there are a ton of books out there about addiction but in this video I'm gonna
tell you about my top seven favorite books on addiction and why that is for
those of you who are new here I'm amber Hollingsworth and I want to welcome you
to put the shovel down this channel is dedicated to helping you get your life
back on track by teaching you the science and psychology of addiction so
you can beat it but you know what there's a lot of other people out there
that know a little something about addiction too and today I'm gonna tell
you about seven of those people and some books that I definitely recommend you
check out now although I'm giving you my top seven books these are not in order
because I like them all I don't really know if I can rank them like least
favorite to favorite of the seven but what I can do is kind of put them in
categories for you so that you might know oh if I like this kind of thing or
that kind of thing which one which one might suits you the best
all right let's start with the sort of what I call like the nerdy recovery
books so there's a book that I read I read this quite a while back it's by a
guy named Mark Lewis and it's called the addicted brain and let me tell you
what's really interesting about this book it's written by a neuroscientist
who's in recovery so this book is the perfect balance of science and story and
y'all know how much I'm a nerd for that kind of thing so if you love that kind
of thing you're gonna like this it has some
really heavy science in it but it breaks it down in a way that you really can't
understand what is happening in that brain and it tells you that information
alongside a personal story which totally keeps your attention and keeps you
engaged throughout this whole book in fact I actually read this book and I
know you're thinking well Amber didn't you read all these books well usually I
listen to books because I'm pretty ADD and I like to do things on the go but I
actually sat down and read this whole book and so for me being
and I read this whole thing that tells you it's a pretty good book next on the
list which I might also kind of put in that nerdy ish category if you really
like to understand how things work is chasing the screen by Johann Hari and if
you've seen a lot of my videos you may have met you may have heard me mention
this before but this is one of my favorites this book is a total
GameChanger and it really explores addiction through so many lenses and so
you get to take a look at addiction historically and politically and legally
and so the author of this book Johann Hari is like a reporter and so he looks
at this thing from all these different points of view he looks at it through
the research point of view and through the person who has an addiction point of
view and from the family point of view and from a drug dealers point of view
and from the legal system or the police point of view just looking at it from
all angles for me this book was a total GameChanger I mean it's like after I
read this book it was almost like questioning your religion like I had to
really back up and rethink some of my some of my long-held philosophical
values about how we deal with addiction that's just how powerful this book is
again it's called chasing The Scream the first and last days of the war on drugs
by Johann Hari and don't worry I'm going to put a list of all these books for you
right in the description ok this next book is the last one that I'm gonna put
in the real like sciency category and it is a book about alcoholism it's called
the naked mind and it's about Annie grace and I just love this book in fact
Annie grace has a YouTube channel and I encourage you to check it out if you
haven't seen it she's got a whole different approach for helping people
stop drinking it's totally different than this 12-step way in fact she really
focuses on helping people decide that they just don't want to drink anymore
which is really different from the typical approach which is like this
ain't working for you and you need to stop drinking so a lot of people think
well I should stop drinking I need to stop drinking but like I said this
naked mind helps you to kind of come to terms with do you don't even want to
drink anymore so if alcohol's the issue definitely consider
checking out Annie Grace's YouTube channel and of course get the book this naked
mind and if you're the family member worried about someone that has an
addiction particularly if you're a parent this next book is for you it's
called house on stilts by Paula Becker and this book really is Paula's personal
story of dealing with her own son's addiction and I mean this is really the
up close and personal point of view about what it's like to have a child
going through this the struggles that you have the decisions that you have to
make the heartstrings that get pulled on the other siblings and how to balance
all that in so if you're a parent of someone struggling house on stilts this
is a great book okay now these next three books I'm going to tell you about
are written from people who are in recovery about their experiences and the
other thing you should know about these next three books is that there's some
language and there's some language in there and a lot of sarcasm know me
personally if you see my videos you probably know I'm a little bit sarcastic
so I love the sarcasm and the humor I mean you like a good real life true
recovery story check out these three books okay the first one I want to tell
you about in this category is the book recovery by Russell Brand you know who
Russell Brand is the comedian you know the British guy who's got the really
sort of funny dark sense of humor like using that movie saving Sarah Marshall
that's the movie I remember him from the most he is hysterical and he talks about
the 12 steps in his book and he really sort of explains it in a really blunt
kind of crass kind of deep philosophical way so I really feel like his book is
this bizarre mix of humor and sarcasm and deep depth like deep stuff and
twelve steps and story you know different stories from his life so it is
a great combination and it really appeals to a lot of
different senses but there will definitely be some points in this book
where you're gonna be like uh did he just say that what I thought he said at
least I had a few of those moments okay next on the list is a book called high
achiever by Tiffany Jenkins oh my gosh I just read this book this week and I am
in love with it in fact I got the book and I thought oh I'll listen to a little
bit of this before I go to sleep guess what I stayed up all night and binge - this
book I know it's like Netflix or something totally love this book like
secretly sniffling trying not to wake up my family because I'm like listening to
this book all night it's her personal story and although this is such a deep
and difficult and personal topic this author uses a lot of humor but it is
very real so if you like that kind of thing check out high achiever again
that's about Tiffany Jenkins okay last book and this is the one that I have
most recently read this is a book called idiot by Laura Cleary now my husband
actually sent this to me recently sometime this week over he sent me like
this funny little Facebook video and he's like this is like a funny view on
recovery I thought you might like and it's hysterical and you can see her on
this little video that I got from my husband it's like she's this woman
Laura the author is talking to her baby and she's like let me tell you how I Met
Your father and she sort of tells these sort of antics in these tales which are
like really far out there and she's got such a great sense of humor and deep
insight but the way she tells it was with such self-deprecation you really
just laugh all the way through this book now a lot of you may be thinking you
know why do you pick all these books that sort of use all this humor and
likeness well I think a lot of times for me one of the ways I can tell someone's
getting better is that there are able to talk about their experiences in a way a
lot of times it does have humor or that doesn't feel like it's going to break
them in pieces that to me is a sign of recovery and I think if you're
struggling with this it might help you to sort of be able to laugh at yourself
and move forward from some of these really dark difficult moments that
you've had so there you have it that's my top seven books
and I'll make sure you have the titles the authors and the links in the
description below