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3.57 AVERAGE
3.57 AVERAGE
inspiring
medium-paced
Very dated, but still has good tips
Content Warnings
Minor: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Alcohol
informative
What an excellent book. It really helps with anxiety and it gives you lots of tips and ways on how to overcome anxiety. I found it really useful
I deal with anxiety and severe depression in my life, and anxiety has been something that I've had a hard time managing. I picked this up right after the first of the year in a bookstore and got engrossed in it immediately. It really spoke to a lot of the problems I'd been dealing with when it came to anxiety.
While I wouldn't substitute this book for actual professional help, it is a good additional resource even for people who are already in therapy. They give good examples of different types of anxiety and how to manage it. A lot of the work in the book is about being mindful and identifying what mental processes are involved in being anxious. For instance, "worry words", which are words that people use that come from and cause their anxiety when they, for instance, get into extreme thinking and are anxious because they think something will be terrible, catastrophic, or they'll absolutely hate it rather than being more reasonable about the outcome of whatever they're anxious about.
All in all, worth picking up and reading. Not a substitute for a professional and they discuss when you know you NEED to go see someone in the book, but it's a good supplementary tool.
While I wouldn't substitute this book for actual professional help, it is a good additional resource even for people who are already in therapy. They give good examples of different types of anxiety and how to manage it. A lot of the work in the book is about being mindful and identifying what mental processes are involved in being anxious. For instance, "worry words", which are words that people use that come from and cause their anxiety when they, for instance, get into extreme thinking and are anxious because they think something will be terrible, catastrophic, or they'll absolutely hate it rather than being more reasonable about the outcome of whatever they're anxious about.
All in all, worth picking up and reading. Not a substitute for a professional and they discuss when you know you NEED to go see someone in the book, but it's a good supplementary tool.
I found this for a dollar at a library book sale, so obviously...as someone on a never-ending journey to reign in my anxiety...I had to buy it. And man, did I take that dollar far. This book is great.
Because this is a "For Dummies" book, I didn't expect to read about anything I didn't already know. And yah, the section explaining what anxiety disorders are, and where they might come from, and the differences between GAD and OCD and whatnot was nothing new to me. But after all of that, the book is split up into three sections to help you manage your anxiety: the logical approach, the "do something" approach, and the emotional approach. I didn't feel like I had a strong preference for one method over the other, so I just read all three chapters in the order I listed them. The book advises you to start with whatever you think will help you the most. All three sections have a bunch of practical exercises, from meditation techniques, to advice about exercising and getting better sleep, to charts and tables that you can make to track making you anxious and then use to transform your worries into constructive thoughts and actions. I've only done a few of the exercises so far, and they've all helped me to some extent.
This was published in 2002, but it was only noticeable because there's a section on overcoming anxiety caused by 9/11. (Which honestly is still relevant to me, almost 15 years later. My dad survived the Pentagon attack. I was 8, and understood both a lot and nothing at all about the whole ordeal.) Some of the information on medication might be outdated, but I don't know enough about pharmacology to know for sure. Obviously, ask a doctor before you take anything.
Reading this book has made me realize that I haven't done nearly enough work on my anxiety symptoms. I'm no longer in denial about it, for sure. And I have a few simple tricks that I turn to when I'm worrying or panicking... but I thought that I knew every coping mechanism in the world after 2.5 years of research, and that simply wasn't the case. Remember if you have a mental illness (or any illness), you should always be open-minded to new ways of making yourself feel better.
Conclusion: add this to your non-fiction collection, anxious friends! It'll be most usual if you have Generalized Anxiety Disorder or crippling phobias. (I agree with other reviewers that this isn't the best resource for OCD or PTSD. I actually wouldn't be surprised if there are other "For Dummies" books that focus specifically on those conditions.)
Because this is a "For Dummies" book, I didn't expect to read about anything I didn't already know. And yah, the section explaining what anxiety disorders are, and where they might come from, and the differences between GAD and OCD and whatnot was nothing new to me. But after all of that, the book is split up into three sections to help you manage your anxiety: the logical approach, the "do something" approach, and the emotional approach. I didn't feel like I had a strong preference for one method over the other, so I just read all three chapters in the order I listed them. The book advises you to start with whatever you think will help you the most. All three sections have a bunch of practical exercises, from meditation techniques, to advice about exercising and getting better sleep, to charts and tables that you can make to track making you anxious and then use to transform your worries into constructive thoughts and actions. I've only done a few of the exercises so far, and they've all helped me to some extent.
This was published in 2002, but it was only noticeable because there's a section on overcoming anxiety caused by 9/11. (Which honestly is still relevant to me, almost 15 years later. My dad survived the Pentagon attack. I was 8, and understood both a lot and nothing at all about the whole ordeal.) Some of the information on medication might be outdated, but I don't know enough about pharmacology to know for sure. Obviously, ask a doctor before you take anything.
Reading this book has made me realize that I haven't done nearly enough work on my anxiety symptoms. I'm no longer in denial about it, for sure. And I have a few simple tricks that I turn to when I'm worrying or panicking... but I thought that I knew every coping mechanism in the world after 2.5 years of research, and that simply wasn't the case. Remember if you have a mental illness (or any illness), you should always be open-minded to new ways of making yourself feel better.
Conclusion: add this to your non-fiction collection, anxious friends! It'll be most usual if you have Generalized Anxiety Disorder or crippling phobias. (I agree with other reviewers that this isn't the best resource for OCD or PTSD. I actually wouldn't be surprised if there are other "For Dummies" books that focus specifically on those conditions.)
Some things in here were questionable, but it's a good first step into managing anxiety.