REVIEW: Dr. Jaime A. Pineda — Controlling Mental Chaos (BOOK)
Dr. Jaime A. Pineda’s new book is titled Controlling Mental Chaos: Harnessing the Power of the Creative Mind. In a nutshell, I’d describe the book as essentially a roadmap to left-brain harnessing the reactive mind. In other words, how to shape the beautiful, amorphous thoughts often considered outside the lines into discernible realities with effective, and successful material results. Dr. Pineda utilizes not just professionally backed statistics for his insights. He also principally utilizes the personal — an effective blend humanizing the flinty, removed nature of the standard business and leadership advice book.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: https://profiles.ucsd.edu/jaime.pineda
Often books of this nature can be unintentionally gory experiences for the uninitiated. Typically they require a sort of healthy objectivity on behalf of the reader, a sort of pre-educational quality hopefully in the mind of someone belonging to their target audience. It’s an effective balancing act Dr. Pineda is able to maintain, never faltering to one extreme, or the other. It’s something I’ve seen in even some of the best authors in business and leadership advice. “The insights and solutions proposed have a basis in science and in personal experience. I have tested them in the clinic and in actual life, and they have proven results.
Each chapter will help you understand and maintain control of your mind to live a creative life, which means a life lived with conscious and curious awareness and as the most natural state of being. Living in this state will bring joy to the rest of your life, unburdened by fear and anxiety and in touch with a source of infinite wisdom,” Dr. Pineda writes, near the beginning of the book. “Regaining your Original Mind is the straightforward part. Getting rid of the bad habits of monkey mind is where the hard work takes place. Good luck on the journey toward an enlightened self, and may you come out of this process happier and wiser than you have ever been.”
He also has written, “I include body and mind exercises throughout the book to help you bring about this change…These are open-ended questions to give you the chance to pause, probe deeper, and consider the evidence further. There are no answers, since they are meant to expand the limits of your thinking…The goal here is to learn to love your mind, as a parent loves a child, a necessary step to setting the stage for the ultimate transformation…The optimal way to achieve this outcome is by focusing on the present moment. Unlike secular-based meditation programs that focus mainly on stress reduction, the more comprehensive insights of Buddhism and mindfulness provide a greater ethical context and targets the roots of suffering, including the stickiness of thought. This leads to deeper and longer-lasting experiences of inner freedom.”
AMAZON: https://www.amazon.com/Controlling-Mental-Chaos-Harnessing-Creative/dp/1538179806
Dr. Pineda isn’t afraid of inserting holistic, spiritual, and sometimes unabashedly altruistic themes and messaging into the text. As the aforementioned quote demonstrates, he’s able to introduce concepts often considered antithetical to left-brain belief systems. I thoroughly enjoyed his willingness to make things work across the widest tonal spectrums possible.
Colin Jordan
