Dr. John Sarno caused quite a ruckus back in 1990 when he suggested that back pain is all in the head. In his bestselling book, Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection, he claimed that backaches, slipped discs, headaches, and other chronic pains are due to suppressed anger, and that once the cause of the anger is addressed, the pain will vanish. Relieved Amazon.com readers call this book "liberating" and say "it sounds too good to be true, but it is true." Sarno has returned with The Mindbody Prescription, in which he explains how emotions including guilt, anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem can stimulate the brain to manufacture physical symptoms including fibromyalgia, repetitive strain injuries, migraine headaches, hay fever, colitis, ulcers, and even acne. If these psychosomatic problems all sound a little Freudian, what with the repression of emotions in the unconscious, it's because Sarno unapologetically borrows from Freud for the basis of his theory and cites childhood trauma as a major source of emotional problems. He also says that his program is a "talking cure" of sorts, since patients must be convinced their pain is rooted in their emotions before healing can begin. The book reads a bit like psychology text, with Sarno quoting from psychoanalytic theorists including Heinz Kohut and Graeme Taylor and the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition). Sarno walks through the neurophysiology of mindbody disorders, lists the symptoms of dozens of disorders that he believes are emotion-based, and offers a basic program for overcoming psychosomatic pain and illness. His recovery plan includes meditation and sometimes psychotherapy, including behavior modification, and stopping any medication or physical therapy. While Sarno's ideas seem radical, they were commonly implemented earlier in the 20th century, when psychoanalysis was at its peak of popularity, and they promise to become more accepted in our current era of alternative medical therapies and anger management. --Erica Jorgensen
Price: $14.00
Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is possibly one of the most self-referential turntablist releases of all time; one kaleidoscopic track segues into another, punctuated with sampled spoken phrases such as "those crazy sound-effects records you like to show off," "stacks of wax," and "they don't even have any instruments, just two record players." But Kid Koala doesn't just drop in a spoken tidbit like "we're nothing but the nerds they say we are" for a quick laugh. Rather, he lingers lovingly over it, back-spinning with such minute precision that he isolates and reorders every phoneme in a technical tour de force that transcends its own virtuosity when it transmutes seamlessly into an equally chopped-up bebop drum solo. This short (38 minutes) but dense release pulls together an astonishing variety of source material and is consistently engaging and technically impressive, although many tracks revolve around comedic elements (like slightly surreal extracts from an interview with a broadcast sound-effects expert and dating how-tos) that may not stand up to repeated listening. In the same way that Eddie Van Halen is not a better guitarist than Jeff Beck simply because he plays faster, Kid Koala and his contemporaries might not strike everyone as an improvement on the innovations of Grandmaster Flash. --Bob Bannister
The Tourgrip gyro is endorsed by 2005 & 2006 Remax Long Drive Champion Gerry James! The TourGrip will help increase your range and accuracy also aiding in the rehabilitation and prevention of Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, tennis elbow, arthritis and tendonitis. The TourGrip Golf gyro has a patented golf handle that gives the user a grip that they are familiar with while reaching speeds of up to 9,000 RPM and 25 lbs of torque resistance. It is a proven and effective way to strengthen arms, wrists, forearms, triceps and biceps. Every golfer should get their hands on one of these ingenious grips. Dynaflex makes the ultimate sports conditioning gadgets and these gyro mechanisms will markedly improve their golf grip, range and accuracy by strengthening muscles in the forearms, wrists and biceps. Even better, the grips will get the job done while they're reading, watching TV or talking on the phone. Includes a Free Instructional Training CD.
The Evoluent VerticalMouse is the advanced third generation of the revolutionary mouse from the inventor of the handshake grip. The patented shape supports your hand in a fully upright handshake position that eliminates forearm twisting. An ordinary horizontal mouse requires your forearm to twist away from its natural position. The grip is the same as an ordinary mouse, just turned sideways into a handshake position. Many users said they got used to it very quickly. The VerticalMouse does not move sideways when clicking with normal force because the thumb naturally opposes the fingers. Pointer control is as accurate as any other good mouse when the pointer speed settings are properly adjusted.
Helps Relieve and Rehabilitate Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and Sore & Aching Wrists