Not a Wasted Breath


Book Description

'Sis, the worst thing CF [cystic fibrosis] can do is kill me. It can't stop me from living.' Todd Gibbs spoke those words once to his sister and he proved that statement true time and time again. Though cystic fibrosis did kill him five days after his thirty-first birthday, the living he did showed that he had won the battle, even if CF eventually won the war. Not a Wasted Breath is not just a story about living with a fatal disease or waiting for a transplant. That was only a part of Todd's life. He never allowed his illness to rule his life, even in the face of over eighty hospitalizations. This is truly a story about how others perceived Todd, how they were affected by his presence in their lives, and how Todd viewed himself and his existence. In a poignant compilation of thoughts, memories, articles, and journal entries, LaRecea Gibbs, Todd's mother, creates a touching tableau of a life well spent that will inspire anyone to overcome personal obstacles through faith, determination, courage, and most of all, humor. Join mother and author LaRecea Gibbs in an inspiring biography which shows that though Todd's life was short, he never wasted a single breath. This Book is an inspiration to all readers in appreciating the gift of life. The account is thorough, has depth of development, is authentic, and puts us inside the people involved. Not a Wasted Breath enables readers to travel along emotionally. As a result, we count our own blessings. John Hagaman, Professor of English, Western Kentucky University, Director of WKU Writing Project.




When Breath Becomes Air


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**THE MILLION COPY BESTSELLER** 'Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful,' Atul Gawande, bestselling author of Being Mortal What makes life worth living in the face of death? At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade's training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, the next he was a patient struggling to live. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi's transformation from a medical student asking what makes a virtuous and meaningful life into a neurosurgeon working in the core of human identity - the brain - and finally into a patient and a new father. Paul Kalanithi died while working on this profoundly moving book, yet his words live on as a guide to us all. When Breath Becomes Air is a life-affirming reflection on facing our mortality and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a gifted writer who became both. 'A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory reading for the living' Nigella Lawson




Breath


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A New York Times Bestseller A Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of 2020 Named a Best Book of 2020 by NPR “A fascinating scientific, cultural, spiritual and evolutionary history of the way humans breathe—and how we’ve all been doing it wrong for a long, long time.” —Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Big Magic and Eat Pray Love No matter what you eat, how much you exercise, how skinny or young or wise you are, none of it matters if you’re not breathing properly. There is nothing more essential to our health and well-being than breathing: take air in, let it out, repeat twenty-five thousand times a day. Yet, as a species, humans have lost the ability to breathe correctly, with grave consequences. Journalist James Nestor travels the world to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it. The answers aren’t found in pulmonology labs, as we might expect, but in the muddy digs of ancient burial sites, secret Soviet facilities, New Jersey choir schools, and the smoggy streets of São Paulo. Nestor tracks down men and women exploring the hidden science behind ancient breathing practices like Pranayama, Sudarshan Kriya, and Tummo and teams up with pulmonary tinkerers to scientifically test long-held beliefs about how we breathe. Modern research is showing us that making even slight adjustments to the way we inhale and exhale can jump-start athletic performance; rejuvenate internal organs; halt snoring, asthma, and autoimmune disease; and even straighten scoliotic spines. None of this should be possible, and yet it is. Drawing on thousands of years of medical texts and recent cutting-edge studies in pulmonology, psychology, biochemistry, and human physiology, Breath turns the conventional wisdom of what we thought we knew about our most basic biological function on its head. You will never breathe the same again.




Philosophy and Religion


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The Breath of Spanish Oaks


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Cayce McCallister and sister Harri Wellington, fifty-year-old "magnets for trouble," live by the philosophy of their father, giver of their gift of seeing into the past. Through a bloodstained cookbook in Natchez, Mississippi, restless spirits channel Cayce and Harri, beckoning them to follow the path leading to Spanish Oaks Inn in south Mississippi. Here the sisters come face to face with spirits of slaves related to the current owner and his distant cousin, the resident fortuneteller. Joshua Devaux, present owner of Spanish Oaks, is smitten with one of the sisters and becomes ghost-hunter-in-training as he joins Cayce and Harri in solving the mysteries haunting the plantation since the 1840s. But can they unravel the disappearances, murder, and thefts in time to save Joshua's daughter from a terrifying death in the swamp at the hands of a modern-day monster?




Complete Works


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The Literary World


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