"All it takes to become an artist is to start doing art."
-from On Becoming an Artist
On Becoming an Artist is loaded with good news. Backed by her landmark scientific work on mindfulness and artistic nature, bestselling author and Harvard psychologist Ellen J. Langer shows us that creativity is not a rare gift that only some special few are born with, but rather an integral part of everyone's makeup. All of us can express our creative impulses- authentically and uniquely-and, in the process, enrich our lives.
Why then do so many of us merely dream of...

In the years since it was first published, this influential book based on the highly innovative findings of social psychologist Dr. Ellen J. Langer and her team of researchers at Harvard made its mark for its unique concept of mindfulness, thoroughly adapted to contemporary life in the West. Langer's theory has been applied to a wide number of fields, including health, business, aging, prejudice, and learning. There is now a new psychological assessment based on her work (called the Langer Mindfulness Scale) as well as an institute in Mexico founded to apply the concepts of mindfulness to...

Radical in its implications, this original and important work may change forever the views we hold about the nature of learning. In The Power of Mindful Learning, Ellen Langer uses her innovative theory of mindulness, introduced in her influential earlier book, to dramatically enhance the way we learn. In business, sports, laboratories, or at home, our learning is hobbled by certain antiquated and pervasive misconceptions. In this pithy, liberating, and delightful book she gives us a fresh, new view of learning in the broadest sense. Such familiar notions as delayed gratification,...