Lisa Find Love

From Happy Money by Ken Honda. Copyright 2019 by Ken Honda. Excerpted by permission of Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.

Here is a list of five steps you can take, starting today, that will get you into the flow of Happy Money:

1. Shift out of the scarcity mind-set.

Each person has the ability to choose what kind of money mind-set they want to live with. That is why the first step to Happy Money is to get yourself into an abundant mind-set. Until now we have been taught to believe that money is scarce and that we have to get it before someone else does. We have become a culture that is obsessed with money. We are so focused on the amount of money that we do or don’t have that it cuts off our potential for a great life.

Why? Because we automatically assume that we won’t be able to make a living if we take a risk and go for what we really want. The concept that there is not enough in the world makes us feel small and less generous. Don’t let your mind-set limit your life’s potential. If you have an abundant mind-set, you start seeing new possibilities, you become more creative, and you become more capable of responding to difficulties in life. You free yourself to create your own destiny.

2. Forgive and heal your money wounds.

We know that our attitudes about money are mostly inherited. And the people whom we inherited those ideas from also inherited theirs. But you won’t get to Happy Money if you let this become cause for resentment. The people who went before you were young, inexperienced, and prone to all sorts of mistakes. You know this because you have been there too. Imagine the situation that your parents were in. They acted out of fear because they didn’t know any other way. They did what they had to do. If you can sympathize with their situation and their humanity, you can begin to understand why they made the mistakes they did. Then you can forgive them, and when you do, your heart will feel lighter. You can break the cycle of Unhappy Money by forgiving others and, just as importantly, by forgiving yourself for the mistakes you’ve made.

You can set the tone for a new era of Happy Money when you forgive and begin the process of healing. When we make peace with the past, those wounds cease to be an obstacle to our present happiness, and money stops feeling like a mysterious, uncontrollable force. That is what gives us the freedom to find the Happy Money flow that works for us.

3. Discover your gifts and get into the flow of Happy Money.

Everyone is born with certain gifts. Some people find them when they are young; others may need time to search. Uncovering your talents, and finding what brings you joy, is one of the most important things in life. If you are no longer burdened by the past, you will be surprised at how quickly your talents will be revealed to you. When you take an inventory of your life, all the dots begin to connect. Getting into a state of flow will become second nature. Difficulty and struggles will transform into fun and adventure right before your eyes. When you start sharing your gifts with the world, you kick-start the flow of Happy Money. Knowing who you are and where you feel most alive is what creates the groundwork for trust, because you have nothing to hide from.

The more you develop your gifts and the more you share your gifts, the more Happy Money you will attract. People who are successful in all kinds of fields credit their success to a love for what they do.

4. Trust Life

Trust is a major part of a happy state of being. Once you can truly trust in yourself and in those around you, life gets so much easier. Those everyday anxieties about the future begin to fade away. When everyone is looking out for each other with hearts and minds of abundance, we all become free to share and receive all the great things that money can do. There is no fear of what might happen in the future, because we know that we can count on people, and they can count on us.

Trust and fear cannot coexist. It is one or the other. Trust makes us more active, creative, and free, whereas fear stifles our actions, counters our intentions, and creates resentment. When we trust, we are free from expectations. Risk no longer feels like risk. Almost all the things that we worried would turn out terribly actually turn out to be some of the most positive things in our lives. The “bad” things that have happened to us end up working in our favor.

We know that everything that happens, positive or negative, will end up working out to support our lives in its own unique way. This is what frees us from the paralyzing anxiety of judging things in our lives as “good” and “bad.” That is why trusting people are more passionate and successful.

When we trust, we are able to become our authentic selves.

5. Say arigato all the time.

A world of Happy Money looks like a world in which everyone is continually expressing a deep appreciation for the energy that flows through their lives. A willingness to give and receive, rather than keep a tight clutch on what we have, is what creates the conditions for Happy Money. The positive energy of gratitude works for us and invites more money into our lives.

There are two kinds of people: those who are outwardly appreciative and those who always find something to blame or complain about. Which do you think is a more magnetic personality?

People who appreciate life are more liked, more approachable, and more attractive. As a result, they invite all kinds of opportunities into their lives.

We know that there will be times when things don’t go exactly as we planned. But a heart that says arigato in the face of it all gives us an inner resolve that navigates us right through all kinds of rough waters.

So take every chance you get to show your gratitude. Show appreciation for yourself. If you live in the flow of gratitude, your life will be full of unexpected miracles. When we are in this kind of flow with our inner self, and with those around us, we live with Happy Money!

You’ve been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, or maybe your loved one has. And you’re wondering, what’s the best treatment? What actually works? What the heck do I do?

Because bipolar disorder is a chronic, complex condition, managing it can feel overwhelming and downright confusing. But thankfully there are effective, research-based treatments that really work.

Medication is the mainstay of treatment. However, the best way to treat bipolar disorder is with a comprehensive approach, which includes “ongoing psychosocial interventions to help maintain health and to respond to breakthrough symptoms when they occur,” according to Candida Fink, MD, a board-certified child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist with a private practice in Westchester, N.Y.

She noted that bipolar disorder is often thought of as a “kind of monolithic entity.” But “bipolar disorder comes in a range of severity and symptom patterns. Different people will respond to different treatments—both medical and psychosocial.”

Finding the right treatment for each person takes time, consistent effort, and good communication with their treatment team, said Dr. Fink, co-author of several books on bipolar disorder. (This treatment team typically consists of a psychiatrist and a therapist.)

But again, the great news is that successful treatments are available. Alisha L. Brosse, Ph.D, a clinical psychologist and director of the Robert D. Sutherland Center for the Evaluation & Treatment of Bipolar Disorder, noted that these science-backed treatments have a lot in common. For instance, they include psychoeducation (educating the person and their loved ones about bipolar disorder), along with “some suggestions for behaviors that can help stabilize mood—like limiting mood-altering substances, and keeping a regular sleep-wake cycle and daily routine.”

Below, you’ll learn about these treatments, along with how you can get help and what strategies you can try on your own.

Evidence-Based Psychotherapy

“One of the best ways to understand what scientific evidence is telling us about the most effective treatments for a condition is to examine international treatment guidelines,” said Erin E. Michalak, Ph.D, a professor of psychiatry at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, and founder and director of CREST.BD, a multidisciplinary collaborative network of researchers, healthcare providers, people living with bipolar disorder, their family members, and supporters.

In 2018, the Canadian Network for Mood and Anxiety Treatments (CANMAT) and International Society for Bipolar Disorders (ISBD) published these guidelines for treating patients with bipolar disorder.

According to the guidelines, the first-line treatment is psychoeducation, which is provided either individually or in a group setting. Michalak noted that psychoeducation typically includes educating the person with bipolar disorder and/or their family about the nature of the illness, its treatments, and key coping strategies.

The second-line treatment is either cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) or family-focused therapy (FFT). Both treatments are used as maintenance therapies, and may be helpful for people who are currently depressed.

Brosse, who has a private practice in Boulder, Colo., noted that how CBT is conducted will depend on different variables, such as your goals, current mood state and functioning, and knowledge of bipolar disorder (or lack thereof). Generally, CBT focuses on helping individuals learn practical skills and strategies to decrease symptoms, improve social, academic, and occupational functioning, and improve quality of life, she said.

Brosse noted that in FFT, loved ones learn how bipolar disorder manifests in their family member, which “often results in more open and productive conversations about bipolar disorder, and more accurate attributions. For example, family members may be less likely to over attribute something to bipolar disorder (e.g., “You seem happy, you must be manic!”), and less likely to attack a person’s character (e.g., “You’re lazy”) when the person is actually depressed.”

