Synopses & Reviews
Powerful, practical strategies to build a lifetime of resilience, flexibility, and happiness.
Several years ago Dr. Tamar Chansky, one of the nation’s leading clinical experts on children and anxiety disorders, realized that roughly half of the children she sees in her clinical practice exhibit “negative thinking.” These children see only those things that are wrong with themselves, the world, and the future. Distinct from the type of thinking Dr. Chansky encountered in children with anxiety and obsessive-compulsive symptoms, children who engage in negative thinking supersize their problems: Nothing ever works for me. There’s no point. I give up. This negativity creates emotional hurdles that often hinder children from achieving success and happiness, both now and in the years to come.
Now in this landmark book, Dr. Chansky thoroughly analyzes the underlying causes of children’s negative attitudes and provides numerous strategies to help parents and their children manage negative thoughts, build optimism, and establish emotional resilience. She shows how to buffer kids from disappointment, failure, and frustration by helping them to think more accurately about their problems—to right-size them.
Freeing your Child from Negative Thinking provides parents, caregivers, and clinicians with the tools they need to relieve a child from the burden of these emotional hurdles and to build the positive, confident mindset that will set them on their way to a bright, happy future.
Review
Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice and Professor of Psychology, Swarthmore College“Tamar Chansky has distilled cutting-edge research on optimism, pessimism, depression, and resilience into an incredibly thoughtful guide for parents. Her book is full of suggestions about what to look for and what to do (and what not to do) that parents should find engaging and accessible. Reading this book should ease the worries of both parents and their children.”
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Philip C. Kendall, Ph.D., ABPP, Professor of Psychology and Director, Child and Adolescent Anxiety Disorders Clinic, Temple University“In a clearly readable fashion, Dr. Tamar Chansky combines clever phrasing (for adults) along with “kid speak” to communicate with youth. From her having worked with anxious youth who struggle with all of the possibilities (too many), Dr. Chansky shifts to the negative youth who see no future—the youth who mistake one thing for everything. She walks the reader through discussions that focus on how negative experiences happen to everyone, and that they are ‘manageable’ and ‘temporary’. This book is not a review of the scientific literature, but it is a readable set of guidelines and understandings that are informed by it.”
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Jeffrey Bernstein, Ph.D., author of 10 Days to a Less Defiant Child“For every parent who wants their child not to feel bad, here is an excellent book to feel great about. In Freeing Your Child from Negative Thinking, Dr. Chansky abundantly gives parents powerful, easy to apply tools to ensure the emotional health and success of any child. I hope no parent trying to help their child to get ahead misses out on reading this wonderful book packed with valuable advice.”
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LiteraryMama.com, 10/15/08“Tamar Chansky, Ph.D., has done it again—written another incredibly helpful, practical book.”
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Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., Director, Beck Institute for Cognitive Therapy and Research and Clinical Associate Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania“Tamar Chansky, Ph.D., has done it again—written another incredibly helpful, practical book. Freeing Your Child from Negative Thinking offers specific strategies for parents (or any adult) to use with children and describes variations on these strategies for younger children and older adolescents. Every parent who has a pessimistic, negativistic child should read this book! As parents use the thinking and behavioral strategies that Dr. Chansky recommends, they will undoubtedly find that they themselves are becoming more optimistic and positive, not only toward their child but also more generally in their own lives. I highly recommend this wonderful book.”
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Robert Brooks, Ph.D., Faculty, Harvard Medical School and co-author of Raising Resilient Children and Raising a Self-Disciplined Child“Many youngsters are burdened by self-doubt, negative feelings, and depression. Their lack of confidence and sadness typically trigger feelings of confusion and distress in their parents as the latter struggle to find the best approach to help their children develop a more optimistic, resilient outlook. Tamar Chansky’s book Freeing Your Child from Negative Thinking offers a wonderful resource for parents. In a very skillful manner, Dr. Chansky’s explains the roots of negative thinking, but most importantly, she offers specific, realistic strategies with actual dialogue that parents can use to minimize their child’s negativity. Her empathy and understanding for children and parents is evident on very page of this very readable, practical book. It is a book that parents of children of all ages will read and re-read as they seek to help their children perceive themselves in a more hopeful light.”
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Myrna Shure, Ph.D., author of Raising a Thinking Child and Thinking Parent, Thinking Child“Tamar Chansky gives parents a dynamic approach to helping their children escape thinking badly about themselves and their world?thoughts ranging from mild negativism to clinical depression. Her insightful and creative techniques, based on scientifically grounded cognitive behavior therapy, are, on any given day, helpful not only for parents and their children but for all of us. Next time I want to blame myself for something that went wrong, or feel terrible about something I did, I will open this book and I know I will soon feel better.”
Review
Suite101.com, 12/3/08“An excellent action based book that offers solutions on how to turn your children around if they’re stuck in a negative thinking spiral.”
Synopsis
In the tradition of The Depression Cure, accessible and practical think this, not that” strategies for dealing with life’s daily challenges
Synopsis
We all know what is healthy to think and what is not, much like we know that eating an apple is better than gorging on donuts. But once we start thinking anxious thoughts, it is tough to move from disaster to reality. Our brain can ruin our day.
The roadmap to happiness can be found in Freeing Yourself from Anxiety. Unlike most guides, Dr. Tamar Chansky’s book explains that the solution is not positive thinking, but possible thinking. Armed with her strategies, readers can achieve accurate perceptions of their lives that can liberate them from fear and perfectionism.
For the 25 percent of Americans who have an anxiety problem, Freeing Yourself from Anxiety provides the step-by-step tools for living stress free, without medications.
Synopsis
From a leading clinician and strong selling author, a guide for all parents navigating the uncharted territory of managing their child’s negative mindset.
Synopsis
A leading clinical expert in the fields of child cognitive behavior therapy and anxiety disorders, Dr. Tamar Chansky frequently counsels children (and their parents) whose negative thinking creates chronic or occasional emotional hurdles and impedes optimism, flexibility, and happiness. Now, in the first book that specifically focuses on negative thinking in kids, Freeing Your Child from Negative Thinking provides parents, caregivers, and clinicians the same clear, concise, and compassionate guidance that Dr. Chansky employed in her previous guides to relieving children from anxiety and obsessive compulsive symptoms. Here she thoroughly covers the underlying causes of children’s negative attitudes, as well as providing multiple strategies for managing negative thoughts, building optimism, and establishing emotional resilience.
About the Author
Tamar Chansky, Ph.D., founder and director of the Children’s Center for OCD and Anxiety, has also written
Freeing Your Child from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and
Freeing Your Child from Anxiety. She lives in Philadelphia.