این کتاب واقعا به من کمک کرد تا خطاهای شناختی ذهنم رو بشناسم و کلی حس و حالم رو عوض کرد. من فهمیدم دچار اضطراب و افسردگی هستم و بعد از خوندن این کتاب دوباره آزمونش رو که توی خود کتابه دادم و با کمال تعجب دیدم نمراتم کلی کمتر شدن. خیلی توصیه‌ش میکنم به هر کسی که با افکار زیاد و نشخوار ذهنی دست و پنجه نرم می‌کنه.

Terrible approach that blames the victim for negative thinking.

Very informative

A very good resource for depression, anxiety, and intimacy. I’ll keep it in my shelf as a reference. There are a lot of great tools and an abundance of information. Don’t be intimidated by the size of the book. The last 200 pages seem optional to me - drug lists and interactions, and resources for therapists. The first 483 pages are all you need.

Don't be intimidated by the size of this book. A number of the pages are simply blanks and spaces for you to work on exercises that Burns is suggesting, and the back half is full of information on medication. As I am not looking to go on medication at this time, I did not read this section.

I bought this item used for a couple bucks, and it was an updated 1999 edition.

The positives: This is a great beginner's or refresher course on cognitive therapy for anxiety and depression. The exercises do work, at least some of them, and there is some variety of exercises presented so if one doesn't work for you personally, you can always try another. I do not regret spending a couple bucks on this, it was a helpful reminder of things I've learned before and I found significant benefit to doing exercises even when I was doubtful.

Negatives: First, this book is very dated feeling. Now, it is an "updated" edition of a book that was more than ten years old in 1999, and it is now 20 years after that re-release; surely some of this is not the author's fault but mine for providing a review of a book that is from an earlier era. The author has since released "Feeling Great," another book on these topics and one which may well address my issues with this book. However, many of the ways examples are told feel fake and cliched in a way that feels a lot more like 1980s self-help writing than 1999 in tone and style, and a ton of it is focused on typical husband-wife spousal relationship problems as they might be imagined three or more decades ago; if that is relevant to you, you may have more to gain from this book than I did.

Second, I personally found the section on interpersonal communication unhelpful and ineffective. My own experience is that validating what other people are saying and assuming there is "some truth" in anything a person says to you gets poor results. Maybe I am just too resistant to this mode of thinking and being unfair to Burns, but I really don't think so. Empathy is valuable when having disagreements, but I am not sure this is the way to get there at least for me. YMMV. I think the value of the book is in addressing your negative thought patterns and writing down what the issues are, not so much in learning new interpersonal skills.

The handbook's strength lies in its straightforward approach to mental health. I particularly liked the concepts of cognitive distortions and identifying them in real-time, as well as the TIC-TOC technique. However, it can be very repetitive at times, and its focus on self-help feels overly simplistic for addressing more severe mental health issues. It does not fully acknowledge the role of community healing and external factors, so it might not offer the depth needed for everyone.

I really enjoyed this book and still use it to this day to process and practice mindfulness, etc.

Sinceramente encuentro muy util la información del libro, explica las cosas de una manera facil de entender e incluso parece que me lee el pensamiento porque predice varia de las quejas que se van generando y explica algunas de ellas, los ejercicios son bastante utiles aunque eventualmente los sentí bastante redundantes. Lo más me quedó es tratarse a uno mismo con compasión, el metodo de la doble exigencia es de mis favoritos.

I skimmed this ten years ago or so, and actually read it recently. I was looking on tips for coming out of "having a bad day" and increasing resilience. I don't suffer from depression or basically any of the cases he talks about.

I found it very valuable, although I skimmed many sections. I do the Mood Log exercise and it's a great way to get out of a bad day.

Quintessential CBT for depression, etc. Compatible with doing it on your own, if needed.

Gaslight yourself into believing you are okay:the handbook

10/10 would generally recommend

First, this book is really out of date. I don't understand most of the analogies or wording. Second, this book might not be for everyone. Like myself, you might not find this useful. As an example, I can't argue with that inner voice. I had to learn to modulate the voice. To change where it's coming from and how it sounds. Imagine a bully being mean to you; in that imagination you can change their voice into Mickey Mouse. Not so bad, right?