FFT also includes helping families develop a concrete relapse prevention plan, and improve communication and problem-solving skills, which are especially vital during a mood episode or after a recent one, Brosse said.

Interpersonal and Social Rhythm Therapy (IPSRT) is recommended as a third-line treatment and also might be helpful for depressive episodes, Michalak said. IPSRT was specifically developed to treat bipolar disorder. According to Fink, “IPSRT is a variation on…interpersonal therapy, which focuses on the work of grieving for the loss of the ‘healthy self,’ and then it integrates the role of interpersonal conflict and events as risks or protective factors for mood episodes.” The primary goal, she said, is to maintain routines and rhythms in your daily life and interactions with others.

In addition, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) has shown some benefits in reducing depressive and anxiety symptoms in bipolar disorder, Fink said. Also, “while not specifically identified as effective in bipolar disorder, dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is commonly adapted in work with those living with bipolar disorder because of the support it provides for both mood regulation and interpersonal effectiveness.”

Substance use disorders also commonly co-occur with bipolar disorder, so it’s vital to treat these conditions, along with any medical conditions, Fink added.

Importantly, these treatments are in addition to taking medication, and there’s currently no therapy that helps with mania, Michalak said.

How to Find Professional Help

To find a therapist, Fink recommended starting with your primary care provider, a local mental health association, a medical center with an outpatient psychiatry department, or an organization such as the Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA) or National Alliance on Mental Health (NAMI). If you have insurance, Fink also noted that it’s important to ask your insurance company about coverage and providers.

Because finding therapists who specialize in the above treatments can be tough, Brosse recommended asking therapists these questions: “Can you tell me about your experience treating people with bipolar disorder? I’m looking for a therapist who can help me learn all the ins-and-outs of my bipolar disorder, and can give me specific skills to help me better manage my moods and prevent relapse. Do you work in this way?”

Finding the right therapist for you can take time. The key is to pick someone you feel comfortable with who has experience treating people with bipolar disorder. Keep in mind that it’s totally normal to work with several therapists before finding a therapist you like.

Self-Management Techniques

According to Michalak, until recently, research hadn’t focused much on self-management techniques as a complement to medication and psychotherapy. Self-management techniques are defined as: “the plans and/or routines that a person with bipolar disorder uses to promote health and quality of life,” she said.

Michalak and colleagues are conducting this kind of research—specifically focusing on web-based programs and applications. For instance, they’ve used some of their research findings to develop the website http://www.bdwellness.com, which features strategies to successfully manage bipolar disorder. Michalak believes that such resources are especially helpful when they’re co-designed by people with lived experience with bipolar disorder, and include social support and interaction.

Brosse also underscored that individuals with bipolar disorder can do so much in effectively managing the condition. You can start by looking for patterns around your mood episodes—and reducing your risk. For instance, you’ve realized that transitions trigger your episodes. When a transition is coming up—moving, starting a new job—you focus on “decreasing other risk factors and increasing protective factors.” Maybe, Brosse said, you see your therapist more often, return to therapy, or start therapy. Maybe you’re especially intentional with keeping a consistent sleep-wake schedule, not drinking alcohol, and taking more frequent walks.

As a whole, you might cultivate supportive relationships, eat nutrient-rich foods, and exercise, she said.

You also can use various skills, such as “opposite action,” Brosse said. For instance, when people with bipolar disorder get depressed, they tend to withdraw from others and do less. In this case, the opposite action is to “activate,” and keep social engagements on your calendar, exercise, and engage in tasks that give you a sense of accomplishment. On the other hand, during mania, the opposite action is to “de-activate,” decelerating your impulsivity and goal-directed behavior. This might look like disengaging from people and projects, sitting in silence in a dark room, and sleeping, she said.

Brosse also wanted readers to know that sometimes you can do all the right things, and a depressive, manic, or hypomanic episode still surfaces. This is when it’s critical to practice self-compassion (or have compassion for your loved one).

Be kind, patient, tender, and gentle with yourself—yes, similar to how you’d treat a friend or child. You deserve these things, even when you’re convinced you deserve the exact opposite.

Fink suggested tracking your mood (and, like Brosse above, regulating your sleep). “Apps are available for both of these and may be helpful for some people.” A favorite app of her patients’ is eMoods. She’s also recommended T2 Mood tracker, and noted that Moodtrack is a social media kind of platform that you can use only for yourself or share (by following others and having followers).

Fink emphasized the importance of speaking up with your treatment providers if something isn’t working for you. After all, “you can try other things.” Also, “sometimes, what is working at one point won’t continue to be needed, or won’t work as well— and a changing or evolving treatment plan is much more the rule than the exception.”

Ancient wisdom to “know your enemy” is good advice when dealing with a manipulator. It allows you to respond strategically. Most people react in ways that escalate abuse and/or play into the hands of the abuser to make you feel small, guilty, doubt yourself, retreat, and allow unacceptable behavior. Understanding what they’re up to empowers you.

When people behave passive-aggressively, what appears passive or defensive is covert aggression. It’s debatable to what extent their behavior is conscious or unconscious. To the victim, it doesn’t matter. The effect is the same. Being overly-empathic puts you in jeopardy of being mistreated again and again. When someone attacks you overtly or covertly, they’re being aggressive.

Psychologist George Simon argues that these covert manipulators intentionally say and do things to get what they want — for power and control. For people characterologically disturbed, such as sociopaths and narcissists and some people with borderline personality disorder, he maintains that their tactics aren’t unconscious in the way that defense mechanisms normally operate. However, their behavior is so habitual that over time it becomes reflexive. They don’t even think about it, but are still conscious of it.

Goals of a Manipulator

The goal of all manipulation is to gain influence to get our needs met, but habitual manipulators do so for power and control and use deceptive and abusive methods. Manipulators maintain domination through continuous, recurring, emotional manipulation, abuse, and coercive control. Often they’re passive-aggressive. They may lie or act caring or hurt or shocked by your complaints — all to deflect any criticism and to continue to behave in an unacceptable manner. In maintaining control to do what they wish, manipulators aim:

1. To avoid being confronted.
2. To put you on the defensive.
3. To make you doubt yourself and your perceptions.
4. To hide their aggressive intent.
5. To avoid responsibility.
6. To not have to change.

Eventually, you are victimized and can lose trust in yourself and your feelings and perceptions. Gaslighting is a treacherous, disabling form of manipulation.

Covert Manipulative Tactics

Manipulation may include overt aggression, such as criticism, narcissistic abuse, and subtle forms of emotional abuse. Favorite covert weapons of manipulators are: guilt, complaining, comparing, lying, denying, feigning ignorance or innocence (e.g.“Who me!?”), blame, bribery, undermining, mind games, assumptions, “foot-in-the-door,” reversals, emotional blackmail, evasiveness, forgetting, inattention, fake concern, sympathy, apologies, flattery, and gifts and favors. Typical tactics are described below:

Lying

Habitual liars sometimes lie when it’s unnecessary. They aren’t lying because they’re afraid and guilty, but to confuse you and do what they want. Some simultaneously put you on the defensive with accusations and other manipulative tactics.

Lying may also be indirect through vagueness and/or omission of material information though everything else said is true. For example, a cheater might say he or she was working late or at the gym, but not admit to an adulterous rendezvous.

Denial

This isn’t denial that’s unconscious, like not realizing you’re being abused, have an addiction, or are avoiding facing difficult truths. This is conscious denial to disclaim knowledge of promises, agreements, and behavior. Denial also includes minimization and rationalization or excuses. The manipulator acts as if you’re making a big deal over nothing or rationalizes and excuses his or her actions to make you doubt yourself or even to gain your sympathy.

