Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Following on from
best-selling The School of Life: An Emotional Education (2020), A
Therapeutic Journey compiles extracts from some of our recent titles
and describes the arc of a journey - from breakdown and collapse to
convalescence and recovery. It is intended as both a practical guide and a source
of consolation and friendship during what might be some of our loneliest, most
anguished moments.
The book discusses becoming unwell, imagining that one has let
everyone down and losing direction and hope. It also speaks to us about
redemption: about regaining the thread, rediscovering meaning and finding a way
back to connection, warmth and joy.
A Therapeutic Journey is ultimately, a book about resilience. It insists that we
cannot allow terror, self-hatred and sadness to have their victories over us
and that we can always, so long as we think matters through with sufficient
creativity and gentleness, identify reasons to live.
Synopsis
Alain de Botton's redemptive volume charts a course from collapse to recovery with kindness, compassion and wisdom.
"Alain de Botton, one of our era's most uncommonly perceptive, lyrical, and lucid existential contemplatives." --
The MarginalianA Therapeutic Journey follows the arc from mental crisis and collapse, to convalescence and recovery. Written with kindness, knowledge and sympathy, it is both a practical guide and a source of consolation and companionship in what might be some of our loneliest, most anguished moments.
In this blueprint for enduring a period of mental anguish, Alain de Botton explores how we can cope with a variety of forms of mental pain and illness, from the mild to the severe. It considers how and why we might become ill; how we can explain things to friends, family and colleagues; how we can find our ways towards recovery; and how we can build resilience, so as to live wisely alongside our difficulties.
At heart this is a book about redemption--about regaining the thread of our lives, rediscovering meaning, and finding our way back to connection, warmth and joy.
An invaluable literary companion through the loneliness of mental illness.