How to Train Your Mind to Overcome Any Obstacle

Neil StraussBooks

Learn the essential ingredients in the precision of Navy SEAL snipers, the focus of Tibetan monks, and the success of elite athletes. Train your mind to overcome even the most daunting obstacle.

I’m a big supporter of the writing of Steven Kotler (Abundance, West of Jesus), who did an incredible talk on flow at The Society Intensive. For the past year, I’ve been watching his latest book, written with Jamie Wheal, take shape: Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, The Navy SEALs and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work One of the many … Read More

WHAT IT TAKES TO BE THE BEST (A CONTROVERSIAL LESSON FROM A WARLORD)

Neil StraussBooks

I was reading a new book, The Ego is the Enemy, by Ryan Holiday, who I had met when he was working with Robert Greene. I remember encouraging him to write a book, and him saying he wasn’t sure what to write about. Considering that he’s written or co-written at least six books in some three years since then, I … Read More

The Lost Afterword from Jerzy Kosinski’s The Painted Bird

Neil StraussBooks

When I first read The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski, I was struck not just by the power of the book but by the parallels in the author’s biography at the end of the book. It was learning that there was some element of truth in this savage book about the human condition that put it at the top of … Read More

The Year in Top Fiction Recommendations

Neil StraussBooks, Neil

On New Year’s Day, 2016, I looked at my bookshelf and thought it was time to read the stack of books that was piling up, most of them top fiction recommendations from others. It was time to re-enter the world that had inspired me to write in the first place: The intersection of imagination, craft, and storytelling. So I committed to emptying … Read More

The Quick-Start Guide to Healing Trauma and Psychological Wounds

Neil StraussBooks, Neil, Public, The Truth

healing trauma

A  Framework For Transformation Over the course of writing The Truth, I came to develop a very specific take on healing trauma, specifically developmental trauma, as I slowly but surely reduced my own. As an overall framework for psychological healing, think of the childhood pain and shame we store—and the dysfunctional behaviors and thoughts created by them—as cancerous tumors attached to the heart … Read More

How To Make Money Like A Porn Star

Neil StraussBooks, Public

This adult graphic novel weaves together black humor and blacker reality. Like all great American stories, it features humble beginnings, life–changing tragedy, stripping, abuse, implants, fame, addiction, gunplay, downfall, & even bigger implants.