Avoidance

Manipulators want to avoid being confronted and taking responsibility at all costs. They may avoid conversations about their behavior by simply refusing to discuss it. This might be combined with an attack, like, “You’re always nagging me,” putting you on the defensive with blame, guilt, or shame.

Avoidance can be subtle and unnoticeable when a manipulator shifts the subject. It may be camouflaged with boasting, compliments, or remarks you want to hear, like, “You know how much I care about you.” You might forget why you were upset in the first place.

Another avoidance tactic is evasiveness that blurs the facts, confuses you and plants doubt. I once went out with a man who claimed we were incompatible because I was too precise and he was a “gloss-over” kind of guy. Precisely! He felt uncomfortable when I’d ask questions or note inconsistencies in his half-truths. It became apparent that he was a skilled, manipulative liar. It’s easy to give someone the benefit of the doubt and go into denial yourself when you’re hopeful about a relationship. When you have doubts, trust them!

Blame, Guilt, and Shame

These tactics include projection, a defense where the manipulator accuses others of his or own behavior. Manipulators believe “The best defense is a good offense.” By shifting the blame, the aggrieved person is now on the defensive. The manipulator remains innocent and free to carry on, while their victims now feel guilt and shame.

Abusers are known to blame their victims or anyone else. Addicts typically blame their addiction on other people, their demanding boss or “bitchy” spouse. A criminal defendant with no defense will attack the police or their methods of collecting evidence. Rapists used to be able to attack the reputation of their victims. In a domestic violence case, the husband, who had beaten his wife, blamed her for his violence. I said to him, “I’m surprised your wife has that much power over you.” He was dumbfounded, since his whole agenda was to gain power over her.

Guilt-tripping and shaming shift the focus onto you, which weakens you while the abuser feels superior. Martyrs use guilt when they say or imply, “After all I’ve done for you…” sometimes combined with criticism that you’re selfish or ungrateful.

Shaming goes beyond guilt to make you feel inadequate. It’s demeans you as a person, your traits, or role, not just your actions. “The children would behave if they had a father who knew how to parent (or, made a decent living.)” Comparing is a subtle, but powerful form of shaming. It’s harmful when parents compare siblings with each other or with playmates. Some spouses compare their mate to their ex to have the upper hand by making their mate feel inferior.

Guilt and shaming may include “blaming the victim.” For example, you find evidence on your partner’s phone that he or she is flirting. Your partner acts outraged that you went into the phone. Now he or she has switched the focus onto you. By playing the victim, your partner avoids a confrontation about flirting, which may also be lied about, minimized, or circumvented altogether. You, the real victim, feel guilty for spying, undercutting any justified anger, and may thereby allow the flirting to continue unaddressed.

Intimidation

Intimidation isn’t always with direct threats, but can be subtle. Intimidation can be achieved with a look or tone and statements like: “I always get my way,” “No one’s irreplaceable,” “The grass isn’t any greener,” “I have methods and friends in high places,” “You’re not so young anymore,” or “Have you considered the repercussions of that decision?”

Another strategy is telling a story meant to provoke fear, such as: “She left her husband and lost her kids, their house, everything” or “I fight to win. I once almost killed a guy.”

Playing the Victim

This is distinct from blaming the victim. Rather than blame you, this “poor me” tactic arouses your guilt and sympathy so you’ll do their bidding. “I don’t know what I’ll do if you don’t help me.” More disordered personalities often threaten suicide if you leave. It can also take the form of, “You don’t care about me,” “Why do you treat me like this?” or “Nobody helps me.”

Compliance breeds your resentment, damages the relationship, and encourages continued manipulation. Guilt over someone else’s behavior or predicament is irrational guilt.

Conclusion

These tactics are destructive. Over time, you can be traumatized and your self-worth severely damaged. Awareness is the first step. You may need help to see things clearly. Write out conversations and try to identify abuse and all the tactics used. Harder still is not taking the words of the manipulator personally and learning how to respond.

©Darlene Lancer 2019

“I was caught in a whirl of racing, obsessive thoughts, which is how many people describe their bouts of mania. Instead of noticing my baby girl’s sweet scent or feeling her rose-petal soft skin, all I could think was, I must write this idea down, and this, and this…,” writes Dyane Harwood.

In her new book, Birth of a New Brain: Healing from Postpartum Bipolar Disorder, Harwood offers an unfiltered, unedited and heart-wrenching journey through postpartum bipolar disorder and reminds us all that, even in the seemingly worst circumstances, hope can remain.

Harwood’s story begins in the delivery room, a place where mania and hypomania can commonly be mistaken for the elation of bringing a new baby into the world. She writes, “During my two days at Sutter Maternity Hospital, I didn’t say a word to anyone about how I was feeling. My fear of being designated an unfit mother made me keep my disturbing thoughts to myself.”

The reality for Harwood was that at the time she gave birth, in 2007, little was known about postpartum depression, mania or bipolar disorder.

In Harwood’s case, just days after giving birth, she found herself in a state of hypergrafia, where she was writing manically. “I never knew hypergraphia existed until I experienced it firsthand. When I was hypergraphic, I wrote so much that my wrist cramped up in agonizing pain. I shook it vigorously to stop the aching, but the pain returned within seconds. I couldn’t stop writing for a moment, even when I breastfed my precious newborn or while answering the call of nature,” she writes.

As Harwood’s mania spiraled out of control, her creativity on overdrive, she wrote long into the night and, when her husband hid her computer, she began filling blank pages of a book. Finally, after being awake for several days, struggling to hide her mania from her extended family, and realizing that her newborn was underweight because she couldn’t focus long enough to breastfeed, she told her husband that she needed to go to the hospital.

Harwood’s mania, however, compounded her understanding of her diagnosis, offering a false sense of confidence and even excitement. She writes, “My mania acted as a buffer that prevented me from feeling upset. Now that I was officially diagnosed, my life made sense in an ineffable way. I felt joyful when I picked up the phone to call my father. I was, in fact, experiencing the grandiose thoughts of mania.”

The other side of bipolar is depression, and when Harwood finally came down from her mania and attempted to find relief from her depression in medication, nothing seemed to work. One pill, in fact, almost took her life.

She writes, “Two thoughts, one rational and one deadly, battled against one another in my mind: You don’t want to leave your girls — you can’t do it! I must hang myself.”

Thankfully, Harwood’s husband noticed her distress and quickly took her to the hospital. However, any relief was compounded by escalating medical bills and an uncertain future.

As Harwood’s depression continued unabated, she fell into a state of despondence, unable to work, concentrate or even try to improve her mental state.

After asking her psychiatrist about alternative medications, and hearing that it had never been effective, Harwood began researching on her own.

And she also stopped taking her medication. When she read one of her husband’s emails to his brother explaining that her mental state was deteriorating and he was contemplating separation, at first she tried to hide her fury behind a fake smile, but later exploded on him, tearing his shirt and punching him in the shoulder.

When her father died, Harwood’s depression reached new depths and after an exhaustive search for effective medication, she asked for electroconvulsive therapy.

Finally, for the first time since the birth of her second child, Harwood found a sense of hope. She writes, “ECT saved my life. The risks were completely worth it.”

However, shortly thereafter, Harwood again tried to go off her medication, this time convincing herself that she was “tapering.” When she finds herself depressed during what should have been an uplifting family vacation in Hawaii, she realized, finally, that she must take medication — and also, accept responsibility for her mental health.

