
First, We Make the Beast Beautiful
A New Journey Through Anxiety
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Narrated by:
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Sarah Wilson
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By:
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Sarah Wilson
About this listen
The New York Times best-selling author of I Quit Sugar transforms cultural perceptions of the mental health issue of our age - anxiety - viewing this widespread condition not as a burdensome affliction but as a powerful spiritual teacher that can deepen our lives.
While reading psychiatrist Kay Redfield Jamison's groundbreaking account of bipolar disorder, An Unquiet Mind, Sarah Wilson discovered an ancient Chinese proverb that would change her life:
To conquer a beast, you must first make it beautiful.
Wilson, a best-selling author, journalist, and entrepreneur, had spent years struggling with her own beast: Chronic anxiety. And the words of this proverb would become the key to understanding her condition.
First, We Make the Beast Beautiful charts Wilson's epic journey to make peace with her lifetime companion and to learn to see it as a guide rather than as an enemy. With intensive focus and investigatory skills, Wilson examines the triggers and treatments, the fashions and fads. She reads widely and interviews fellow sufferers, mental health experts, philosophers, and even the Dalai Lama, processing all she learns through the prism of her own experiences. Pulling at the thread of accepted definitions of anxiety, she unravels the notion that it is a difficult, dangerous disease that must be medicated into submission and reframes it as a divine journey - a state of yearning that will lead us closer to what really matters.
Practical and poetic, wise and funny, First, We Make the Beast Beautiful is a small book with a big heart. It will encourage the myriad souls who dance with this condition to embrace it as a part of who they are and to explore the possibilities it offers for a richer, fuller life.
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Hardly anyone is happy with American health care these days. Patients are getting sicker and going bankrupt from medical bills. Doctors are burning out and making dangerous mistakes. Both parties blame our nation’s outdated and dysfunctional health care system. But that’s only part of the problem. In this important and timely book, Dr. Robert Pearl shines a light on the unseen and often toxic culture of medicine.
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Important to understand the current medical world
- By DMM on 07-12-21
By: Robert Pearl MD
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The Formula
- Unlocking the Secrets to Raising Highly Successful Children
- By: Ronald F. Ferguson, Tatsha Robertson
- Narrated by: Cynthia Farrell
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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In The Formula: Unlocking the Secrets to Raising Highly Successful Children, Harvard economist Ronald Ferguson, named in a New York Times profile as the foremost expert on the US educational "achievement gap," along with award-winning journalist Tatsha Robertson, reveal an intriguing blueprint for helping children from all types of backgrounds become successful adults.
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would recommend
- By Marcia on 02-25-20
By: Ronald F. Ferguson, and others
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Little and Often
- A Memoir
- By: Trent Preszler
- Narrated by: Matt Bomer
- Length: 9 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Trent Preszler thought he was living the life he always wanted, with a job at a winery and a seaside Long Island home, when he was called back to the life he left behind. After years of estrangement, his cancer-stricken father had invited him to South Dakota for Thanksgiving. It would be the last time he saw his father alive. Preszler’s only inheritance was a beat-up wooden toolbox that had belonged to his father, who was a cattle rancher, rodeo champion, and Vietnam War Bronze Star Medal recipient. This family heirloom befuddled Preszler.
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So good
- By Trevor Stanco on 04-28-21
By: Trent Preszler
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How to Teach Relativity to Your Dog
- By: Chad Orzel
- Narrated by: Will Collyer, Cassandra Morris
- Length: 9 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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They say you can't teach an old dog new tricks. But what about relativity? Physics professor Chad Orzel and his inquisitive canine companion, Emmy, tackle the concepts of general relativity in this irresistible introduction to Einstein's physics. Through armchair- and sometimes passenger-seat-conversations with Emmy about the relative speeds of dog and cat motion or the logistics of squirrel-chasing, Orzel translates complex Einsteinian ideas into examples simple enough for a dog to understand.
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Amazing!
- By Anonymous User on 11-08-23
By: Chad Orzel
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The Power of the Downstate
- Recharge Your Life Using Your Body's Own Restorative Systems
- By: Sara C. Mednick PhD
- Narrated by: Sara C. Mednick PhD
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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If you’re like most people, the relentless daily grind of go-go-go, do-do-do, can run down your energy and deplete your resources. While most of us find our lives full of “Upstate” moments that rev up our stress engines, it doesn’t have to be this way. World-renowned sleep researcher Sara C. Mednick, PhD, shows us how we can access the most replenishing and repairing aspects of sleep through activities and moments that happen during our day by diving into our “Downstate”.
