"Unleashing Your Brilliance" by Brian Walsh is a well-written, well-researched book about the great potential each of us has within us. It's fascinating the way in which we absorb and process information. Brian's book gives a thorough, simple and comprehensible explanation of how we learn.

I'm drawn to self-help books that explore the human mind. I think the science of human understanding is vastly changing. Brian points out in his book that more progress has been made in understanding the human brain in the past five years than we had in the preceding decades. Imagine what we will know in five more years.

The techniques Brian introduces to stimulate thinking, creativity and learning are helpful. I used several of them before writing this review. I pinched my right nostril to get more oxygen to my creative, right brain. I cross-crawled (left elbow to right knee, right elbow to left knee) to improve my focus and concentration. I tapped my K 27 to increase the blood flow to my brain.

The book is targeted for teachers, parents and students wanting to improve performance. It is also designed for corporate HR personnel wanting to better understand how employees learn in the workplace. I recommend this book for anybody who has an interest in the human mind and its potential.

I've read a lot of books about Superlearning, PhotoReading, success habits, brain functioning, mind mapping, memorizing. But here's a book that brings it all together in one place, full of way more realistic information than I'd known about before. In 273 pages, Brian Walsh gives a practical overview of state-of-the-art learning tools and techniques.

The book was a pleasure to go through! Not academic and heavy and boring, but a fun, informative read. Filled with great quotes, illustrations, internet links, practical information--heavy-duty reality--the structure itself is an example of facilitated learning.

In a sense, the book is a portal: one opening up a host of resources for the mind. Walsh points the reader to all kinds of ways for producing change. We learn how to break negative patterns and how to experience more productive and satisfying lives. He shows us how to best learn--and teach--a second language. He writes about brainstorming, about effectively influencing others, about real listening. We learn how we learn: what works and what doesn't.

It's a handbook for the human brain. I learned a lot by reading it. And I'm learning a lot by checking out some of the other sources referred to. If "unleashing your brilliance" is one of your goals, here's definitely a book to read.

This is an excellent overview of the how to best use your brain and natural gifts to unleash your personal brilliance. Dr Walsh covers everything from basics on brain function through NLP, emotional intelligence and other natural intelligences, to hypnosis. All building skills and tools to accelerate your learning.

The format is a fascinating one that really involves the reader and supports both comprehension and application!   Get it!

Brian Walsh understands brilliance and teaches the reader how to "unleash" brilliance in every learner. "Unleashing Your Brilliance" answers the question, how can i best learn? for adult and child students. Its instructional design is of vital value to educators, trainers, leaders, managers, and anyone wanting to understand the impact of different learning styles and its relation to results.

Dr. Walsh explains, in simple, easy to apply terms, how the brain works, its levels of comprehension, and how to capture these levels to enrich learning and stimulate creativity. One awareness I gained, which I will use from now on as a corporate trainer, is how to integrate creative activities to augment adult learning. Unfortunately, my experience with adults show that most adults have forgotten how to play. Dr. Walsh validates how important it is to include creative exercises for adult learners regardless of the initial resistance.

Walsh further illustrates in his seminal book, how to empower each learner's thinking. He uses, for example, online activities and crossword puzzles to reinforce immediate prior learning as imprint tools. Additionally, Dr. Walsh superbly utilizes scientific data to support each learning tenant and offers suggestions for clarity and application.

His chapter on Accelerated Learning is crucial for any teacher or trainer. He takes a new "buzz" word and explains its usefulness in plain language. The chapter on Many Intelligences offers detailed explanation and affirms that this understanding must be clear for any type or style for effective learning.

Learning can be, and should be, dynamic. Dr. Walsh teaches how to accelerate intelligence, how to enrich discovery, and the simple techniques and learning strategies to catapult potential. We can all be smarter than we are, according to Dr. Walsh. The insights found within this excellent book aides the understanding of complex topics, such as Emotional Intelligence (EI), stress, mind-body unity, Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP), and even PhotoReading and links it to academic success. Buy this book, its value and usage is vital to anyone who wants to positively influence learning.

Reviewed by Linda Benninghoff for Reader Views (1/06)

Before a child enters school, he or she learns on many levels in many ways, with all the senses. Adult learning tends to be rigid and standardized. The school may ignore the fact that each learner is unique and processes material in different ways.

Brian Walsh's book, "Unleashing Your Brilliance," will be of value to teachers, students, corporate management and anyone wanting to improve his or her life, because it explains that the brain works on many levels, and harnessing its full abilities can enhance creativity and foster learning. Walsh devotes some time to understanding where obstacles to learning come from--for example, hours spent studying that result in memorization instead of real learning.

Discussing the biological basis of learning, Dr. Walsh suggests that we need to integrate right-brain and left-brain in order to empower our thinking. Walsh describes how Einstein would use image-streaming (a thought-process stemming from his right-brain) then use the critical powers of the left brain to decode the right-brain process.

