How to Be Your Own Best Friend by Mildred Newman
How to Be Your Own Best Friend was recommended to me by my Mom. When she recommended it to me she wrote: “I know, it sounds corny and it will take you about 20 minutes to read, but it got me through some tough times when I was a teen and before I met your Dad.”
I have little experience with books that would be labeled ‘self-help’ or ‘personal psychology.’ Lately, of course, I’ve been reading a few books that attempt to offer general advice and answers to people in various situations. But this book, in its format and content, aims not to elucidate grand themes or life lessons but instead to reveal the essential ways we choose to view our situations and ourselves.
The book is written by two psychologists who also happen to be husband and wife. The question and answer format gives the book’s main voice a relentless feel in conveying its message. I wouldn’t say there is a unifying theme in this book. This is what distinguishes it in fact, that there is no ‘message’ per se in this book. (It has no oversimplified advice to sell (no pseudo-mantra for Oprah to promote (no cliché’ system to eventually drive it out of date (thus drive it out of print.)))) This is the beauty of the book: that is searches for ways to break down the modes of thought that fail to lead us out of sorrow. It reminds us that it is often our natural inclination to feel sorrow and we must address our selves at the core: “We build our worldviews half asleep and let them, like tinted lenses, color our lives (pg. 49).
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