Susan Gillis Chapman

The few times the author resorts to classifying her clients as having specific psychological disorders comes across as character assassination. It seems to be an appeal to her own authority and a way to assert that she is better than them.

A lot of the language used is not natural. Meaning that people would not talk this way with any random group without concern of being labeled as odd. Ms. Chapman is trying to stress paying attention to emotions to guide some basic ways of responding to situations based on those emotions. Unfortunately she treats emotions as if they are some sort of mystic seer that you have to seek out for guidance. Personally, I prefer Lisa Barrett's approach that emotions are created by your brain>. Same result but the language is more straightforward.

There is good advice and finding it and listening to it will require that you practice listening (and ignoring some of the author's self-aggrandizing statements). When I said that I wasn't enjoying this book my friends advised me to drop it and switch to another. I took it as a challenge to look past the things that bothered me and find some value in it.… (mer)