She writes, “On certain days I’m exhausted physically, mentally, or both, and I want to crawl into my bed and hide. But if I stick to my routine, I surprise myself and find the effort is worth it. Taking care of myself is empowering, and there’s nothing indulgent or selfish about it. The more we practice self-care when life is relatively calm, the better equipped we’ll be in facing difficulties or crises when they occur.”

With sharp honesty, Birth of a New Brain presents postpartum as it is: full of starts and stops, missteps, false hope, staggering depression, and finally, acceptance that healing begins from within — with a commitment to maintain a consistent routine of self-care.

Birth of a New Brain: Healing from Postpartum Bipolar Disorder
Post Hill Press, October 2017
Softcover, 208 Pages

The age of the happy, accomplished, unapologetic single person has arrived. Happy Singlehood: The Rising Acceptance and Celebration of Solo Living, by Hebrew University sociologist Elyakim Kislev, is here to herald it.

There is no place for pity in Happy Singlehood. Kislev shows that single people are, on the whole, already doing well. They do not need to desperately seek coupledom to improve their lot in life. The kinds of questions we need to ask about single people, Kislev believes, include: What are they doing right? How can they do even better? And what can other people learn from them?

To answer those kinds of questions, Kislev analyzed data from hundreds of thousands of people from more than thirty nations. He also scrutinized more than 400 blog posts, more than 300 magazine and newspaper articles, and thousands of comments on Facebook posts about single life. He did interviews, too, of 142 single people from the U.S. and various European nations.

Happy Singlehood, published by the University of California Press, was deeply researched and sourced, boasting an astounding 63 pages of notes and references at the end. It is a treasure trove for any scholars interested in developing expertise in the study of single people.

The book, though, is not just for academic types. Anyone interested in a smart, thoughtful, unconventional take on single life will find a lot to like in Happy Singlehood. Kislev treats readers to the kinds of approaches we have come to expect from the most successful nonfiction trade books, including, for example, illustrating his points with stories from the single people he interviewed as well as anecdotes from his own life.

Overwhelmingly, books about single life are written by and about women. They are also very disproportionately about singlehood in the U.S., and maybe a few other Western nations. Happy Singlehood adds some much-welcome balance. It is written by a single man, it is about single men as well as single women, and, in more than just a token way, it is international in its scope.

Happy Singlehood is one of the most recent in a growing list of books about single life. This surge of interest has at least one obvious motivator — the rise in the number of people living single. Kislev notes that this is happening even in conservative societies: “Almost everywhere, it seems, the number of people delaying marriage, living alone, or choosing to be single is on the rise.”

In the first chapter beyond the introduction, “The Age of Singlehood,” Kislev describes eight major mechanisms accounting for the declining status of marriage: demographic changes; changes in women’s roles; risk aversion in the age of divorce; economics, consumerism, and capitalism; shifts in religiosity; popular culture and the media; urbanization; and immigration. Lots of authors have speculated about the changing role of marriage, but aside from books devoted entirely to that topic, this is the most comprehensive discussion I’ve seen.

Kislev argues that the eight forces “act simultaneously, making the rise in singlehood a real and sustainable trend, perhaps even unstoppable.”  They are, he adds, “so powerful that it seems time for us to face reality, embrace the trend, and start paving the way to an age of happy singlehood.”

When I first skimmed the table of contents, I was surprised that the chapter on older singles, “Happy Singlehood in Old Age,” was upfront — the second chapter in the book. Shouldn’t it come toward the end? Kislev explains that one of the most powerful reasons for marrying is “the fear of aging alone and dying without anyone at our bedside.” That fear, then, had to be addressed early on. And wow, did Kislev ever address it. By the end of the chapter, readers may end up feeling a wee bit sorry for those married people: “Not only do married people feel lonely in surprisingly high numbers, but also long-term singles are often better equipped to deal with loneliness in later life.” His explanations for why lifelong single people are, in some ways, in a better position in old age are among the true delights of the book.

Among pundits and even some scholars, there has been quite a bit of hand-wringing about the rise of individualistic values. Their concern is that the valuing of freedom, creativity, fun, and trying new things is fraying social bonds and making people miserable. Single people get targeted for much of the blame. Kislev shows that they are right in one way — people who are not married embrace those values more than married people do. But they are exactly wrong about the misery. People who care more about individualistic values — whether single or married — are happier. Unmarried people, though, get even more happiness out of those values.

The pearl-clutchers are also wrong in seeing single people as isolated and alone. Kislev’s analyses of the data from the hundreds of thousands of European adults showed that lifelong single people are the most social – they have the most interactions with friends and family. Married people are the least social, with the previously married, as well as cohabiters, in between.

Typically, people who spend more time with their friends and relatives, whether single or married, are happier. Feeling optimistic, positive about yourself and your job, and feeling accomplished and valued are also correlated with happiness. Again, it is the single people who squeeze more happiness out of all of these experiences.

As affirming and positive as Happy Singlehood is, it does not deny singlism. Kislev devotes a chapter to the stereotyping, stigmatizing, and marginalizing of single people, and the discrimination against them. The title of that chapter is “Defying Social Pressure.” In it, he explains how that is done.

In the U.S., marriage is not just valued, it is actively promoted. As explained in a new report by the Family Story think tank, “The case against marriage fundamentalism: Embracing family justice for all,” conservative foundations have funded wide-ranging projects to privilege marriage and nuclear families over other ways of living. They even succeeded in getting more than a billion dollars moved from federal programs that ensured a minimum standard of living for low-income children into programs to promote marriage among adults. No such programs to teach the value of single life have ever been funded or even proposed.

Kislev argues for changing that, and not just in the U.S.: “Given that a quarter of today’s children will never marry, and that 40 to 50 percent of those who do will divorce, it is essential to equip children with a social and psychological ‘toolbox’ that will enable them to be happy singles. Learning about singleness in schools and supporting high-quality solo lifestyles through the health and welfare ministries, exactly as is done with family life, are essential to our society.”

Others need to do their part, too, Kislev maintains. Policy makers, social institutions, academic institutions, urban planners, and municipalities all need to re-orient in ways that acknowledge and support the rise of single people.

Happy Singlehood will not be the last iteration in the evolution of books about single people. There is room to do even better. For example, although Kislev is mostly good at avoiding the usual mythology about marriage, he sometimes slips, as, for example, when he says that “there is evidence to suggest that married people…benefit from improved levels of mental and physical health.” He cites a number of references, dating back to 1983, but not the many recent, sophisticated studies that counter those claims.

Here and there, Kislev seems oblivious to the single people who are on the cutting edge of embracing single life. For example, he says that “happy older singles are those who can come to terms with not having followed the traditional family path.” But some single people have nothing to come to terms with — they are unbothered by their unconventionality, or even proud of it.

Kislev has quite a lot to say about the importance to single people’s happiness of spending time with other people. That’s where his data have led him. But future writings, I trust, will have more to say about those single people who derive meaning and sustenance from the time they spend alone.

All told, Happy Singlehood is an extraordinarily important contribution to our understanding of single people. It will remain a touchstone for years to come.

Happy Singlehood: The Rising Acceptance and Celebration of Solo Living
University of California Press, February 2019
Paperback, 266 pages

Stoicism, according to Donald Robertson, is experiencing a resurgence. As we come to realize that not only does this philosophical approach to life offer a greater connection to our virtues and values, we also become aware that some problems have deeper roots that modern therapeutic solutions will allow.

