This is an actual photo the self-help section of my bookshelf at home.
Over the years, I have gone through lots of self-help phases. I don't have many of the books I used to have - mostly because I
have always been very happy to share a good book with my friends - lots of whom are just as nuts as I am, or, if they're not, so they will at least be aware that
I'm aware that I need to read a book about a certain "ill of the moment" that I might possibly be suffering from.
Back in the 80s I remember reading "Adult Children of Alcoholics" and "Toxic Parents." I found all I needed to know in those books on how to "explain" my idiosyncrasies.
Later it was "The Road Less Traveled", "Codependent No More", "Beyond Codepencency", and "Getting the Love You Want." For stress I have "Undoing Perpetual Stress", "Food and Mood", "The Feeling Good Handbook" and "Potatoes Not Prozac." For my body, I have "The New Guide to Remedies", "You The Owner's Manual" and "You are What You Eat." If I really want to feel like I have every disease possible, I flip through the "Merck Manual" to self-diagnose the rash on my stomach or the ache in my foot. I do not recommend this book for laymen. You will, most certainly, find that you have a
little symptom in every category of disease, and this is worrisome. Put that book DOWN immediately and go read something like "Stop Being Your Symptoms and Start Being Yourself: The 6-Week Mind-Body Program to Ease Your Chronic Symptoms. " This brings you back to reality and you can go on to the next phase of "help."
After I started to feel like I had "cured" any psychological maladies via these books, I had my kids. For them, the bible: "What to Expect When You're Expecting", "The Happiest Baby on the Block" and "How to Talk So Kids Will Listen, & Listen So Kids Will Talk."
In order to be a good and "whole" parent, I need to be at peace. There are books for that. I've read "The Four Agreements", "Broken Open" and "Full Catastrophe Living" as well as "A Purpose Driven Life" and, actually, "Vogue Knitting." Really.
There have been times when, if I've felt very "clueless" about a particular subject - the hows and whys of something, I've just bought another book to help. I have "The IDIOTS GUIDE to Understanding Catholicism", "The IDIOTS GUIDE to the Vietnam War" and "Politics for Dummies." I was raised Catholic, went to Sunday School, but don't remember a damned thing. I thought the book might help me know why I have to do all the stuff they made me do EVERY SUNDAY AND EVERY HOLY DAY (of which there are at least 40 a year, it seems). To me, Holy Days = Help! There's another day of church DURING THE WEEK! Yuuuuk. Vietnam - too young, knew it happened, knew the bad end result for the veterans and how they came home to hatred, but I didn't know what started the war REALLY. I know I learned it in high school, but I never paid attention in history, so I don't remember. Maybe I skipped class that day (or that week). So, then, of course, after reading that book about Vietnam and the politics that started it, I had to read "Politics for Dummies." I still don't get any of it - politics OR dummies.
Here's the funniest thing - you'd think after reading all these books, I might have a CLUE about - well, anything. But I don't. I get most of my history and trivial lessons from the "Uncle John's" series of Bathroom books. There's a lot of VERY INTERESTING info in there! Really! And you get lots of information just in little "snippets!"
So, I will continue to buy these books, in the hope that I will someday be "cured" of whatever my next "malady" will be; I know there'll be one. These books are habit forming, really. I wonder - do they have self-help books for self-help book addicts? Good question.
Either way, at the end of the day, I pick up the big, bad book you see right in the middle of all those self help books. It's the book called "Limericks" and it says it is "The Famous Paris Edition Complete & Unexpurgated
1700 EXAMPLES with Notes, Variants and Index-Nasty." Now, there's a helluva book! No matter how stressed you feel, how dysfunctional you may be, or how much you might hate your toxic parents, this book will put you right in your place. Because some of these limericks date back into the early 1900s, and these people were DIRTY! So, along with admiring how many things a "Girl From Nantucket" can do with her "bucket", I don't feel so screwed up. Those people who wrote those things were not only brilliant, but just a wee bit kooky. Gotta love a whole book about that!
