Audiobooks by Amanda Ripley

"Strategies to achieve meaningful and lasting conflict resolution In From Conflict to Convergence: Coming Together to Solve Tough Problems, two expert collaborative problem solvers deliver an incisive, hands-on guide to de-escalating conflict and constructively engaging with those you disagree with to find better solutions to problems. In this book full of real-life stories and examples, you'll find a collection of tried and tested strategies you can employ immediately as you negotiate and navigate your most seemingly intractable conflicts. You'll learn how finding what the authors call “higher ground” can advance your interests even when facing people and groups you think you have little in common with and how this can set the stage for longer term cooperation. The authors explain how to improve your ability to understand how other people think, feel, and perceive the world around you, and how to use that knowledge to develop mutually beneficial solutions that help advance your interests and the interests of the people you're dealing with. You'll also find: Strategies for distinguishing the message from the messenger, so you can appreciate the arguments and intentions of imperfectly-presented positions Techniques for responding to emotional and powerful conflicts and disagreements without getting lost in argument Ways to find breakthrough solutions to long-term conflicts that have failed to respond to previous attempts at resolution Perfect for business and organizational leaders, board members, community and religious leaders, public servants, mediators, and anyone else looking to find common ground with people with differing views and perspectives, From Conflict to Convergence also speaks to concerned citizens looking for concrete pathways to lessen troubling divides in their workplaces, their communities, and society at large. From Conflict to Convergence is a must-read resource for an increasingly combative and conflicted world."

Amanda Ripley, Mariah Levison, Robert Fersh (Author), Jeffrey Machado (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Unthinkable (Revised and Updated): Who Survives When Disaster Strikes--and Why

"Unlock the secrets of survival with this riveting expedition into the science of disaster-now revised and updated to address the pandemic, the role of social media in disaster response, and more-from the New York Times bestselling author of The Smartest Kids in the World Disaster can come in many forms, from earthquakes and avalanches to catastrophic machine failure and acts of terror. And afterwards, when the dust settles and the survivors emerge, we can't help but wonder: why them? Why did they live when so many others perished? In The Unthinkable, Prize-winning journalist Amanda Ripley, who has covered some of the most devastating disasters of our age, sets out to find the answers. To understand the human reaction to chaos and imminent danger, she turns to leading brain scientists, trauma psychologists, and other disaster experts-formal and informal-from a Holocaust survivor who studies heroism to a master gunfighter who learned to overcome the effects of extreme fear. Along the way, we learn about crowd psychology, the neurobiology of fear, and the many other invisible factors that can make the difference between death and survival. Seamlessly marrying neuroscience, firsthand accounts, and thrilling investigative journalism, The Unthinkable is a must-read for anyone who has ever wondered how they would respond in a life-or-death situation-or wanted to increase their odds of surviving one. This revised and updated edition updates all the original research and expands on enormous, slow-moving disasters like pandemics to bring Ripley's lessons on survivorship into the modern day. * This audiobook edition includes a downloadable PDF including the Appendix, Selected Bibliography, and Notes sections."

Amanda Ripley (Author), Kirsten Potter (Narrator)

Audiobook

High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We Get Out

"When we are baffled by the insanity of the "other side"—in our politics, at work, or at home—it's because we aren't seeing how the conflict itself has taken over. That's what "high conflict" does. It's the invisible hand of our time. And it's different from the useful friction of healthy conflict. That's good conflict, and it's a necessary force that pushes us to be better people. High conflict is what happens when discord distills into a good-versus-evil kind of feud, the kind with an us and a them. In this state, the brain behaves differently. We feel increasingly certain of our own superiority, and everything we do to try to end the conflict, usually makes it worse. Eventually, we can start to mimic the behavior of our adversaries, harming what we hold most dear. In this "compulsively readable" (Evan Osnos, National Book Award-winning author) book, New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist Amanda Ripley investigates how good people get captured by high conflict—and how they break free. Our journey begins in California, where a world-renowned conflict expert struggles to extract himself from a political feud. Then we meet a Chicago gang leader who dedicates his life to a vendetta—only to realize, years later, that the story he'd told himself about the conflict was not quite true. Next, we travel to Colombia, to find out whether thousands of people can be nudged out of high conflict at scale. Finally, we return to America to see what happens when a group of liberal Manhattan Jews and conservative Michigan corrections officers choose to stay in each other's homes in order to understand one another better, even as they continue to disagree. All these people, in dramatically different situations, were drawn into high conflict by similar forces, including conflict entrepreneurs, humiliation, and false binaries. But ultimately, all of them found ways to transform high conflict into good conflict, the kind that made them better people. They rehumanized and recategorized their opponents, and they revived curiosity and wonder, even as they continued to fight for what they knew was right. People do escape high conflict. Individuals—even entire communities—can short-circuit the feedback loops of outrage and blame, if they want to. This is an "insightful and enthralling" (The New York Times Book Review) book—and a mind-opening new way to think about conflict that will transform how we move through the world. Featuring audio highlights from actual interviews, town hall meetings, and podcasts."

Amanda Ripley (Author), Amanda Ripley (Narrator)

Audiobook