Peace in the Heart & Home: A Down-to-Earth Guide to Creating a Better Life for You and Your Loved Ones

Most people find that relationships are very difficult to manage. Instead of home being a place of peace, it is a source of aggravation, hurt and deprivation. Disappointment, loneliness, frustration and stress take a high toll on people's physical and mental health. Serious health problems such as high blood pressure, heart disease, irritable bowel syndrome, obesity, sleep disorders, migraines, fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue interfere with feelings of competence, self-worth and peace. Individuals also fail to have a good relationship with themselves and the world as it is. Depression, anxiety, panic, phobias, anger, compulsions, addictions and attention problems are practically epidemic in our society. Dealing with emotions in self-defeating ways is common and psychological trauma is more widespread than people recognize. Fortunately, scientific research and knowledge have been proliferating in the past few decades, helping us to understand the brain, the mind and their interplay with human relationships. We know now, more than ever before, how to prevent and heal the trauma that is at the base of most of the above-mentioned conditions. Also, mental health and marriage and family practitioners have been learning how to help couples create a safe haven for each other and their children. Peace in the Heart and Home is the manual on life and relationships that so many have been wishing they had. The book by clinical social worker Charlette Mikulka provides abundant, explicit advice and a wide array of effective skills, resources and methods for managing emotions, healing trauma, building self-awareness and fostering effective and fulfilling relationships. A multitude of memorable anecdotes, metaphors and quotations bring the material to life and will resonate with readers' most meaningful experiences. This book will also benefit those in the helping professions who will develop a deeper understanding of the most powerful patterns and practices that foster wellbeing.

Charlette Mikulka is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with three decades of professional experience. She earned her masters degree from Rutgers Graduate School of Social Work in 1976 and has engaged in child protective services, family life education and psychotherapy with adolescents and adults. Charlette is a member of the Academy of Certified Social Workers, National Association of Social Workers, EMDR International Association, International Center for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) and the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. Charlette maintains a full time private psychotherapy practice. She is certified in EMDR, a clinically and research-validated treatment for healing psychological trauma. Charlette participates in ongoing training in EFT, a highly respected approach to helping couples build a secure emotional bond. Additionally, Charlette's personal experience has contributed greatly to her knowledge of couple and family dynamics, the subject of her book, Peace in the Heart and Home. She has reflected deeply on her emotional and relational experience within her family of origin and adult family. In 2011 she and her husband, Joe, will have been together forty years.They have two sons, Michael, 25 and Christopher, 19.As well as enjoying her family, her profession and learning, Charlette loves being with friends, appreciating nature and architecture, walking, biking, quilting, singing, cooking and visiting her favorite places: New York City; the New Jersey Shore; New Hope, Pennsylvania and Vermont.