Maybe You Should Talk to Someone

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed by Lori Gottlieb
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This much talked-about book is hard to rate. It is mostly a memoir, with factoids about therapy, and the stories of the people whom this therapist sees. While I didn't particularly relate to Gottlieb and at times found her humble-brags a bit annoying, I respected her need to seek out therapy for a crisis in her life. Her observations about therapy are also helpful and well demonstrated by her patients' stories which are in turns entertaining, heart-breaking, and inspiring. However, I couldn't get past that regardless of changed names, disguised story-lines, permissions granted, these are real peoples's stories and if I ever went to a therapist and then read about my life in a book, I would feel violated and vulnerable. Especially since it's more than the story--it's her reaction and interaction with the patients. In fact, I think I am less inclined to go to a therapist now than before I read this, wondering if my therapist is tolerating me, confused by me, or even annoyed by me. What I took away from this is that we could all use some introspection, that we are often the ones stopping ourselves from progressing, and that the future matters more than the past.

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People want to be understood and to understand, but for most of us, our biggest problem is that we don't know what our problem is.  We keep stepping in the same puddle.  why do I do the very thing that will guarantee my own unhappiness over and over again?

irrational fear of joy: cherophobia (hero is the Greek word for "rejoice").