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JJjamin71472583
Guest
Do you think it is good or bad?
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Kristen
Guest
I read about a third of it several years ago (it was recommended by the psychologist I was seeing at the time, whom I determined quickly was working against my Catholic faith and whom I therefore dropped).
As I recall, the book had some useful thoughts, but was mostly popular fluff. I guess that my primary thought is that any book that is subtitled “And it’s all small stuff!” is probably off the mark in more than one place, as life is most certainly **not **all “small stuff”!
Frankly, if you’re looking for good books on anxiety and depression (as I have done for many years), I could recommend at least one book – and one strategy – that is far more useful. The book, which I am working through now, is “Getting Your Life Back: The Complete Guide to Recovery from Depression,” by Jesse H. Wright, M.D., and Monica Ramirez Basco, Ph.D. It offers common-sense theory and practical exercises five “keys,” including a spiritual key, and I am finding that the keys are just as useful for anxiety as for depression.
Furthermore, the “thought” key uses cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), which I first learned about six years ago (while seeng a good Catholic psychologist) and which helped me through a really rough time. Basically, the theory is that your thoughts – not events and other people – control your feelings, and since your negative feelings are often the result of **inaccurate **negative thoughts, you can feel better and live better by training yourself to replace inaccurate negative thoughts with more accurate, positive ones. The books we used at the time were by Dr. David Burns and they are still in print. The most useful one was a workbook entitled (somewhat inaccurately, in my opinion) “Ten Days to Self-Esteem.” I think, though, that “Getting Your Life Back” distills the best of Burns’ work and adds considerably more useful information, so I would recommend starting there.
This may be considerably more info than you wanted, but I have found that sound psychological information is hard to come by, and sound pyschologists even harder to find, so when one finds some good sources, one should try to share them!
God bless you!
As I recall, the book had some useful thoughts, but was mostly popular fluff. I guess that my primary thought is that any book that is subtitled “And it’s all small stuff!” is probably off the mark in more than one place, as life is most certainly **not **all “small stuff”!
Frankly, if you’re looking for good books on anxiety and depression (as I have done for many years), I could recommend at least one book – and one strategy – that is far more useful. The book, which I am working through now, is “Getting Your Life Back: The Complete Guide to Recovery from Depression,” by Jesse H. Wright, M.D., and Monica Ramirez Basco, Ph.D. It offers common-sense theory and practical exercises five “keys,” including a spiritual key, and I am finding that the keys are just as useful for anxiety as for depression.
Furthermore, the “thought” key uses cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), which I first learned about six years ago (while seeng a good Catholic psychologist) and which helped me through a really rough time. Basically, the theory is that your thoughts – not events and other people – control your feelings, and since your negative feelings are often the result of **inaccurate **negative thoughts, you can feel better and live better by training yourself to replace inaccurate negative thoughts with more accurate, positive ones. The books we used at the time were by Dr. David Burns and they are still in print. The most useful one was a workbook entitled (somewhat inaccurately, in my opinion) “Ten Days to Self-Esteem.” I think, though, that “Getting Your Life Back” distills the best of Burns’ work and adds considerably more useful information, so I would recommend starting there.
This may be considerably more info than you wanted, but I have found that sound psychological information is hard to come by, and sound pyschologists even harder to find, so when one finds some good sources, one should try to share them!
God bless you!
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dalesmom
Guest
YES!!! It’s a fabulous encouraging book. It is all small stuff in the grand scheme of things. Read it. You’ll enjoy it. 
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LilyM
Guest
Plenty of it is big stuff in terms of our salvation - the REAL grand scheme of things.YES!!! It’s a fabulous encouraging book. It is all small stuff in the grand scheme of things. Read it. You’ll enjoy it.
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Cat
Guest
My husband read some of them while he was being treated by a psychologist (along with a psychiatrist) for his clinical depression.
They were helpful. He had developed a self-destructive thought pattern over the years of taking everything too seriously and blowing up if the slightest little thing didn’t go his way. Something as simple as getting a paper cut could send him off into a spiral of negative thoughts–“Paper cut. I’m such a klutz. What if I get an infection and they have to amputate my hand? I’ll be unable to continue working and support my wife and kids. And because I can’t work, international companies will close down and people will be out of work and many people will probably kill themselves and perhaps a war will start because of rioting in the streets leading to a revolution with a militant dictator and he’ll impose satanism as the national religion and Christians will be beheaded and it’ll be all my fault because I got a PAPER CUT!”:
I know you all think I’m kidding. I’m not kidding. It was scary sometimes hearing him go on like this about the smallest things.
So reading these books was one thing that helped him to re-train his thought processes so that he could say with the rest of us, “Paper cut. Ouch!”
They were helpful. He had developed a self-destructive thought pattern over the years of taking everything too seriously and blowing up if the slightest little thing didn’t go his way. Something as simple as getting a paper cut could send him off into a spiral of negative thoughts–“Paper cut. I’m such a klutz. What if I get an infection and they have to amputate my hand? I’ll be unable to continue working and support my wife and kids. And because I can’t work, international companies will close down and people will be out of work and many people will probably kill themselves and perhaps a war will start because of rioting in the streets leading to a revolution with a militant dictator and he’ll impose satanism as the national religion and Christians will be beheaded and it’ll be all my fault because I got a PAPER CUT!”:
I know you all think I’m kidding. I’m not kidding. It was scary sometimes hearing him go on like this about the smallest things.
So reading these books was one thing that helped him to re-train his thought processes so that he could say with the rest of us, “Paper cut. Ouch!”
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