Walsh discusses the many forms of intelligence and goes into depth about each one. These include verbal-linguistic; logical-mathematical; spatial; musical; bodily-kinesthetic; social-interpersonal and spiritual-intra-personal. He mentions that for the person with great bodily-kinesthetic intelligence, sitting at a desk in school can be a cramping, stifling experience, and adds that many such children may have been incorrectly diagnosed with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). This part of the book was helpful to me, because I have two nephews diagnosed with ADHD disorder. They love sports and are physically active, and I wonder if they aren't misdiagnosed and might benefit from a kinesthetic approach.

After discussing the many intelligences, Walsh suggests activities that an individual can use to enhance each one. For example, someone interested in improving their verbal-linguistic skills can read, play word games, do crosswords, join Toastmasters, among other activities. Schools tend to emphasize linguistic and logical-mathematical abilities, and sometimes ignore some of the other intelligences.

Walsh also discusses hypnosis, Neurolinguistic Programming, photo reading and learning a second language.

While there are tools that can help facilitate learning, there are also factors and events that can inhibit it--a crucial one is stress. The memory of a stressful event, lying quiescent for years, can be triggered and cause "negative beliefs, desires, fantasies, compulsions, obsessions, addictions or dissociation. This toxic brew can inhibit learning and memory. Even the simple stress involved in test-taking can decrease brain-function.

While discussing stress, Walsh emphasizes the importance of emotional intelligence (EI), something different than the multiple intelligences already mentioned. Emotional intelligence may be more important than the traditional I.Q. in leading a satisfying life. Low EI can be devastating. "Low EI can sabotage the intellect and ruin educational endeavors, relationships and careers. Emotional Intelligence can be strengthened through training and/or therapy." Walsh then suggests some tools that can help emotions--exposure to natural light among them.

In "Unleashing your Brilliance," Walsh covers many topics, drawing on the most recent expertise of scientists and psychologists. His book is clear and well-organized. The writing about these difficult topics is easy to understand. He suggests a multiplicity of ways that people can use their minds more effectively. This excellent book will be useful to anyone with a goal in mind that involves using intelligence.
 

Brian Walsh, in this book "Unleashing Your Brilliance" provides a helpful strategy for implementing change. This book will help you attain success in your individual endeavors, or your professional or academic life.

Brian uses a clear-cut approach to language that was easy for me to understand

The online exercises afford an excellent tool for meaningful reflection and insight into who we are and who we can become. I found the suggested activities challenging, fun, and often with surprising results. Using these exercises on a regular basis can lead to insights into monitoring personal growth and attaining higher levels of performance.

I especially appreciated the comprehensive resources. These were helpful as well as the widespread. The appendices, endnotes and index provide additional resources for future reference.

This book is a practical text for leaders in the corporate world, college and university students and for parents concerned with developing the full potential of their children. It is enlightening and helpful.

This is an important and indispensable tool for anyone in the accelerated learning field. I am keeping a copy as a ready reference on my book shelf.

Brian Walsh's book, "Unleashing Your Brilliance", has everything you need to get on the way to achieving more, in less time, with less effort, and have more fun doing while doing it. The author gives you the tools you need to explore everything from NLP (Neurolinguistic Programming) to PhotoReading to Hypnosis and much more. This book is a road map to accelerated learning. The top twelve (I tried to limit it to ten, but could not) things I learned from reading this book twice (yes, you read that correctly) are:

1. "I tried" is a cop-out. It is an escape hatch. "Try" is one word you should work on removing from your vocabulary.
2. "I will" tells the subconscious mind to not act on something since it only operates in the "NOW". Remember that when you are making affirmations or writing goal statements.
3. Exercise enhances memory, improves reaction times and aids in the generation of unique and spontaneous ideas.
4. Self-master is a lot like poker, you need to know when to learn new skills, when to hold on to beliefs that serve you and when to let go of beliefs that do not serve you.
5. People with high self-efficacy choose tasks that are more demanding. They set higher goals, put in more effort and persist longer than those who are low in self-efficacy.
6. Emotional Intelligence is a completely learned phenomenon that helps people excel in life and have flourishing relationships and careers.
7. The words "always" or "never" indicate a false statement.
8. Whatever is strongly believed becomes reality.
9. Anything can be learned if it is broken down into smaller units. There are no mistakes, only outcomes and no failures, only lessons.
10. If something can be learned by anyone else in the world, it is possible for you to learn (something my Grandmother always told me).
11. PhotoReading is something more people should explore and put effort into learning.
12. The Vivaldi I played when my son was very young may have improved his recall by at least 25 percent.

If you think these twelve things are valuable, you should see the things in this book that I did not include in the list. Overall, "Unleashing Your Brilliance" offers a clearinghouse of information and is enough to get you started and to whet your appetite for more. This book, written in language simple enough for the average person to understand, gives enough information for even those already practicing many of the topics to find it valuable.