Robertson writes, “Techniques and concepts from CBT have been adapted for use in resilience-building, to reduce the risk of developing serious emotional problems in the future. However, I believe that, for many people, a combination of Stoic philosophy and CBT may be even better suited for use as a long-term preventative approach.”

In his new book, How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius, Robertson shows us how, in thinking like a Stoic, we can better face adversity, overcome conflict within ourselves, endure pain and illness, contain our desires, and find true joy and happiness.

While some philosophies adhere to strict rules and practices, such as doing away with “external goods,” the true measure of a philosophy is how it affects our character.

Robertson writes, “He (Marcus) repeatedly warned himself not to become too distracted with reading too many books — thus wasting time on trifling issues in logic and metaphysics — but instead to remain focused on the practical goal of living wisely.”

One similarity Robertson draws between CBT and Stoicism is their paradoxical nature. Often, what could conceivably be construed as bad fortune turns out to be the best thing that ever happened.

Robertson explains, “What the Cynics meant was that our character is the only thing that ultimately matters and that wisdom consists in learning to view everything else in life as utterly worthless by comparison.”

Living wisely comes from protecting one of our most sacred abilities — to think rationally and apply reason. By living in agreement with nature, accepting the natural course of life and death, and practicing the cardinal values — wisdom, justice, courage, and moderation — we flourish as human beings.

Robertson uses the experience of being in a boat in the open water caught in a storm to describe how, according to Stoicism, there are two stages of any response to such events. In the first stage, we, much like animals do, become startled and frightened in a way that is involuntary. In the second stage, however, we add voluntary judgements to our automatic reactions.

Robertson writes, “Epictetus says the Stoic should neither assent to nor confirm these emerging impressions, such as anxiety in the face of danger. Rather, he rejects them as misleading, views them with studied indifference, and lets go of them.”

One step we can take toward separating ourselves from our emotional reactions, notes Robertson, is to begin deliberately describing events more objectively and in less emotional terms.

In CBT terms this is known as “decatastrophizing,” or representing events without emotive language, strong value judgements, and unrealistic assumptions.

“Normally, once you’ve arrived at a more realistic description of a feared situation, you will consider ways that you could potentially cope and get through it,” writes Robertson.

Following our virtues also comes from daily practice. When we can list the values that are important to us, and identify them in mentors, it becomes much easier to visualize and embody them within ourselves.

One question Robertson suggests we ask ourselves: What qualities might we hope to possess in the distant future?

Overcoming desires, for example, begins with first evaluating the consequences of our habits, spotting early warning signs, separating our impressions from external reality, doing something else, such as practicing healthy activities, contemplating qualities we admire in others, and cultivating gratitude.

Robertson writes, “Some philosophers, as we’ve seen, claim that the mere act of exercising moderation could become more gratifying itself than indulging in bad habits.”

On coping with challenging situations and pain itself, Robertson suggests employing the philosophy of Aurelius, and focusing on the limits of the pain, as opposed to the inability to cope with it. He offers the following quote from The Meditations, “On pain: if it is unbearable, it carries us off, if it persists, it can be endured.”

Our bodies may fail us. We may have pain. We may encounter obstacles that seem insurmountable. However, our intellects are our own to cultivate, to adapt, and use to respond. And when we sever our attachments to external things, to painful pasts and unrealized futures, we find that we are free to invest fully in fulfilling our own nature — and our own happiness.

Bridging timeless wisdom with modern day application, How to Think Like a Roman Emperor is an invaluable guide for anyone seeking a more fulfilling, purposeful, and happy life.

How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius
St. Martin’s Press, April 2019
Paperback, 304 pages

Hard to Love: Essays and Confessions is Briallen Hopper’s deep, thoughtful, moving, and beautifully written book on relationships. It is unlike anything else out there and perfectly in keeping with how we actually live in the twenty-first century.

In the U.S. and other countries around the world, rates of marriage have been declining for decades. Even people who do marry typically spend many years of their adult lives unmarried. Research has shown that, contrary to the stereotype of the isolated and lonely single person, people who are not married are, on the average, more connected to their friends, relatives, neighbors, and coworkers. They make the effort to stay in touch, exchange help, and be there when needed.

And yet, at a time when people such as friends, relatives, and mentors are so often at the center of so many of our lives, books about relationships are overwhelmingly about romantic relationships and marriage. Hard to Love is that rare and priceless collection in which the neglected pantheon of personal relationships gets the attention and respect it deserves.

I don’t think Briallen Hopper imagined writing a book like this when she was younger and believed with all her heart that romantic relationships are more important than every other kind of relationship and should be prioritized. (In the jargon, that’s called “amatonormativity.”) Describing how she felt when she was suddenly single after six years of romantic coupling, she said, “I honestly believed that as far as I was concerned, all joy in life was gone.”

Faced with the option of seeking the next romantic partner or refashioning herself as a self-reliant single person, she chose door number three — a way of living single based on “powerful forms of female love, friendship, commitment, and community.”

Across twenty-one essays, the 30-something year-old Hopper shows us the joys, complexities, depths, and meaningfulness of her spinster life. (I don’t use “spinster” as a pejorative and neither does she.) She had great material to work with. She and her brother and four sisters were “homeschooled children of religious hippies” in Tacoma, Washington. She dropped out of high school twice before finishing. Getting a PhD in American literature from Princeton should have set her on a sure path to success, but she couldn’t get a job. She enrolled in divinity school. Now she is a college professor teaching creative nonfiction.

Emily Nussbaum, the Pulitzer Prize winning television critic for the New Yorker, puts together delicious end-of-year reviews of the year’s best TV shows. Her article might start with, “the best show this year was “Fleabag.”” But then, a few sentences later, she says that “The People v. O. J. Simpson” is “the year’s best show.” Then, in the next paragraph, it is “The Americans” that is “this year’s best television show.” And so on.

That’s how I felt about the essays in Hard to Love. My favorite essay was “Hoarding,” about Hopper’s friendship with Cathy. They had “fallen into instant friendship” and “took an idyllic trip to Positano.” For a long time, she said, their friendship “kept that honeymoon quality.” Years later, when Hopper was a “single, childless, broke divinity student” and Cathy was a tenure-track professor, living with her husband and child, Hopper moved into one of the four bedrooms of Cathy’s home. It was a disaster. Hopper moved out. Six years later, they finally had a wrenching discussion of what transpired during that trying time — while “holding hands and crying in public,” in a coffee shop. Now they are “truly and unequivocally family again, taking care of each other with joy.”

My favorite essay in Hard to Love was “Dear Octopus,” about Hopper’s relationship with her brother. They grew up fighting as kids, then grew close enough for Hopper to say, “I hated high school and had few friends, but I didn’t need them; I had him.” Later, though, their relationship became strained when Hopper dated an atheist, then went to a divinity school he deemed too liberal. There were “times when he kept reaching out to try to bring me back in… Until, at last, he stopped trying.”

My favorite essay in Hard to Love was “Coasting,” in which Hopper’s friend Ash, in treatment for Stage IV cancer, was cared for by Hopper and three other friends of Ash’s. Not all four women on the care team knew each other at the outset, but “strong structures of friendship… arose in response to the crisis.” Ash is still alive.

And so on.

It is evident from the very first essay that Hard to Love is going to offer something special — the unexpected. In “Lean On,” Hopper skewers the American celebration of rugged individualism, calling self-reliance “less a virtue than a myth.” The subtitle of the essay is, “A Declaration of Dependence,” and it is a declaration that is proud and unapologetic.

Pundits and even scholars are making names for themselves by castigating college students as “snowflakes” who are needlessly coddled. In “Tending My Oven,” Hopper boasts of coddling her students with homemade cupcakes as they “dared to demand justice and respect [in their] March of Resilience.”

