with peace and focus and joy.

This is an excellent follow up to 'Stroke of Insight." Her personal journey, combined with her intricate knowledge of how the mind works as well as her ongoing research, have produced a highly informative and insightful (pun intended) description of how our brains work. I have found myself totally immersed in figuring out my own characters 1,2,3 and 4 and how they interact with each other and the external world. I have learned new techniques to dampen my own emotional responses to old triggers and am finding more time for peaceful living. It doesn't require any special foreknowledge because she has a unique ability to take complicated concepts and boil them down into easy-to-understand, everyday language. If you want to take control of your thoughts and find a more nourishing way to live, this book is for you.

Fascinating consideration of recent understandings of brain science. Not simplistic left/right brain rules of past. Looking forward to living a more balanced brain life with guidance from this book.

Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor shares neuroanatomical insights in an enjoyable and accessible way. This way of thinking is life-enhancing. Thank you!

I enjoyed this book.The idea of Four Characters, as presented by Dr.Jill Bolte Taylor (JBT), reminds me of what psychologists call IFS / Internal Family Systems. Also reminiscent of typologies such as Enneagram or Myers-Briggs, although these latter typologies seem more like classifying / pigeon-holing you as one of the various types, whereas IFS and this book's "Brain Huddle" aim at integration of, and collaboration between the various parts.​ (I had links for some of these, and following, references, but removed them as they violate guidelines for reviews.)​JBT's account of her own experience, along with her lessons in brain anatomy, are inspiring and informative. As are many other of her insights, such as our ability at any given time to influence the tenor of our thinking and feelings. I wonder whether, or hope that, further brain science might shed more evidential light on characteristics of thought or feeling that might be based in (or somehow identified with) these four (or perhaps other, smaller or larger) anatomical regions in the brain.In order to gain insight about my own psychic landscape, I have been trying to grok in my own terms the four characters that JBT describes both at length throughout the book, and with a list of characteristics in an early chapter. She suggests that these characters might correspond to Jungian archetypes, but I have been trying to identify some archetypes that I would find more-easily accessible. For what it's worth, I have come up with the following: #1 The Engineer, #2 The Vulnerable, #3 The Innocent and #4 The Mystic.If you read the book (I recommend it) you may benefit from coming up with your own idiomatic archetypes. Also, though I have no clue how it might map to my brain, I favor a fifth character: #5 Awareness. This character notices which of the other characters are in play, and may decide and help to shift attention, and/or to integrate / harmonize the whole family of characters.

A very streamlined IFS-like approach. (IFS= Internal Family Systems). Very accessible. Fascinating. Wonderful follow-up from her book My Stroke of Insight.What I learned from Jill's work makes a qualitative difference in my life every day. Every day.

After Dr. Jill Knowlte Taylor suffered her major stroke she discovered how amazing her brain really was and how much, even as a brain surgeon, just how much she had to learn about it. In this book, she talks about how she has discovered how the different regions of the brain work in creating the way we see and think about the world, how we make decisions, and how we choose to feel. The book is written in a way that most people should be able to understand and discover something about how their own brain, and their personality work. You may remember the old "stories" about how the different voices in your mind try to influence your choices...(the good and not so good angels on your shoulder?) Jill actually explains that in easy to understand ways... and best of all she has come up with easy to follow instructions and activities to help you interact with people and the world around you without necessarily loosing your head. I like her writing and her insights and think you will too.

I found peace on my right brain! I was able to understand how my left brain thinking may have interfered with the euforia I always felt when I read new things that were exciting like your book!I can see now what you mean to find it without meditating, you are genius! Thank you so much for this awesome gift! You've saved my life!Carlos, from Dominican Republic

Interesting read but it takes a bit of time to get into it.

A completely new way, scientifically backed of looking at life and spirituality. It blows my mind to understand my brain so much better now and I feel it's a huge help to now understand what I'm doing when I meditate and how I connect with the infinite wisdom of the universe.I'm truly grateful for this book and I want to thank Jill Bolte Taylor for her insight and sharing. Thank you

Excellent book. Very informative and easy to understand if you want to find out more about your brain and your habits!

Its an Amazing book, i love reading It.

I found the four characters and the brain huddle really interesting and useful information, with potential for practical implementation on my daily life. However, the second half of the book was disjointed and did not offer much.