Mental Fitness 101

This book uses insights from psychological science along with illuminating anecdotes to present a framework for understanding our inner architecture and helping readers discover how to live their best lives. Author Noam Shpancer explores humans' fundamental psychological need for connection and need for autonomy and details how the fulfillment of these needs underpins robust mental health. In brief, accessible chapters, he offers ten guiding principles for achieving this fulfillment based on proven psychological findings. These principles--including trusting evidence, honoring your own experiences, being flexible, facing your fears, and trying to love--help readers develop new ways to think about themselves and others and to cope with life's challenges. Through engaging stories and explanations of human psychology, the book provides a path along which readers can explore their emotions, relationships, and ultimately what a meaningful life means to them.

Noam Shpancer, PhD, is professor of psychology at Otterbein University in Westerville, OH, and a practicing clinician with the Center for Cognitive and Behavioral Psychology in Columbus, OH. He received his PhD in clinical psychology from Purdue University. He teaches introductory psychology, child development, personality, abnormal psychology, human sexuality, assessment, advanced research, and health psychology. He is the author of the novel The Good Psychologist and writes about psychology for Psychology Today's Insight Therapy blog.