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Derek O'Dell: A Quick Thinking Virginia Tech Survivor
Dr. Siebert discusses the survival response shown by Derek O'Dell, Virginia Tech student.

Why Some People Have a Better Chance of Surviving When Survival is Necessary
Dr. Siebert explains why some people are more likely to survive deadly crises than others. Sometimes it IS more than just luck or chance.

Guidelines for Listening to War Veterans
The main problem for many war veterans and survivors of torturous experiences is not what they went through. Their problem is that very few people have the emotional strength to listen to them talk about what they went through. Here are some guidelines if you REALLY want to listen....

Holding Meeting During Emotional Times
Here are some valuable tips for manging group meetings in a sensitive way When people are emotionally distracted by upsetting world events or internal organizational disruptions.

Resiliency and Longevity
Research into the psychology of aging shows that psychologically resilient adults cope well with an aging body. Resiliency can be developed and increased at any age, but it can't be taught. A longevity program for developing psychological resiliency must avoid standard "training" methods.

Overcoming the "Good Child" Syndrome
A major barrier to developing strong resiliency skills comes from being trained to be a "good boy" or a "good girl." Read about reasons why being a "good child" can be detrimental to your quest to be resilient.

Caregiver Resiliency
Some caregivers are more resilient, hardy, and stress-resistant than others. They hold up well under pressure and even gain strength from the difficulties and strains. Read a case study with tips about what can help you to create resiliency tendencies.

Developing a Highly Resilient, Change Proficient Work Force
Lean, customer driven, agile corporations are having difficulties finding qualified employees. The school systems are not graduating students prepared for employment in excellent, constantly changing corporations....

Guidelines for Listening to Survivors of Extreme Experiences
More than once after a survivor has talked with me, the person's family has said, "What did he tell you? He's never talked to us about it." The following guidelines show how to be a good friend and a good listener with people who have survived distressing experiences.

Telling Your Survivor Story: From Trauma To Transformation
Every transformational journey is unique, but the heroic survivors have two things in common. First they integrate the traumatic experience into their identity and make the experience a defining part of their life story. Second, they talk or write about it in a way that is helpful to others. The transformational process of recovery from deeply traumatic experiences into being a helpful resource for others, follows a sequence of steps and phases.

Let's Make Stress Less Distressing
(Concept paper prepared for the Oregon Department of Education)
"For thousands of years during human history, the primary causes of early death were contagious diseases and infections....Then life style emerged as the main cause of early death. The old philosophy 'Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we may die,' it turned out, contributed to people dying. People were shortening their lives through smoking, unhealthy eating and drinking, reckless living, and sloth...."

How to Handle the Emotional Side of Job Loss and Job Search with Resiliency
Losing your job through no fault of your own can wipe you out emotionally. How do you find the energy to search for work? How do you deal with your anger? You know that prospective employers are turned off by an applicant who complains about a previous employer, how can you be pleasant, relaxed, and self-confident in an interview when you don't feel that way? Here are some guidelines for skillfully handling the emotional challenge of dealing with job loss and searching for new employment.

How to Be A Survivor:
Details about the Gayle King Show on "Women Survivors." During the taping of this program Gayle asked if someone can have a survivor personality without knowing it. I said "Yes! You do!"

How Resilient Are You?
How do you react to life's difficulties? Take this quiz courtesy of our sister site, The Resiliency Center. People with excellent mental health are resilient, agile, hardy, and thrive under pressure. They have stress-resistant personalities and learn valuable lessons from rough experiences. They rebound from major setbacks even stronger than before.

You Learn to Do Whatever it Takes:
A checklist that describes personal traits seen in people who have a better than average chance in establishing and succeeding at running a home based business. See how you match up.

When HOW You React Makes a Difference: Oprah Winfrey show appearance
The purpose of the Oprah Winfrey television program on March 11, 1997, was to show why some people have a better chance of living through deadly disasters than others might have. An extraordinary group of survivors was brought to Chicago for the program. Read their stories.

Obituary of Victor Frankl
(Reprinted from Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Vol. 38, No. 2, Spring 1998.)

How World Peace Became Inevitable By 2010
Essay submitted to Christian Science Monitor Peace 2010 contest in April, 1988.

IQ Idiocy:
In their controversial book The Bell Curve, Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray advocate a new form of Darwinistic elitism. They assert that a 'cognitive elite' will and should 'run a custodial state' for an 'underclass' of people with lower intelligence that is 'disproportionately black.' Read another viewpoint!

Exceptional Mental Health:
A curiosity which started in 1953 about life's best survivors led to the identification of a small subgroup within the population who will probably be the normal or typical human of the future. Such persons can be described as having "survivor" or "synergistic personalities."

It is hypothesized that the synergistic personality reflects the emergence of a new level of human development and brain functioning that is fundamentally different and more advanced than that of Cro-Magnon humans.

Book Plagiarism in the UK: Has it Happened to You?
In 1996, Berkley sold the UK rights to The Survivor Personality to Thorsons, a London publisher. A few weeks later we received a request from Thorsons asking if they could retitle the book How Thrive and Survive in Any Life Crisis. The editor said they discovered there was already a UK book titled The Survivor Personality, authored by Patsy Westcott, and wanted to avoid confusion. A friend in London bought and mailed a copy of Westcott's book to me. As I stood in the post office looking through it I felt angry and distressed seeing page after page of my original work copied verbatim.

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