We all know we are supposed to yearn for quality time with the important people in our lives. But a brilliant essay on Cheers is about what the opposite can add up to: “For eleven long years, the friends at Cheers continue to age alongside their audience, which gives their relationship with one another and with us the weight of duration, and the irreplaceable intimacy that comes with low-quality, high quantity time.”

And so on.

Only one of the essays disappointed me. “How to Be Single,” intended as an amusing take on the matter, was fine, but it could have been written by a less talented author. Variations of it already have been.

Hard to Love joins the growing collection of contemporary memoirs and other nonfiction books on single life. Briallen Hopper’s contribution is in a class of its own, and not just because of the rightful recognition it affords to all the kinds of people who matter to us other than romantic partners. It is a book that compellingly illustrates some of the most important lessons of the science of single life but does so without any nods to research.

Unlike books such as Elyakim Kislev’s Happy Singlehood: The Rising Acceptance and Celebration of Solo Living, Eric Klinenberg’s Going Solo: The Extraordinary Rise and Surprising Appeal of Living Alone, or my own Singled Out: How Singles Are Stereotyped, Stigmatized, and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After, in which arguments are built upon reams of data, Hopper makes her case with the stories of her life. Unlike other essays and memoirs by single women, Hard to Love includes no love letters to the joy of living alone or pursuing great solo adventures. Hopper prefers to live with other people and pursue her adventures with others, too. Hard to Love also stands out for its incisive analyses of literature and pop culture; just about every essay has something wise to say about a book, movie, TV show, or other cultural artifact.

Days after reading Hard to Love and thinking a lot about it, I couldn’t figure out the title. I realized it could have multiple meanings but kept focusing on the possible self-referential one and how profoundly wrong it seemed. Briallen Hopper struck me as a person who is easy to love. Finally, I asked her about the title (without revealing any of my own thoughts) and she graciously responded:

“I chose the phrase Hard to Love because I wanted to celebrate and delve into the difficulty of love. People are hard to love, and love is hard to do. That’s a universal truth. As the Supremes say, love don’t come easy! But beyond that, in a more meta way, some forms of love get less love than others, and I wanted to set aside the easier-to-love forms of romance and marriage in order to pay attention to relatively unglamorous relationships between friends, roommates, caregivers, and distant siblings.”

Hard to Love is easy to love. With it, friends, roommates, caregivers, and distant siblings are easier to love, too.

Hard to Love: Essays and Confessions
Bloomsbury Publishing, February 2019
Hardcover, 325 pages

A trip down a bookstore aisle will reveal that there are as many different approaches to parenting as there are books to choose from. For every approach, there is an expert and a book to go along with it. In this modern age, there is probably a blog, too. The common theme between all these books is a problem to fix, a habit to address, or an issue to figure out.

Then there is Differently Wired: Raising an Exceptional Child in a Conventional World, a book as differently wired as the children it refers to.

While it will be on the same shelf as a book about dealing with a “problem child,” Differently Wired isn’t a book about problem children — it’s about exceptional children, the ones wired a little differently than the rest, and how to raise them well. This distinction is more than semantics. It provides a core basis for a book that, in this reviewer’s opinion, has the potential to empower a very stifled, frustrated group of parents and their exceptional kids.

Author Deborah Reber pulls on her real life experience as a mom of her own exceptional child and as founder of TiLT Parenting to open a dialogue with readers about “differently wired” child — the one with ADHD, autism, giftedness, anxiety, and more. In a refreshing, down-to-earth, and highly researched approach, Reber’s book is the equivalent of a long coffee chat with a box of tissues, encouragement, and useful tools for parents who are at their wit’s end. As Reber puts it, “The stigmas of raising different kids drive us underground to suffer in secrecy.”

It is this suffering in secret that Differently Wired seeks to end, evidenced early on by Reber’s commitment to not only providing a dialogue, but also solutions, tools and support. “Raising different kids in a parenting culture that thrives on sameness and conformity doesn’t leave room for us to openly share the reality of our experience,” Reber says before sharing the journey with her son, Asher, that brought her to this place of redefinition. From this place, she shifted her perspective, or as she put it “tilted,” and leaned into raising an exceptional child rather than a special needs one.

The book is broken down between the establishing of context and their family’s story and what Reber calls the 18 Tilts, a section aptly entitled “How Everything Can Change.” If the first section draws in the reader and creates a shared foundation of experience, this second section provides the meat and the resources that so many in this position are seeking.

While tinted with some classic self-help verbiage, e.g., “Let Go of What Others Think” and “Show Up and Live in the Present,” these Tilt steps are far from mere platitudes and affirmations. The steps given are a deviation from the standard parenting lines, including the straightforward “Question Everything You Thought You Knew About Parenting” and “Stop Fighting What Your Child Is and Lean In.” These chapters are equal parts encouragement and empowerment, putting the child back at the forefront rather than the at the center of challenges.

Tilt 11, “Let Go of Your Impossible Expectations for Who You ‘Should’ Be as a Parent,” could very well be an entire parenting seminar in and of itself, exceptional children aside. Reber’s own experiences have produced a commitment to authentic, shame-free parenting with an acceptance of limitation rather than a resenting of it. Each Tilt could be studied on its own, but when applied in tandem with the others, this is a fully loaded weapon against the isolation, stress, shame, depression, frustration, and discouragement that so often characterizes the homes of these exceptional kids.

As the aunt and guardian of a gifted child, the Tilt steps alone are enough to make a parent or caretaker exhale in relief. Reber has masterfully provided the real, functional steps to raise an exceptional child in a world and parenting culture that makes it more of a challenge than it should be. While the content itself is exceptionally well put together, supported by personal story and widely applicable across a wide variety of situations, Reber herself is a treasure. Her voice as a mother and her voice as an expert on the topic blends beautifully in such a way that I wanted to keep reading, keep understanding, and keep engaging with her and her experience. This particular voice keeps this book out of the self-help realm and moves it to the self-empowerment realm, leaving the reader feeling like they are enough, not by changing who they are, but by leaning in to their own reality, their own homes, and their own precious little ones.

Differently Wired is just the right mix of truth, story, honesty, grit, and resource to be a quiet but profound gamechanger for exceptional parents raising exceptional children in this modern world, and I couldn’t recommend it more.

Differently Wired: Raising an Exceptional Child in a Conventional World
Workman Publishing
Hardcover, 278 pages

The premise of Charlize Theron and Seth Rogen’s new movie Long Shot is a simple one: the beautiful, successful person is romantically out of reach for the average, less than polished person who does not look like he has a personal stylist. Or is he? You’ll have to watch the movie to find out.

For years, I’ve been fascinated by the idea of leagues, as in, “she/he is out of your league.” Do we really mean that people are sorted into groups and that they can only be romantically connected within those groups? Are there really boundaries that manage our most intimate relationships? Sometimes it seems so, doesn’t it?

Still, ‘Long Shot’ is the latest in a genre of movie that asks the question: what if the normal guy got the girl? (Also popular is the movie about an average girl who gets to marry a prince, usually after a makeover). It’s worth examining the gender differences in these types of movies a bit. While Seth Rogen’s character might be a little grating (and I definitely was rooting for him to change out of his windbreaker), he doesn’t go through a metamorphosis. He changes the way normal people do in healthy relationships—he is still himself, but he makes the occasional compromise. When asked to go through the sort of life-changing protocol that would be expected of any woman choosing to date someone with extreme visibility, he refuses. I’m sure you can think of many examples of movie plots centered around lessons women take to learn to comport themselves according to the stations they aspire to. Rogen is definitely not wearing books on his head to walk, or learning to wave appropriately.

