MindWorks: A Practical Guide for Changing Thoughts Beliefs, and Emotional Reactions Paperback – November 30, 2014

After 4 years of weekly trauma therapy I found myself frustrated, stuck & confused. I was experiencing progressively worsening health issues that lead me to being debilitated bed ridden for a year and a half at 45 years old. I was experiencing disassociation due to deep denial that lead my body into somatic shock, emotionally numb & my nervous system so dysregulated that my digestive system was shutting down.I found Gary van Warmerdam March 2020 after searching You Tube for beliefs & values. I watched two videos & was taken aback by the simplicity in his delivery simply explaining what I could not get from years of therapy. My accountant analytical mind was struggling feeling extremely defeated, helpless, hopeless, depressed, with high anxiety, severe pain in my stomach & lower back. Gary explained that he had a career in engineering so I was hopeful he had experienced the same analytic "need to know now" mindset challenges that I had been unsuccessfully experiencing for years due.FINALLY a book that provides PRACTICAL SKILLS & advice that is authentic. Written by Gary van Warmerdam who understands how daunting & dismantling the effects of trauma & emotional pain can be. As I began reading Mind Works I was confident that I was in the right place for the next level of healing that had been skipped over for several years by two different therapists. This book provides a break down of the practical skills necessary to allow the reader to gain a deep understanding that true healing happens within. I was worried that the book wouldn't have more to offer that his You Tube channel but it does!!! By focusing on healing within this book compassionately encourages you to stay committed to the process that will allow you to achieve acceptance, forgiveness & power based self discovery while discharging shame & guilt. Gary explains by taking responsibility for our own actions, pain, tears & frustration it will lead us to take our power back. This is an exceptional self-help book full of practical advice & techniques that will help the reader recognize how the development of self protection can provide numbing relief from emotional pain but at the expense of self acceptance, joy & happiness.On his WEBSITE www.pathwaytohappiness.com Gary generously offers free resources through articles & podcasts that demonstrate his level of expertise he has gained in the last 20 years.Being captivated by his book & spending time increasing my self help knowledge on his website I decided I wanted to take my healing to a deeper level. I decided to sign up for Gary's Self Mastery 1 course for 20 weeks that started May 2020. The course just ended & I am so glad I made the decision to sign up for one of his courses. What a wonderful adventure the last 20 weeks have been shifting myself out of the fog of confusion & into the clarity I had hoped I would find. The online academy community platform allowing us to connect with others was nothing less than a place for connection, unconditional love & support. I will always be grateful for Gary for giving me the skills that have allowed me to search deep within to find my own personal freedom from the defeating somatic experiences of trauma with chronic illness in addition decades of pain & abuse.Thank you Gary for being a GEM of true knowledge grounded in unconditional love. You are making a difference in the world especially during very challenging times we continue to experience in 2020.

Having gone through several self-help books over the years, I was obsessed with thinking there was something wrong with me and I had to fix myself; make myself “better”. Well I found out that there is nothing wrong with me and there was nothing that needed to be fixed with the help of this book.This book, which I hold like another might hold their bible, is nearby so I can grab it any time and open it to understand what is happening inside me (thoughts, feelings) at any given time. Then I can understand, smile and just go on with life.I have had this book for over two years and have read it completely three times and certain chapters several times. By using this book, I was able to open my eyes and see things differently. I also began to change things about myself, including getting rid of some habits. I understood things that I could not before and came to know things about myself I did not even know were there.Please note, I believe this book is no more than a guide to help a person on your own journey. AND I believe, no one will not get there overnight. I didn’t. And you may fall into many self-laid traps and not understand how you got there, until later. This book helped me identify how smart and strong I really am to have become the very person I am and how it may have all happened. I wish the knowledge in this book would had been taught to me in high school.I am so thankful for finding this book. I am also very thankful to the author who wrote it with an obvious vision of how to help others understand the truths about themselves so they can make their own changes and understand what in fact makes them who they are today. I am a much happier person today than I was in the past and most of it is because of this book.

I grew up learning that I was one very deficient person.As I created my own identity, I took the events of mylife as confirmation that I was nothing special, just anaverage, ordinary messed up human being. After readingGary's book, however, I've come to realize that I am NOTreally one very deficient person. Instead, I'm a HOST ofvery deficient characters!This book is a great textbook for someone who is lookingto understand about the process of the human mind.With concepts drawn from the Ruiz family of booksand his own Mastery Course, Gary reduces thenonphysical mind to an objective science. I learnedhow the mind operates as a buffer between thespiritual reality and the physical reality of the body.I highlighted hundreds of meaningful ideas to incorporateinto my own thinking process. I especially likedthe stories and analogies Gary used to explain howthe mind thinks. As I analytically studied the text,the book did not touch my heart as much as someother books on the subject, but it did register in my head.Since Mind Works comes from Gary's mind, it is morefocused on our thinking processes than on ourspiritual processes. It provides some great practicalways to watch your mind and brain in action ineveryday life. The overall idea I got from the book is:Although understanding how the mind works isvery helpful, it will not necessarily change your life.If you want to change your life, you must constantlypractice controlling your mind instead of letting itcontrol you. Even though you learned to ride the bike,you still need to practice what you learned to getanywhere. Gary, thanks for explaining all this! Jim K

A coworker recommended this book to me while he was listening to me vent about things that were emotionally reactive and unconfirmed things that sound made up from my mind like overthinking. I didn’t realize how much control I have given others by emotionally reacting. This book is perfect and anyone who is open minded and self reflecting or trying to improve should read this book!! It’s a must!