Feeling Good

The rare self-help book that has itself been tested: bibliotherapy trials using this book show measurable reduction in depressive symptoms. Teaches the single most transferable mental skill available, catching and testing an automatic thought.

The chapter guide

Depression is manufactured and maintained by distorted thinking, and you can dismantle it yourself by catching the distortion in writing and answering it.

1. Part I opening: the cognitive breakthrough claim and the Burns Depression Checklist

   Pitches CBT as equal or superior to antidepressants, then gives a self-scored depression inventory to establish a baseline.

2. You Feel the Way You Think (the cognitive premise)

   Every bad feeling is preceded by a thought, so changing the thought changes the feeling.

3. The Ten Cognitive Distortions (all-or-nothing, overgeneralisation, mental filter, disqualifying the positive, mind reading, fortune telling, magnification, emotional reasoning, should statements, labelling and personalisation)

   A named taxonomy of the ten reliable ways thinking goes wrong under low mood.

4. The Triple-Column Technique and the Daily Mood Log

   Write the automatic thought, name the distortion, write a rational response, and rate belief before and after.

5. Do-Nothingism: How to Beat It (Antiprocrastination Sheet, Daily Activity Schedule, TIC-TOC, the ‘But’ rebuttal, five-minute rule)

   Procrastination is caused by self-defeating thoughts about the task, so rebut the thought and break the task into small enough steps and action follows.

6. Build Self-Esteem / talking back to the internal critic

   Externalise the inner voice and answer it in writing until its authority drops.

7. Ways of Defeating Guilt (should statements, the tyranny of the should)

   Guilt is generated by moralising language applied to yourself, and the fix is to convert shoulds into preferences and consequences.

8. Your Work Is Not Your Worth

   Separates achievement from human value and dismantles the achievement-based self.

9. The Approval Addiction

   Argues that needing approval is a learned dependency with identifiable costs, and can be unlearned.

10. The Love Addiction

    Being loved is not a prerequisite for happiness or self-worth.

11. Dare to Be Average (perfectionism)

    Perfectionism produces less output and more misery than aiming for good enough, demonstrated with the reader’s own data.

12. Verbal Judo: talking back to criticism

    A three-step method (empathy, disarming, feedback and negotiation) for absorbing criticism without collapsing.

13. Feeling Angry? (Irritability Quotient, cost-benefit analysis of anger, hot thoughts)

    Anger is created by your interpretation of events, and is worth keeping only when it is useful.

14. The Ultimate Victory: Choosing to Live (hopelessness and suicide)

    Hopelessness is itself a symptom and a cognitive distortion, and it can be argued with while it is happening.

15. The mood chemistry and antidepressant chapters (the drug guide added in the 1999 revision)

    A consumer’s guide to antidepressant classes, dosing, side effects, and interactions.

16. The implicit frame that a book alone is sufficient treatment

    Presents guided self-help as a standalone route out of depression.

Scorecard

Universality

4 of 5

Evidence

4 of 5

Reread value

3 of 5