But these are movies, what about real life? For most of us, looking for love isn’t focused on status, right? We meet someone, we decide we like them, or not, and that’s how it goes. Or so we might think. Let me ask you this: when was the last time you wondered if the person you were messaging with might be disappointed meeting you in person? Have you ever avoided someone’s profile because you thought they were too attractive, or because of what they did for a living? Have you ever ruled someone out because you didn’t think they’d fit into your life?

There are good reasons to be thoughtful when it comes to thinking about who you are going to date. There’s nothing wrong with thinking through how someone will mesh with your routine, your family, your life goals, but there is something to be said for paying attention to other important things, like how you feel around that person, whether or not you can be yourself with them, and your level of respect for how they live their life.

For some people, the “long shot” might be someone they thing is very attractive, or very powerful (or both, as in the movie) but your long shot might be different. It’s worth asking yourself why you consider them “out of your league” just as it’s worth asking why you might consider yourself out of someone else’s league. You might be selling yourself short.

But it’s not a happy ending if you end up with someone you’re not convinced is right for you but that you “landed.” It’s not a happy ending if you have to walk on eggshells around that person, hoping they won’t see who you really are and leave. A romantic happy ending is about fully inhabiting yourself and being that person unapologetically and allowing that person to be the one who attracts someone else. You don’t need to learn how to cross your ankles or pick out the right clothes or speak a certain way so that whatever unattainable person will wake up and love you. The right person doesn’t need you to go to charm school in order to want you in their life.

I think we like movies like ‘Long Shot’ because they show us that regular people can find a happiness that they thought was out of reach. I liked it because it showed that even though Theron’s character seemed very cool, aloof, and out of Rogen’s league, it turns out that she was a regular person, too. She was funny and vulnerable and had needs and hopes and dreams. Both she and Rogen’s character were looking for the same thing. Meeting each other gave them the opportunity to explore whether it was something they could find together.

So let’s dispense with the leagues and the long shots and just think about individuals. Each person you meet is a person, just as you are, with feelings, hopes, dreams, a life. Just because you don’t choose to be with all of those people, doesn’t mean they are out of your league, or you theirs. Choosing to be with someone, or not, isn’t about categories, it’s about making choices about who you want to spend your life with, even if just for a while.

Cara Strickland writes about food and drink, mental health, faith and being single from her home in the Pacific Northwest. She enjoys hot tea, good wine, and deep conversations. She will always want to play with your dog. Connect with her on Twitter @anxiouscook.

Image courtesy: Lionsgate

The post On ‘Long Shot’, Leagues, and Who We’re Allowed to Date appeared first on eharmony Advice.

In her wedding vows for her second (or maybe third) marriage, my sister said, “…as long as this lasts” instead of “’til death do us part.” Was it wry and dark humor, or a pretty accurate reflection of how modern relationships play out? The American Psychological Associates notes that, in Western cultures, 90% of people marry by age 50, and 40-50% of those couples divorce. Divorce rates are even higher for subsequent marriages. Perhaps my sister’s vow reflected her own personal experience as well as an understanding of the landscape of our times.

In Love between Equals, Dr. Young-Eisendrath brings her professional background as a psychoanalyst and psychologist with decades of experience offering couples therapy, her own life experiences, and her lifelong devotion to Buddhist dharma to bear on how we define love, how to sustain a relationship after the first flush by understanding what relationship means, and developing love as a spiritual practice. She notes that modern marriage has come to mean wanting a partner who “gets” you and who affirms you, which has a perfectly ordinary consequence of feeling like you are being untrue to yourself when or if the marriage becomes unhappy. How often I have heard a friend or loved one specifically say that their partner “gets” them; now when I hear that, I will have a deeper understanding when I walk with them as their relationship develops.

One twinned pleasure of this book is the wide range of sources Dr. Young-Eisendrath brings into the conversation, and how well and accessibly she writes. Whether she is reflecting on Carol Tavris’ classic work on anger, Jung’s analysis of one’s inner dialogue around self and other, the Buddhist understanding of dukkha, or experiences drawn from her personal experience or clinical practice, the material flows seamlessly and the reader has everything she needs to follow along.

The book begins with an exploration of personal love (Ch1), then moves to falling in love and taking it personally (Ch2), trusting in your relationship (Ch3), dialogue (Ch4), the streets of love (Ch5), true love as a spiritual practice (Ch6) and finally family, friends, and marriage in the 21^st century (Ch7). You could drop into a chapter for itself, but starting with a first read from beginning to end will give you a clear and integrated understanding of what Dr. Young-Eisendrath means by “love between equals.” In fact, one strength of the book for me was the way she frequently circled back to earlier material in order to present as clear and cohesive a view as possible.

In-depth and narrative in focus, this book is definitely not an exercise-based workbook, but the author writes in such a clear and organized way, she is able to walk you through a great many topics so you can deepen your understanding and practice. For example, in the chapter on dialogue, she discusses four skills to learn and practice: speaking for yourself, paraphrasing, being curious and asking questions, and responding. She then explores each skill in depth and tugs at it from all directions, leaving you with a clear understanding of what the skill does and does not mean.

For example, speaking for yourself means using ‘I’ statements. This does not mean “I just feel like you are a jerk,” but it does mean something more along the lines of “I am very sad that I didn’t hear anything from you about our wedding anniversary.” The first is an attack, even under the guise of “I” expressing a feeling, and the second clearly expresses a feeling, the context for the feeling, and leaves space for a conversation. The first turns the relationship partner into an object, and the second opens the door to a deeper understanding of the other and the connection between.

This is a book to take your time with, to reflect on, and to use as a springboard to developing your own relationships as a spiritual practice. I will read it a second time at a slower pace so I can apply the material to my own life and relationships, and practice the wide range of approaches she describes. As I read, I thought frequently of the way Fred Rogers described love: “Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. … To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.” This book will be ideal for anyone entering a serious relationship, those whose relationships are not what they long for, and for those already in long-term, committed relationships who want to deepen and mature their understanding of their loved one, themselves, and the connection they hold dear.

Love between Equals: Relationships as a Spiritual Path
Shambhala, January 2019
Paperback, 240 pages

In eleven chapters and a preface, this large-format book presents a thoughtful exploration and dozens of exercises to help the reader develop approaches and techniques to find happiness. Throughout, Dr. Paquette presents the research underlying our current understanding of the elements of happiness in a clear and easily understood way.

From the outset, this workbook announces itself as an engagement for the reader to define his or her own specific and personal ways to find happiness, purpose, and productivity in work and life. Even in the preface, there are eight opportunities for the reader to engage with the material by writing their own experiences and definitions, including what the word happiness means to them and what roadblocks to happiness they personally experience.

The exercises in each chapter (five to seven per chapter) follow a standard presentation throughout the book: each exercise lists the duration (e.g., 5-10 minutes), the frequency (e.g., once, daily) and the level of difficulty (easy to moderate to difficult). They begin with an overview of the practice, followed by instructions to guide you in putting the new technique into use. Each exercise is followed by a section titled How and Why it Works (always interesting to learn!), and then a note section for your own reflection on that exercise.

Readers can write in the book itself, as plenty of space is set aside for personal responses. The broad topics covered are gratitude, kindness and compassion, mindfulness, self-compassion, connection, optimism, forgiveness, cultivating strengths, savoring the good, and health and happiness. If you have done much reading (or self-reflection) on happiness, these will be familiar landmarks.