This is an actual photo the self-help section of my bookshelf at home.
Over the years, I have gone through lots of self-help phases. I don't have many of the books I used to have - mostly because I
have always been very happy to share a good book with my friends - lots of whom are just as nuts as I am, or, if they're not, so they will at least be aware that I'm aware that I need to read a book about a certain "ill of the moment" that I might possibly be suffering from.
Back in the 80s I remember reading "Adult Children of Alcoholics" and "Toxic Parents." I found all I needed to know in those books on how to "explain" my idiosyncrasies.
Later it was "The Road Less Traveled", "Codependent No More", "Beyond Codepencency", and "Getting the Love You Want." For stress I have "Undoing Perpetual Stress", "Food and Mood", "The Feeling Good Handbook" and "Potatoes Not Prozac." For my body, I have "The New Guide to Remedies", "You The Owner's Manual" and "You are What You Eat." If I really want to feel like I have every disease possible, I flip through the "Merck Manual" to self-diagnose the rash on my stomach or the ache in my foot. I do not recommend this book for laymen. You will, most certainly, find that you have a little symptom in every category of disease, and this is worrisome. Put that book DOWN immediately and go read something like "Stop Being Your Symptoms and Start Being Yourself: The 6-Week Mind-Body Program to Ease Your Chronic Symptoms. " This brings you back to reality and you can go on to the next phase of "help."
After I started to feel like I had "cured" any psychological maladies via these books, I had my kids. For them, the bible: "What to Expect When You're Expecting", "The Happiest Baby on the Block" and "How to Talk So Kids Will Listen, & Listen So Kids Will Talk."
In order to be a good and "whole" parent, I need to be at peace. There are books for that. I've read "The Four Agreements", "Broken Open" and "Full Catastrophe Living" as well as "A Purpose Driven Life" and, actually, "Vogue Knitting." Really.
There have been times when, if I've felt very "clueless" about a particular subject - the hows and whys of something, I've just bought another book to help. I have "The IDIOTS GUIDE to Understanding Catholicism", "The IDIOTS GUIDE to the Vietnam War" and "Politics for Dummies." I was raised Catholic, went to Sunday School, but don't remember a damned thing. I thought the book might help me know why I have to do all the stuff they made me do EVERY SUNDAY AND EVERY HOLY DAY (of which there are at least 40 a year, it seems). To me, Holy Days = Help! There's another day of church DURING THE WEEK! Yuuuuk. Vietnam - too young, knew it happened, knew the bad end result for the veterans and how they came home to hatred, but I didn't know what started the war REALLY. I know I learned it in high school, but I never paid attention in history, so I don't remember. Maybe I skipped class that day (or that week). So, then, of course, after reading that book about Vietnam and the politics that started it, I had to read "Politics for Dummies." I still don't get any of it - politics OR dummies.
Here's the funniest thing - you'd think after reading all these books, I might have a CLUE about - well, anything. But I don't. I get most of my history and trivial lessons from the "Uncle John's" series of Bathroom books. There's a lot of VERY INTERESTING info in there! Really! And you get lots of information just in little "snippets!"
So, I will continue to buy these books, in the hope that I will someday be "cured" of whatever my next "malady" will be; I know there'll be one. These books are habit forming, really. I wonder - do they have self-help books for self-help book addicts? Good question.
Either way, at the end of the day, I pick up the big, bad book you see right in the middle of all those self help books. It's the book called "Limericks" and it says it is "The Famous Paris Edition Complete & Unexpurgated 1700 EXAMPLES with Notes, Variants and Index-Nasty." Now, there's a helluva book! No matter how stressed you feel, how dysfunctional you may be, or how much you might hate your toxic parents, this book will put you right in your place. Because some of these limericks date back into the early 1900s, and these people were DIRTY! So, along with admiring how many things a "Girl From Nantucket" can do with her "bucket", I don't feel so screwed up. Those people who wrote those things were not only brilliant, but just a wee bit kooky. Gotta love a whole book about that!
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