9781524746742 Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence
9780593476215 The Official Dopamine Nation Workbook: A Practical Guide to Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence
This book is about pleasure. It’s also about pain. Most important, it’s about how to find the delicate balance between the two, and why now more than ever finding balance is essential. We’re living in a time of unprecedented access to high-reward, high-dopamine stimuli: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, sexting, Facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, tweeting . . . The increased numbers, variety, and potency is staggering. The smartphone is the modern-day hypodermic needle, delivering digital dopamine 24/7 for a wired generation. As such we’ve all become vulnerable to compulsive overconsumption.
In Dopamine Nation, Dr. Anna Lembke, psychiatrist and author, explores the exciting new scientific discoveries that explain why the relentless pursuit of pleasure leads to pain . . . and what to do about it. Condensing complex neuroscience into easy-to-understand metaphors, Lembke illustrates how finding contentment and connectedness means keeping dopamine in check. The lived experiences of her patients are the gripping fabric of her narrative. Their riveting stories of suffering and redemption give us all hope for managing our consumption and transforming our lives. In essence, Dopamine Nation shows that the secret to finding balance is combining the science of desire with the wisdom of recovery.

In Dopamine Nation,Dr. Lembke introduced readers to her groundbreaking research that demonstrates how abundance itself is a stressor, contributing to rising rates of addiction, depression, and anxiety. Since the book’s publication, she has often been asked: When will there be a workbook helping people apply these ideas to their own lives?
With her signature warm, authoritative voice, Dr. Lembke has written the workbook that her readers have been asking for. Full of interactive exercises and inspiring examples, the workbook helps readers identify the substances and behaviors they struggle to moderate, undertake a dopamine fast, and reset reward pathways for a happier and more fulfilling life.