Chapter 5, Self-Compassion, opens with two quotes, one by Jack Kornfield (“If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete”) and one by Lucille Ball. The presentation of this material focuses on the work of Dr. Kristin Neff, one of the world’s foremost experts on self-compassion, and introduces the reader to what is meant by self-compassion, reasons to practice self-compassion (psychological, health, and interpersonal benefits), and a brief discussion of brain responses to the practice of self-compassion.

If you’ve struggled with offering yourself compassion, you may know these things but still find it hard not to be hard on yourself. The exercises take you head-on into an exploration of your own thoughts and experiences in six focused exercises: a letter of self-compassion (repeat monthly or as needed); self-compassion break (daily or as needed); loving-kindness meditation (daily or as needed); seeing the double standard (weekly); self-appreciation (weekly or as needed); and self-criticism vs self-compassion (weekly).

By noting the frequency of each exercise, I see my own practice developing, and by writing very personally about my own experiences and struggles on this topic — in an ongoing, reflective way — it’s easy to imagine that my difficulties with self-compassion will release their grip. I found the presentation of each exercise to be compassionate and inviting, important because a lack of self-compassion is already critical, and the exercises themselves focus on the elements that personally challenge me. Even just working through them once to prepare this review helped me think more clearly about why this is so hard for me.

Readers who use this book in greater depth over a sustained length of time will add to their own toolboxes of personal understanding and techniques to help them find more happiness. Even if you feel like you’ve heard all there is to say about a topic — gratitude, for example — don’t neglect the chapter! You might already have some understanding of a topic and perhaps even already practice strengthening it, but the exercises are so thoughtful and practice-oriented, you’ll undoubtedly find new ways to get even better at the topic.

I am a social psychologist — the subdiscipline that includes positive psychology — and have spent a great many years thinking about this topic and seeking ways to help myself be even more resilient in this important area of my life. This workbook made me excited about ways to build and strengthen happiness as a practice. It’s easy to be happy when you’re happy, but when difficult experiences occur that could be soothed and helped by focusing on gratitude, kindness and compassion, mindfulness, self-compassion, connection, optimism, forgiveness, drawing on your strengths, and savoring the good, you will find your toolbox well stocked by working carefully through this great workbook.

I look forward to incorporating these exercises into my own daily life, and will be recommending it to anyone who thinks about happiness, explores their own happiness, needs a way to build and strengthen their responses to life, and to grumpy people.

The Happiness Toolbox
PESI Publishing, March 2018
Paperback, 214 pages

In a rare way, I am a perfect reviewer for this book, written by a psychologist in the devastated wake of (and through the long aftermath of) the suicide of her boyfriend. I, too, am a psychologist, and my father committed suicide, leaving me in the devastated wake and aftermath. Is it an important difference, the relationship to boyfriend versus father? In other words, will this book apply to all those who survive the suicide of a loved one? That’s a question you may be wondering about as you consider this book.

This deeply personal book is organized in three large sections, reflecting a path through the pain and toward healing: despair, shifting, and beauty. Each section presents the correspondence the author wrote to John, her boyfriend, almost entirely after he died, and is concluded by material Dr. Neustadter refers to as a map:  helpful and practical tools and advice to consider and practice as you are in each stage of dealing with your loved one’s suicide. For many people, if not most, this material will be the primary reason to buy this book — although it is surprising how often the correspondence parts of the chapters will connect.

The first section, despair, will probably be painfully resonant for anyone who finds themselves in this group no one wants to belong to. Depending on how recently your loved one died, in fact, the rawness of the author’s emails to John, her boyfriend, and the specific hours around his suicide (including his suicide note), may be too difficult to read.

The material chronicling John’s suicidal act, her learning about it, and his death, met my own experience in deeply psychological ways that are probably universal: the disbelief, the numbness, the wondering how other people are doing things like reading, the praying praying praying it is going to be OK, the near impossibility to speak when the final news is delivered. Although reading about her experience awakened my memories and caused me some pain, they also very much made me feel less alone, it wasn’t just me, maybe this is  just how it is. And that, in fact, is part of her mission in writing this book.

The map material for the despair chapter includes a mix of external and internal recommendations, each elaborated and explained: acknowledge and surrender, gather community support, resist suicidal urges and seek therapy, dealing with trauma, dissociation, and shock, and crying. I was startled by some of her specific suggestions regarding dealing with shock and dissociation, because I had intuitively done them myself. Although not a gardener at all, I had felt a deep need to put my hands in dirt — a suggestion she presents as “earthing,” putting your bare feet on the earth for at least 30 minutes a day. I mention this as an example of the useful and specific activities one might do in this painful part of the healing process.

The middle section, shifting, focuses on the proactive process of getting out of your own pain and suffering — a process that Dr. Neustadter notes is still part of her experience 10 years after his death, and one she expects will continue the rest her life. The author’s letters to John swirl around the experiences of anger and guilt, responses that are so common even when there is absolutely no reason one could feel guilt. The map material in this section does not say “don’t feel guilty and angry” (instructions I received all the time), but does acknowledge that survivors feel this way.

The activities then focus on using the anger as a way to get out of your misery, practicing self-forgiveness (and she notes the power of meditation to help this difficult process), and a great number of specific ways to help you shift your perspective on death, and life after death. If the activities that focus on psychic abilities and mediums don’t resonate with your specific beliefs, she offers others that might help, including meaning-making and bodywork. I appreciated the range of activities that can reach every reader.

The final section, beauty, explores the possibility of finding beauty within and around yourself and emerging from the darkness of grief. The author found herself moving into this phase around 2½ years after John’s death, although she is careful not to proscribe the length of grief, noting that some people may take a year or less and others may still be processing their grief five years and longer. The map activities in this section might feel impossible to achieve if you are just starting to deal with a loved one’s suicide, but they offer a beautiful light to walk toward.

And if you are ready to emerge from that darkness, the suggestions she offers will guide you toward comfort and relief: a brief discussion of meditation, an exhortation to spend time in nature, ideas of ways to cultivate magic and feeling your aliveness, ways to be in connection to others, a suggestion of following your dreams, her own positive experience of relocating as a way to move forward, suggestions for creating your purpose, and her story of self-love in the aftermath. Even just reading that list felt light and hopeful to me, and the further description of each suggestion fleshed them out with specifics.

There are two appendixes that provide a great trove of resources that will be very useful: a lengthy list with descriptions of transformational practices and a list of resources that will expand on the ideas she explores in this book.

To answer the question in my opening paragraph — will this book apply to all those who survive the suicide of a loved one — my conclusion is that it will. There is very little that’s unique to the aftermath of the suicide of a loved one, whether he or she was parent, sibling, intimate relationship partner, or friend, and the small details that are specific are unimportant to the value of this book. Despair after a suicide is despair. Shifting is shifting. Beauty is beauty. For me, the real value was in the map material in each section rather than in her lengthy correspondence with John, which I would have preferred summarized and presented in a broader context of the issues she was experiencing and exploring at that time, with occasional quotes.

But even 37 years after my father’s suicide, I found new approaches and ideas that resonate and that I will put into practice. Reflecting back on my shattered and traumatized experiences in the immediate and near-term days and months after his suicide, I can see how helpful this book would have been to me, in a great many ways. Whether your own loved one has committed suicide or you have a friend who is dealing with this traumatic experience in his or her life, this book offers a useful and practical guide to surviving this tragedy and finding your way back to yourself and life.

Love You Like the Sky: Surviving the Suicide of a Beloved
Sparkpress, June 2019
Paperback, 256 pages