I am coming from the side of performance enhancement, especially in sports. Having read numerous books on learning and the mind, I found Unleashing Your Brilliance to be a refreshing book that brings many disciplines together under one roof for so many applications other than teaching and education. The real value as I see it is in Mr. Walsh's style and format that is understandable and and even entertaining for the average person. The fact that it contains updated, cutting-edge concepts gathered from many sources has spurred me on to more possibilities I wasn't previously aware of. I will be recommending it to my clients as homework.
 

"Unleashing Your Brilliance" far exceeded my expectations for a book on accelerated learning. It gave tools and techniques for harnessing the power of the human brain and utilizing it to its fullest based on one's own personal style of learning. It shared the effects of emotions, personality, etc. on our learning.

The principles shared were comprehensive, yet easy to understand. The tools at the ends of the chapters helped to reinforce the learnings and were creative and fun (for us right-brainers).

This book will be a reference that I will use often in the design of training workshops.

"Unleashing Your Brilliance" by Brian Walsh, PhD. is a wonderful synopsis of how the mind/body is influenced and how that influence can affect acquiring knowledge. Much of how we understand human nature is explained in elegant terms that those not schooled in psychology or bio-physics can easily understand. I believe that no one can utilize their full abilities without the knowledge of how they are manipulated by the inner workings of their personality as well as the continuing influence of their environment. "Unleashing Your Brilliance" gives you the background to understand this relationship and then offers tools to use this knowledge. Dr. Walsh has created a manual for learning, period.

For the professional: Though I have been a counselor for twenty years, I still found new and exciting information in "Unleashing Your Brilliance". This would also be a great book for someone just beginning in the helping fields. They would find an overall study of the many aspects of body and mind integration so necessary in modern counseling.

For the layperson: Perhaps the book's greatest strength, however, is to make this information attainable to the average person. Anyone with a strong interest in helping themselves or others (e.g., home-schoolers) learn easier and retain more usable information will be well rewarded by reading this book.

Whether you are helping yourself or others, read this book if you want a concise handbook on absorbing, retaining and using information.

James E. Morris, MSEd. (author, "Free Air Clinic, Your Personal Guide To Stop Smoking" and "Losing Weight Through Stress Control")

I've read many books about brain function and what we can learn from that about how we learn. And this is one of the best I've read.

The author writes about complex topics in a way to make them understandable and relevant to our lives as learners. I am especially pleased that the book is up-to-date - with research from 2005 included. In the area of brain research this thorough accuracy is especially important, because we are learning so much about these areas of science very rapidly.

The subtitle of this book is "Tools and techniques to achieve personal, professional and academic success." I heartily recommend it from all three perspectives. The book is valuable to me as a trainer and facilitator of learning, as an individual wanting to continue to improve my ability to learn faster and I plan to have my son read some of it - because there is lots of value for students as well.

If you have heard of the phrase "accelerated learning" this would be a good book to read to help you understand it. If you want to be a more successful student of anything, this book with help you immediately. Perhaps most of all, this book will truly help you unleash your potential, or as the author says, unleash your brilliance.

I think the techniques in this book are very powerful and should be incorporated into the classroom as early as kindergarten. This should be a MANDATORY course for all college freshmen or high school seniors. What societal differences would we see if these techniques were included in all schools?

I dare anyone to read it and not come away with a new perspective on learning, achieving, or having success.

This is an important book. I wish I had read it years ago, but at least I can use the information now.

Dr. Walsh has provided us with a remarkable resource here. Unleashing Your Brilliance combines the lessons from many different disciplines of how to use your mind and body to accomplish more.

You will read about mind mapping, how your brain operates, accelerated learning methods, the many dimensions of intelligence, how emotions and feelings can affect learning, different thinking processes, learning styles, the benefits of mind-body integration, how hypnosis helps, the key principles of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, the PhotoReading process and learning a second language.

Dr. Walsh has a gift for simplicity. While any of these subjects normally fills many books, he manages to gracefully capture the gist in a few pages. It's a talent I envy.

He also provides you with extensive references so you can dive in to learn more in any of these areas that attracts your interest.

The book has one of the most entertaining chapter review mechanisms I have ever seen. You fill out a crossword puzzle at the end of each one to see if you recall key phrases, terms and ideas. Seeing what you missed naturally causes you to want to reread the chapter for greater mastery.

I was impressed that the material is very up-to-date. If you are going to read this book, do it now. Our knowledge of perception, learning and thinking are advancing so rapidly that this book will inevitably become obsolete in a few years. I hope Dr. Walsh will provide us with an updated edition when that's the case.

If you only read one self-improvement book in 2006, Unleashing Your Brilliance would be a good choice.

Nice work, Dr. Walsh!