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Game Changer
- By MES on 01-22-23
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Clearing the Fog
- From Surviving to Thriving with Long Covid: A Practical Guide
- By: James C. Jackson PsyD
- Narrated by: James C. Jackson PsyD
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, the shocking mortality figures obscured the fact that death is not the only adverse outcome of the virus. Today, as many as 30 percent of COVID-19 survivors still experience symptoms long after their acute illness has passed, with cognitive and mental health problems especially prominent. For long haulers, this struggle with Long COVID has irrevocably changed their lives. In Clearing the Fog, neuropsychologist Dr. James C. Jackson offers people suffering from Long COVID and their families a roadmap to help them manage their “new normal.”
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Extremely helpful on so many levels
- By Doc jojo on 05-21-23
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With the End in Mind
- Dying, Death, and Wisdom in an Age of Denial
- By: Kathryn Mannix
- Narrated by: Elizabeth Carling, Kathryn Mannix
- Length: 11 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Modern medical technology is allowing us to live longer and fuller lives than ever before. But with changes in the way we understand medicine come changes in the way we understand death. Once a familiar and gentle process, death has come to be something from which we shy away, preferring to fight it desperately than to accept its inevitability. Palliative care has a long tradition in Britain, where Dr. Kathryn Mannix has practiced it for 30 years. In this book, she shares beautifully crafted stories from a lifetime of caring for the dying.
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Wonderful book!
- By Randall Roth on 01-29-18
By: Kathryn Mannix
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Hell's Princess
- The Mystery of Belle Gunness, Butcher of Men
- By: Harold Schechter
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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In the pantheon of serial killers, Belle Gunness stands alone. She was the rarest of female psychopaths, a woman who engaged in wholesale slaughter, partly out of greed but mostly for the sheer joy of it. Between 1902 and 1908, she lured a succession of unsuspecting victims to her Indiana “murder farm". Some were hired hands. Others were well-to-do bachelors. All of them vanished without a trace.
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Can a book about a serial killer be entertaining?
- By Lori Hanson on 05-08-18
By: Harold Schechter
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N-4 Down
- The Hunt for the Arctic Airship Italia
- By: Mark Piesing
- Narrated by: Matt Jamie
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Triumphantly returning from the North Pole on May 24, 1928, the world-famous exploring airship Italia — code-named N-4 — was struck by a terrible storm and crashed somewhere over the Arctic ice, triggering the largest polar rescue mission in history. Helping lead the search was Roald Amundsen, the poles’ greatest explorer, who himself soon went missing in the frozen wastes. Amundsen’s body has never been found, the last victim of one of the Arctic’s most enduring mysteries....
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Interesting and entertaining
- By 2451 on 09-01-21
By: Mark Piesing
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Everyday MAGIC
- The Joy of Not Being Everything and Still Being More than Enough
- By: Mattie James
- Narrated by: Mattie James
- Length: 6 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Today we are all stretching ourselves more than ever to live up to life’s seemingly endless demands, so why do we still feel we are less than enough? Mattie James— mother, influencer, and CEO—believes that living a beautiful life amidst the chaos and pressures is possible. All it takes is a little everyday MAGIC.
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Grounding book
- By Bree on 12-22-22
By: Mattie James
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The Characters of Creation
- The Men, Women, Creatures, and Serpent Present at the Beginning of the World
- By: Daniel Darling
- Narrated by: Tim Mullins
- Length: 4 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Most Christians are familiar with the opening words of Genesis: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” But push beyond those iconic words, and sometimes the details get a little hazy. And strange. God walked around in a garden? Eve was made from Adam’s rib? A talking serpent? And what the in the world were the “Nephilim”? In The Characters of Creation, Daniel Darling re-introduces listeners to the story they thought they knew.
By: Daniel Darling
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The Books of I & II Maccabees
- Where the Story of Hanukkah Is Found
- By: Robert Bagley III - adaptation
- Narrated by: Steve Cook
- Length: 4 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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This is the full, uninterrupted audiobook of the story of I & II Maccabees - read with the passion this masterpiece deserves by number-one best-selling voice talent Steve Cook. Hanukkah or Chanukah is an annual Jewish celebration in the late fall/early winter that dates back to circa 164 BC. It was also referred to as "Festival of Lights" or "Feast of the Dedication" or "Feast of the Maccabees".
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good to know more
- By Desmond Hall on 11-28-17
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Your Plantation Prom Is Not Okay
- By: Kelly McWilliams
- Narrated by: Heni Zoutomou
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Harriet Douglass lives with her historian father on an old plantation in Louisiana, which they’ve transformed into one of the South's few enslaved people’s museums. Together, while grieving the recent loss of Harriet’s mother, they run tours that help keep the memory of the past alive. Harriet's world is turned upside down by the arrival of mother and daughter Claudia and Layla Hartwell—who plan to turn the property next door into a wedding venue, and host the offensively antebellum-themed wedding of two Hollywood stars.
