Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #458 in Books
• Published on: 2000-05-05
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 736 pages

Synopsis
A drug-free guide to curing anxiety, guilt, pessimism, procrastination, low self-esteem, and other depressive disorders uses scientifically tested methods to improve mood and stave off the blues. Reprint.

From the Author
Overview of changes in revised edition of Feeling Good
Some people have asked about the changes in the 1999 edition of Feeling Good. What is new and different? Why did I revise the book?

Let me say first what was NOT changed. All of the sections on how to use cognitive therapy to overcome depression are the same. Why is this? Several recent research studies published in scientific journals indicated that approximately two thirds of depressed people who were asked to read Feeling Good improved or recovered in just four weeks with no other therapy.

The references to these articles are contained in the new introduction to Feeling Good, along with summaries of other interesting new research studies. Much of this research was conducted by Dr. Forrest Scogin from the Univeristy of Alabama. My thinking was, "if it's not broken, don't fix it!"

However, there is an entirely new section in the 1999 version of Feeling Good on the chemistry of moods. These new chapters contain nearly 200 pages of material on how the brain works, including detailed information on all the drugs currently prescribed for depression as well as manic depressive illness. The material on antidepressant medications had not been updated since the first edition in 1980 and was out of date!

Individuals who are taking these drugs can learn all about the doses, side effects, and toxic interactions with other substances such as prescription or over-the-counter drugs they may be taking. They will also learn how to find out if the drug is really helping, how to monitor side effects, what to do if the drug doesn't work, how long to stay a drug it if it does help, and so forth. I believe interested readers will find a wealth of practical information on medicatons in these new chapters.

Readers familiar with my work will know I have not been overly enthusiastic about antidepressant medications over the years. Although I started out my career doing full-time research on brain serotonin and on antidepressant medications, I was never impressed with these agents. This is because I always had many patients who just weren't helped by these drugs. Others were helped a little, but still were not getting back to full self-esteem and joy in daily living.

That's why I developed a keen interest in the new type of drug-free therapy I describe in Feeling Good. These methods have subsequently been shown to as effective as the best current antidepressants, and often more effective, in many research studies. In the past 20 years since I first wrote Feeling Good, I have become even more impressed with the healing power of these new methods for individuals suffering from severe or mild depression.

Nevertheless, depressed individuals often receive antidepressant drugs and many people have benefitted from them. Certainly all patients deserve to have the best and the latest information about these agents. I spent approximately six months working full time to create the new material for the revised edition of Feeling Good--so that my readers would hopefully have available the best of both worlds: the best information about cognitive therapy, and the latest information about the commonly prescribed medicatons as well.

I hope these comments are useful and that readers who are suffering from depression will find the help and relief they deserve. If you have any further questions or suggestions, feel free to visit my new web page at www.feelinggood.com.

One last point. If you already own a copy of Feeling Good, and you are not interested in medications, then there is no reason to update to this new edition. I am working on some exciting new projects for you--visit my web page to learn about them.

Best Regards,

David D. Burns, M.D. Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine

Customer Reviews

Good, but not the whole story
A book that describes the link between what we feel and what we think. Even though the book helped me recognise the way I looked at things, I do not think that there was enough emphasis on the way one has to cultivate a gentle approach to oneself. I would also recommend books by Dorothy Rowe. She approaches depression from the emotional, instead of the thinking, aspect of the brain. Together I think that both approaches compliment one another.

Good ideas but not very user-friendly
When I first looked at Feeling Good by David Burns, I thought it was an excellent book. It's packed with practical ideas for improving mood and breaking out of depression. Unfortunately, when I tried to use the book's suggestions when actually depressed, I found them of little use. The theory behind the exercises is sound (as I know from successfully using CBT in other contexts) but the way the book is written and laid out does not seem to have the depressed reader in mind.

Burns clearly wanted to pack in as many helpful techniques as possible, but that is actually the book's failing. The reader is bombarded with things to do that are often not described in very much detail. When you are depressed, you may find it hard to concentrate, have trouble making decisions, get overwhelmed easily, and above all struggle to find energy and motivation. Feeling Good doesn't take any of these factors into account. I think if the book had presented fewer ideas and taken me through them step by step, it would have been helpful. Instead, I was left feeling as though I should be doing all these different things, I didn't know which one to try first, I wasn't quite sure how to go about some of them, and faced with the mountain of exercises, I gave up.

Judging from the other Amazon reviews, many people have found this book helpful. I would guess it's extremely good for milder depression, where you don't have so many of the issues I described above. If you're interested in CBT but more severely depressed, I'd recommend Mind Over Mood by Greenberger and Padesky instead. It's more of an introduction to CBT, but it takes you through everything slowly, with lots of blank worksheets to fill in, and the techniques described really do help.

If you do buy Feeling Good, treat yourself to a nice notebook and pen as well, and above all, pace yourself.

Seems not the best book for applying cognitive therapy for oneself
Cognitive therapy makes sense, but I've read this book several times and have gotten little from it. I also tried the "Feeling Good Handbook" and didn't find that helpful either. However Burns apparently has had a key role in spreading the value of cognitive thereapy and this book played a key part.

My difficulty may not be with cognitive therapy but using this book (and handbook) on a regular basis. I've just found another, "Mind over Mood" by Greenberger and Padesky. It is also introduced by Aaron Beck, who pioneered cognitve therapy. But "Mind over Mood" seems short and focused. It contains about 10 worksheets (a copy of each is included in the appendix) and the author's go over each worksheet very carefully, with examples, to show you how to use them. Unlike "Feeling Good", "Mind over Mood" seems to better thought out and with your use in mind. The author's seem to know how to present. They seem careful to explain so that you are able to apply cogntive therapy techniques well.

I've only used the worksheets in "Mind over Mood" for several weeks. They seem to at least help me at the time I use them. I'm open to cognitive therapy but "Feeling Good" seems too hard to work with and like it could use a rewrite. Meanwhile, I'm taking my feelings to Greenberger's and Padkesky's "Mind over Mood".