The ESL Teacher C · Nomad Educator

*I’m constantly updating these lists, so you might want to pin it down for future reference.*

There are multiple manuals out there that you can simply look up based on your area of interest. Here I am contributing alternative sources, scientific and from the liberal arts in an attempt to illustrate the complexity of our mind in images.

I’m sharing the more artsy sources too, because 1-there is value to gain from a different perspective, and 2-because in spite of our best efforts, we don’t know much about our minds, but the use of the fantastic and sci-fi allows us to take a new angle in our understanding, and for that these representations are highly valuable.

Content

• Scientific sources
• Artistic representations

Scientific sources

Manuals

• The DSM-V is the latest version (as of 2022) of the book compiling all psychological disorders studied and acknowledged by the community
• I made a post giving a bird’s-eye view of psychology
• I could put together a list of most key studies in psychology, tell me if you’d be interested in that

Self help books

☞ Before I start I want to say two things about self-help books:

1. Most will have nuggets of wisdom
2. You don’t need to read the whole book to get to them, just read the table of content and skim the chapter, you don’t read the whole dictionary when you look for a single word in the Z section)

That being said, here are self-help books I found interesting and why (tell me if reviews of self-help books is something that would interest you in the future).

• The Talent Code, by Daniel Coyle. Gives documented cases that explain how skills were improved through deliberate practice and how practice can be maximized within a single period of time.
• Everything is Figureoutable, by Marie Forleo. The author doesn’t shy away from expletives. She takes you by the hand, makes the space for you to put down your thoughts and verbalize your objectives. It got me out of a slump and brought me to being more optimistic about what I can do on my own and it’s one of the reasons I’ve started this website.

YouTube channels

• The YouTube channel Neuro Transmissions is hosted by a young neuroscientist and a therapist. They do a great job at explaining the brain.
• Consider also the SciShow Psych YouTube channel for psychology bite sized capsules.

Others

• Speakers : here are some people that made talks and that I found excellent on various subjects of the mind
  • Jim Kwik: for memory (check from the 12:00 min time marker), speed reading (check from the 30:00 min. time marker), learning, he’s got a whole business built around his teachings, but he also has a lot of free stuff and you might have heard him before
  • Jay Shetty: a former monk, great talk about dealing with emotional pain (like grief) has great (non-religious) rituals to create habits towards higher mental wellbeing
  • Dr Caroline Leaf: restructuring your thoughts, a clear explanation of the mind/brain connection
  • Anthony Metivier: has a great application of the memory technique of loci, if you look further into him, you’ll find that he’s a little ‘out there’, go as far down that rabbit hole as you want

Artistic representations

Television series

• Tv Series “Maniac” for defence mechanisms
• Tv Series “Bojack Horseman”, season 6, episode 10: ‘Good Damage’ for a visualization and verbalization of depression
• Tv Series “Bojack Horseman”, season 4, episode 6: ‘Stupid Piece of Sh*t’ for an illustration and vocalization of self loathing

Novels

• “The Bell Jar” by Sylvia Plath, great representation of how one can slowly and simply fall into depression without a heavy or medical reason behind it.

Movies

• Film “Inside out” for emotions and their role in our thought processes
• Film “Soul” for a description of what makes an individual’s personality

Exhibitions

• The exhibition “Star Wars: Identities”: it explores all the psychological elements that can build and affect a person’s identity

Questions/Comments

• Have you read or seen any of the items I listed? If so, what did you think?
• How do you view non serious sources as a way to learn about psychology?
• Tell me if me reviewing self-help books is something that would interest you in the future.
• Do you have films or other media that you think portray well certain aspects of our psychology?