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Amazing
- By Daniel Baldwin on 06-22-23
By: Kelly McWilliams
What listeners say about First, We Make the Beast Beautiful
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- Arimusch
- 07-16-19
Will go back to it regularly
This is a very helpful book for anyone suffering from anxiety as well as their loved ones so that they can have a better understanding of what it is and mostly how it feels.
The production is not very good, the volume is lower than normal and the chapter numbers don't coincide with what audible shows you. However, those are minor things that didn't impede me from enjoying the book.
There's a lot of information (at the beginning I felt it was kind of allover the place) and I wish I was able to have a notepad to write it all down, so that is why I think I will be going back to this regularly.
I cannot tell you if there's an order or a storyline, but somehow it still works because of all the useful quotes and information she gives.
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- Inga Adamyan
- 01-04-20
Amazing!!!! Very helpful.
Amazing book. Can’t recommend it enough. The way she describes anxiety and what to do about it is like I have never heard it before.
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- Beenish Lodhi
- 11-19-19
Great Listen!
Thank you Sarah for sharing your story! A perfect book to listen to on my walks home. Your story encouraged me to see my mental illness in a whole new way 🙏
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- Kelly Ernest
- 07-24-24
A raw, honest and holistic view on anxiety…wonderfully written
Highly recommend the read for anyone looking to get more in tune with their own anxious or intrusive thoughts
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- Cameron Moody
- 10-18-18
Insightful
I picked this book up in the midst of a personal crisis with my own anxiety. Its a broad topic, and not everything Sarah encounters in her story and research fully applied to my situation. However, I found a lot of solace in what she had to say, and found answers to a lot of the questions that we're bouncing around my head. All in all, it made facing my Beast a little easier, which is exactly what I needed.
I continue to listen to it now and then, sometimes specific chapters, when I need a reminder that I'm not alone with my anxiety, or a refresher on a better tactic in facing it.
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- Thomas A. Siewert
- 12-20-22
Overwhelming
If you're looking for a book that tries, and mostly succeeds to say everything about anxiety that can possibly be said, then this could be the book for you. Early on in listening she revealed her Hashimoto's diagnosis, and combined with her anxiety and depression, I figured it was a book I could really relate to, but that didn't turn out to be the case. I'm more on the depression side of depression/anxiety, and for me it was all very overwhelming. I think it would be a good text for Overachievers Anonymous. I could see it being a good sourcebook, but listening for me was just too much. And yet, I can't give her a bad rating, because it is obvious she did a lot of research and put an incredible amount of effort into the book, and it is a valuable book for people with severe anxiety.
I would say that, while she presents some good science, there are times when she also presents pseudo-science as science. Also I just have to say that as far as I can find out, Diane Fossey never studied chimpanzees. One item of note is that she mentions the good research done by Sheena Iyengar and Barry Schwartz on how too many choices can cause anxiety and dissatisfaction, and yet this book has about 500 suggestions for how to deal with your anxiety. For me it would have been a better listen if she had followed their advice.
I thought that the last two chapters were the best ones in the book. She revealed some things about herself that, frankly, I would like to have learned more about, but it was interesting and brave of her to include. And the ending was very well-written. My heart goes out to her as it's clear she has gone through some real hell between her anxiety and bipolar. I wish her well. I'm glad I listened to the book, even if it was too much for me at times.
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- Courtney
- 08-19-20
Read this book!
I mean it! Read this book! It’s so beautifully done and is that perfect combo of story and advice. I’ve read a lot of books on anxiety and this one has given me, by far, the most to take away. I don’t want to give too much away but how the author finishes everything up makes you feel a sense of calm that I’ve never found in another book.
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- Caroline
- 03-11-21
Better than your average
Liked everything about this book from the incredibly vulnerable content, empathetic and honest messaging and Sarah’s reading style.
I have started countless books on anxiety and mental health and finished few. I loved every minute of this journey and this book is one I plan to revisit again and again.
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- tree
- 10-13-18
Love love love
Anyone who struggles with anxiety needs to read this book! Sarah is brilliant, intuitive, funny and authentic. A great listen!
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- Amazon Customer
- 08-05-18
The big picture
This book I don’t think will change my life in anxiety, but it has made sense of my journey with it. Parts of it are full of research, others stories, and the rest her theories on anxiety. She tries to stay somewhat neutral in religion but sense she feels that spirituality is closely tied to anxiety, she dances around the theories a lot. Read with your own mind and beliefs to get the most out of it but also keep an open mind! It’s like she has put a lot of puzzle pieces together and I’m more on my way to seeing the big picture. I am hoping to implement some tips she does give to possibly ease the day to day struggle.
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