If we could turn back the clock psychologically, could we also turn it
back physically?
For more than thirty years, award-winning social psychologist Ellen
Langer has studied this provocative question, and now, in
Counterclockwise, she presents a conclusive answer: Opening our minds
to what's possible, instead of presuming impossibility, can lead to
better health--at any age.
Drawing on landmark work in the field and her own body of highly
original experiments--including her "counterclockwise" study, in which
elderly men lived for a week as though it was 1959 and showed dramatic
improvements in their hearing, memory, dexterity, appetite, and general
well-being--Langer shows that the magic of rejuvenation and ongoing good
health lies in being aware of the ways we mindlessly react to social and
cultural cues.
Examining the intricate but often defeatist ways we define our physical
health, Langer challenges the idea that the limits we assume and impose
on ourselves are real. With only subtle shifts in our thinking, in our
language, and in our expectations, she tells us, we can begin to change
the ingrained behaviors that sap health, optimism, and vitality from our
lives. Improved vision, weight loss, and increased longevity are just
three of the results that Langer has demonstrated.
Provocative and riveting, Counterclockwise offers a transformative and
bold new paradigm: the psychology of possibility. A hopeful and
groundbreaking work by an author who has changed how people all over the
world think and feel, Counterclockwise is sure to join Mindfulness
as a standard source on new-century science and healing.
