Research & Resources

by James S. Gordon, MD

Synopsis: Each year, as many as twenty million Americans are diagnosed with clinical depression. Tens of millions more have low energy, or feel unhappy and dissatisfied with their lives. And each year, American doctors write 189 million prescriptions for anti-depressant drugs for these people. Dr. James Gordon, a Harvard Medical School-educated psychiatrist who founded and directs The Center for Mind Body Medicine in Washington, DC, has been helping his patients find their way out of the darkness of depression for the past forty years. He has worked with everyone from high-powered Washington politicians to Hurricane Katrina victims, from overstressed doctors, lawyers, and stay-at-home moms to orphans from war-ravaged Kosovo and Gaza. Each one of Dr. Gordon’s patients is unique, but all suffer from some level of depression, and none are getting the relief they want from the anti-depressant drugs their doctors keep prescribing or the psychotherapy they’ve been receiving.

Dr. Gordon believes that depression is not an end point, a disease over which we have no control. It is a sign that our lives are out of balance, that we’re stuck. It’s a wake-up call and the start of a journey that can help us become whole and happy, one that can change and transform our lives. Unstuck is a practical, easy-to-use guide explaining the seven stages of Dr. Gordon’s approach and the steps we can take to exert control over our own lives and find hope and happiness. Unstuck is designed for anyone who is suffering from depression, from mild subclinical depression (“the blues”) to its severest forms. Using dramatic and inspiring examples from the patients he has worked with over the years, he explains the practical, mood-healing benefits of: food and nutritional supplements; Chinese medicine; movement, exercise and dance; psychotherapy, meditation and guided imagery; and spiritual practice and prayer. He concludes each chapter with a carefully designed prescription for Self-Care, guidelines to help each person play an active, effective role in their own healing. The result is Unstuck, an incredibly thoughtful, practical, and meditative guide to the difficult but rewarding journey out of depression.