Spencer Lord - The Brain Mechanic: A Quick and Easy Way to Tune Up the Mind and Maximize Emotional Health

Praise for The Brain Mechanic

This is heavyweight psycho-spiritual guidance doled out with a ladle of honey. Spencer is the quintessential affable gurufriendly, approachable, flexible. His emotional algebra provides an invaluable formula for liberation, empowering each of us to be our own brain mechanic instead of a sniveling victim to the false self. A must read for spiritual seekersone which I will be using at Columbia College with my Mystical Consciousness students.

Elizabeth-Anne Stewart, Ph.D.,
author and professor at Columbia College

Concise, accessible, and indescribably powerful.

David Geffen,
cofounder of DreamWorks SKG

A good brain mechanic is hard to find. Usually you wind up in a chop shop. And the replacement parts are inferior. Spencer Lord has changed all that. He offers a one-stop service and youre out and running smooth before lunch. This may sound glib, but youll feel the same way when you realize how simple it is and how stupid you were not to have realized it before you drove into that wall.

Bruce Vilanch,
comedy writer for the Academy Awards
and multiple Emmy winner

Spending one night with The Brain Mechanic can change your life.

Lori Andrews,
professor of law at Chicago-Kent College of Law,
legal chair for the Human Genome Project,
and author of The Silent Assassin

A must-read. I feel brighter and better having read it!

Carole Bayer Sager,
singer, painter, and Oscar- and
Emmy-winning songwriter

Great book.

Sheri Salata,
executive producer of
The Oprah Winfrey Show

The Brain Mechanic empowers its readers with a simple, straightforward equation for change. Perhaps EV + B = EM should be offered to all middle-school youngsters as part of the standard curriculum. How skillfully they would navigate through life learning this tool early on!

Rhonda J. Noonan, M.S., L.P.C.,
clinical director, private practitioner

A work of preternatural genius.

Dr. William Cole,
former president of Lake Forest College and
chairman of the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations

Your brain cant run without a good mechanic. Spence is mine.

Howard Bragman ,
founder of Fifteen Minutes, publicist,
and author of Wheres My Fifteen Minutes?

Mr. Lord uses letters like words, words like thoughts, thoughts like tools, tools like dreams, and dreams like reality...

Christopher G. Ciccone,
artist, film director, artistic director, dancer,
interior and furniture designer, and
author of Life with My Sister Madonna

Spencer Lord is a not only a mechanic of the brain but a life enlightener and surgeon of the soul.

Mario Cantone,
writer, comedian, and Tony-nominated actor

Spencer is the ultimate connectorof our friends, our dreams, and our brains.

Hilary Rosen, editor-at-large,
The Huffington Post and political contributor at CNN

Brace yourself: The Brain Mechanic is the best brain candy to gobble up at the moment. Spencer Lord weaves together a simple, easy-to-read guide to understanding your emotions and your behavior. More important, he provides the tools needed to create the possibility for real transformation. Delicious!

Greg Archer, San Francisco Examiner

Imagine that... THINKING actually does play an important role in how we feel and what we do... The Brain Mechanic not only reinforces that causal link, but it arms readers with tools to apply cognitive behavioral therapy techniques in their daily lives.

Joe Zuniga, president/CEO,
International Association of Physicians in AIDS Care

Well, I thought I knew everything. Apparently not. This book has, if I say so myself, made me brilliant. I have only four words for anyone who wants to unlock the potential of his/her brain: You. Should. Read. This.

Elayne Boosler, writer, comedian, and
founder of Tails of Joy

Spencer Lord has provided us with a users manual to the human brain. By applying the material in The Brain Mechanic, one has the tools to positively change their life. I see this book as a step in the right direction to powerfully merge science and spirituality.

Jesse Brune, founder of Project: Service L.A.,
Le Cordon Bleutrained chef,
personal trainer, and reality television star

It will change your outlook and your life!

ANT, comedian and VH1 host

THE BRAIN
MECHANIC

THE BRAIN
MECHANIC

A Quick and Easy Way to Tune Up the
Mind and Maximize Emotional Health

SPENCER LORD
Foreword by Cheryl Saban, Ph.D.

Health Communications, Inc.
Deerfield Beach, Florida

www.hcibooks.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lord, Spencer.

The brain mechanic : a quick and easy way to tune up the mind and maximize emotional health / Spencer Lord.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

eISBN-13: 978-0-7573-9207-8
eISBN-10: 0-7573-9207-5

1. Cognitive therapyPopular works. I. Title.
RC489.C63L67 2011
616.891425dc22

2010039689

2011 Spencer Lord

All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.

HCI, its logos, and marks are trademarks of Health Communications, Inc.

Cover design byJustin Rotkowitz
Author photo by Ron Volanti
Interior design and formatting by Dawn Von Strolley Grove

For You

In the struggle for survival,
the fittest win out because they succeed
in adapting themselves best
to their environment.

CHARLES DARWIN

Contents

by Cheryl Saban, Ph.D.

by William Graham Cole, Ph.D.

T he Brain Mechanic is by far the most uncomplicated and easy-to-absorb discourse on cognitive behavioral therapy Ive ever read. I breezed through this little tome within hours, marking page after page with a yellow highlighter so that I could refer to it later, and most important, so I could share it with my kids and friends. I came away from reading this book with a smile on my face. Its entertaining, it makes perfect sense, its easy to follow, and any one of us can benefit immediately from reading it.

Spencer Lord introduces the reader to several important parts of the brain, but with a slightly unorthodox methodology he cuts to the chase and makes his material accessible to everyone. He describes the prefrontal cortex, the amygdala, and the cingulate gyrus in laymans terms. In other words, he takes the medical school, out-of-my-pay-scale mystery out of these important structures and turns them into neighborhood friends that we can get to know and understand.

Mr. Lord makes the argument that we can indeed control our behaviors once we understand emotional algebra. He has devised a way to teach this equation (EV + B = EM) quickly and creatively. I highly recommend The BrainMechanic. I would venture to say that as you seek knowledge and actualization of mind-body wellness, self-worth, and self-esteem, emotional algebra could end up being one of the best lessons youve ever learned.