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A review by gothhotel
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed by Lori Gottlieb
4.0
Does Lori Gottleib have any ugly patients? Are any of them losers, loners, or just plain weird? Are any of her patients not white? Are any of them poor? Because I truly enjoyed this book, but throughout I couldn't help but feel that I'm the target audience, and maybe it's limited beyond that context. Such is the danger of therapy, however well intentioned, if it does not engage with the cases where the patient's environment has more to do with their behavior than their internal landscape. Gottleib, being a therapist for affluent white people in L.A., has little to say about the most burning questions in modern therapy (beyond a requisite hand-wave at digital wellbeing, which amounts to a typical Gen X "phones bad"). Let's just say that when it comes to the depth of her social analysis, I can tell Gottleib wrote for The Atlantic.
But I'm being too harsh. Try as I might to put myself above it, the book taught me a lot I didn't know and prompted me to reflect on my own emotional life in a way I usually avoid (or at least water down). I found myself feeling plucked raw after certain passages, when the stories told hit a bit close to home. It made me wish I'd had a better experience in therapy and consider whether I'd gone at it with the right approach - I saw a lot of myself in John and Rita and even Gottleib herself, though the reflections weren't necessarily pleasant. And I have to respect the book for its educational merit, as Gottleib is careful to scatter the contents of Psychology 101 throughout the book. Some of her "stories" are clearly meant to illustrate certain general principles, which is a little corny, but I get it. It's not like the whole book is hand-holding. Like I said, a lot of it cuts deep - it feels honest and real in the way a good therapist would be.
But I'm being too harsh. Try as I might to put myself above it, the book taught me a lot I didn't know and prompted me to reflect on my own emotional life in a way I usually avoid (or at least water down). I found myself feeling plucked raw after certain passages, when the stories told hit a bit close to home. It made me wish I'd had a better experience in therapy and consider whether I'd gone at it with the right approach - I saw a lot of myself in John and Rita and even Gottleib herself, though the reflections weren't necessarily pleasant. And I have to respect the book for its educational merit, as Gottleib is careful to scatter the contents of Psychology 101 throughout the book. Some of her "stories" are clearly meant to illustrate certain general principles, which is a little corny, but I get it. It's not like the whole book is hand-holding. Like I said, a lot of it cuts deep - it feels honest and real in the way a good therapist would be.