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Excellent no-nonsense advice for human beings. Regardless of your creed and beliefs, these pages offer honest advice for real life and its ugly moments. It's definitely not a replacement for actual therapy, but it's great support for those days when you just don't want do do anything ( )

I've had Therese Borchard's new book The Pocket Therapist for about 3 weeks now. It's not the kind of book you pick up and plow through, rather it's a thoughtful read, to be enjoyed a page at a time.

The behind the scene story on this book is compelling. Therese suffered (s) from depression and anxiety. The Pocket Therapist is a compilation of techniques and thoughts garnered from her own experiences, including hospitalizations, medication tribulations and sessions with different psychiatrists. Much of it was pulled from twelve years of journaling..

The result is a thought provoking collection of 142 short essays that will leave you feeling refreshed, encouraged and ready to face whatever has slowed you down. Interspersed with philosophy references and lots of personal experiences, this little volume is chock full of good advice and coping strategies that everyone could take advantage of.

Be quiet, take baby steps, begin again, befriend yourself and keep showing up are just a few of the headings. I'll be keeping this book in a handy place to just pick up and read at random. Lots of great food for thought!

"Sometimes when life hands you lemons, it's harder to make lemonade than that cheery notion suggests. In more trying situations, the initial urge may be to use said lemon as a projectile weapon aimed at the source of frustration. The Pocket Therapist is a book for those lemon-lauching moments in life."

That description sets the tone for the entire book. With 144 techniques to help cope with anxiety, conflicts, and just life in general. Each of the techniques are designed to help us cope with the negative thinking patterns that so many of us encounter often leading us to feel defeated in our own minds.

I really enjoyed the writing style in this book, it was a pleasant mix of honesty, sarcasm and cynicism with a sprinkle of hope. The book was full of very useful techniques, all of which are common sense but often difficult to implement into our lives. With the amount of people living fast paced lifestyles and the increase of people living with anxiety disorders this book has a handy collection of tips to help remind us that we are indeed only human and sometimes we have to know when to just let go of the lemon and take a breath. ( )

I previewed this book today. I like books that have advice in bite-sized pieces - they are good for people and times when a little food for thought is needed quickly. I'm not crazy about it talking about God because that leaves a lot of people out if they can't relate, but there's enough morsels in this book that speak of common sense wisdom without the mystical that I think the average American could get some good mileage out of keeping this on their night table.

One of the pieces of advice I found useful in this book is #15: Pick a Pace. This world moves faster all the time and sometimes keeping up can feel impossible. Basically, the author says it's important to stay mindful and accepting of one's unique capabilities. Anything that promotes being gentle to oneself gets a thumbs up from me. ( )