Unfortunately, this book just wasn't for me. I'm usually very invested in this type of book, but this one just didn't pull me in. I found myself very confused throughout this whole book and that it was written more like a text book.

In Essential Living, Dr. Uram explains how our ancient survival brain mechanisms shortcircuit our connection to our Essential Self, starting when we are young children, which ultimately leads us away from who we really are and down a path of unnecessary suffering.

Dr. Uram has shown us how our personalities are developed and how we can choose to make shifts in our everyday thoughts, feelings and behaviors using many different kinds of modalities she has listed in this book. As a lifelong learner and as a therapist, I highly recommend this book to help anyone get back to their own essential self and be able to experience happiness and peace.

Excellent resource for those looking to reflect more of the essential self. Uram makes a brilliant case that our conditioned responses originate from when we are very young and we hold on to even minor negative events so significantly that we develop unhealthy habits. Through these exercises that are throughout the book she guides a reader to reconnect with our essential self to tap into our inner strength in an effort to achieve more empowerment and greater calmness.

I love self help and spiritual books, but this one felt more like a science book. The introduction was long and boring, like intentional ramble. The chapters seemed less about self awareness and more about science and why our brains do what they do, which is great for a text book, but not exactly captivating for pleasure. I love delving deeper into my own self. This did not help me accomplish that.