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Coward: Why We Get Anxious & What We Can Do About It
After a decade of living with panic attacks and anxiety, Tim Clare made a promise to himself – he would try everything he could to get better, every method and medicine.His year of treatments took him from anti-depressants to hypnosis, running to extreme diets, ice baths to faecal transplants. At the end of it he discovers what helps him (and what doesn’t), and what might help others. Most of all, he comes to rethink anxiety and encourages all of us to do the same.
486 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 5, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews
June 25, 2023
I keep picking up books on mental health from the library's new acquisitions shelf. Most of them leave me unmoved (e.g You Are Not Alone, Overcoming Health Anxiety: A Self-Help Guide Using Cognitive Behavioural Techniques, The Anxiety Sisters' Survival Guide: How You Can Become More Hopeful, Connected, and Happy), but sooner or later one was bound to have more impact. After borrowing Coward: Why We Get Anxious & What We Can Do About It, I realised that I'd read two fantasy novels by the same author: The Honours and The Ice House. Both are great, but the latter includes such intense and gruesome scenes of body horror that it gave me nightmares. I should have guessed that experience of severe anxiety was required to write something that fucked up - which I mean as a sort of compliment.
Coward: Why We Get Anxious & What We Can Do About It is Tim Clare's memoir of attempts to alleviate his intense anxiety disorder; he states up front that it isn't a self-help book, polemic, or manifesto. Yet I found it more compelling and (hopefully) useful than any of the mental health self-help books I've read in recent years. Notably, Clare only mentions offhand reading such books himself and they do not form one of his treatments. The book is structured around the different things he tried to reduce his anxiety, including but not limited to antidepressants, cold showers, magic mushrooms, hypnosis, exercise, and a device that delivered small electric shocks to his brain. I had to admire his willingness to attempt all these things and to write in what feels like a painfully honest manner about his mental illness. I also appreciated the measured tone and grasp of nuance when discussing the complexities of academic research around anxiety, especially the point that genetics is probabilistic.
Contrary to my usual practise of liberally quoting when reviewing nonfiction, I feel much less comfortable doing so from this book. Although I found it very intellectually satisfactory, it's an unusual instance of a book on mental illness also eliciting emotional reactions. Quoting parts that I found familiar from my own extensive experience of anxiety seems too revealing and personal. Titling the book 'Coward' is in itself a brave move on Clare's part, as the word encapsulates the intense shame of anxiety that he articulates so vividly. His discussion of this shame is far easier for me to understand and relate to than self-help book encouragements to share your mental health story in public, become an advocate, etc, etc. I struggle to understand and admit even to myself, let alone anyone else, the impact that anxiety has on my life. (Would I read so many books if I wasn't always anxious? I simply don't want to think about it!) Thus it was tempting to try and distance myself from Clare's experiences, on the pretext that I don't have panic attacks as bad as his. Yet his descriptions of the chronically anxious mindset were too close to home for this, so I found myself thinking: he really committed to finding a way to recover. Could I let go of the idea that I need anxiety to keep me safe and do the same?
Despite the heavy topic, Clare is also an amusing writer and this made me laugh:
For the most part, though, it was an intense experience reading Coward: Why We Get Anxious & What We Can Do About It. Clare writes powerfully about living with anxiety and the lengths he was willing to go to in an effort to alleviate it. The conclusion is encouraging, as some combination of the things he tried made him feel a lot better; at the time of writing he hadn't had a panic attack for two years. He doesn't claim that what he did would work for anyone, but nonetheless offers hope that if you keep trying something could help. I'm going to give the following insights further thought:
Coward: Why We Get Anxious & What We Can Do About It is Tim Clare's memoir of attempts to alleviate his intense anxiety disorder; he states up front that it isn't a self-help book, polemic, or manifesto. Yet I found it more compelling and (hopefully) useful than any of the mental health self-help books I've read in recent years. Notably, Clare only mentions offhand reading such books himself and they do not form one of his treatments. The book is structured around the different things he tried to reduce his anxiety, including but not limited to antidepressants, cold showers, magic mushrooms, hypnosis, exercise, and a device that delivered small electric shocks to his brain. I had to admire his willingness to attempt all these things and to write in what feels like a painfully honest manner about his mental illness. I also appreciated the measured tone and grasp of nuance when discussing the complexities of academic research around anxiety, especially the point that genetics is probabilistic.
Contrary to my usual practise of liberally quoting when reviewing nonfiction, I feel much less comfortable doing so from this book. Although I found it very intellectually satisfactory, it's an unusual instance of a book on mental illness also eliciting emotional reactions. Quoting parts that I found familiar from my own extensive experience of anxiety seems too revealing and personal. Titling the book 'Coward' is in itself a brave move on Clare's part, as the word encapsulates the intense shame of anxiety that he articulates so vividly. His discussion of this shame is far easier for me to understand and relate to than self-help book encouragements to share your mental health story in public, become an advocate, etc, etc. I struggle to understand and admit even to myself, let alone anyone else, the impact that anxiety has on my life. (Would I read so many books if I wasn't always anxious? I simply don't want to think about it!) Thus it was tempting to try and distance myself from Clare's experiences, on the pretext that I don't have panic attacks as bad as his. Yet his descriptions of the chronically anxious mindset were too close to home for this, so I found myself thinking: he really committed to finding a way to recover. Could I let go of the idea that I need anxiety to keep me safe and do the same?
Despite the heavy topic, Clare is also an amusing writer and this made me laugh:
The Wim Hof Method's dirty little secret - the reason, I suspect, it has gained such popularity - is that it's basically autoerotic asphyxiation without the wanking.
For the most part, though, it was an intense experience reading Coward: Why We Get Anxious & What We Can Do About It. Clare writes powerfully about living with anxiety and the lengths he was willing to go to in an effort to alleviate it. The conclusion is encouraging, as some combination of the things he tried made him feel a lot better; at the time of writing he hadn't had a panic attack for two years. He doesn't claim that what he did would work for anyone, but nonetheless offers hope that if you keep trying something could help. I'm going to give the following insights further thought:
The more we cling to certainty, the less amenable we are to the benign doubt that leads to change.
[...]
When you ask an anxiety sufferer to give up their fear, what new reality are you offering in exchange?
[...]
Psychologist and founder of person-centred therapy Carl Rogers put it like this: 'The curious paradox is that when I accept myself as I am, then I change. I believe that I have learned this from my clients as well as within my own experience - that we cannot change, we cannot move away from what we are, until we thoroughly accept what we are. Then change seems to come about almost unnoticed.'
[...]
What I've discovered is that the opposite of anxiety isn't comfort. It's curiosity. It's appetite. It's moving towards things that make you feel alive and embracing them, while doing your best to accept that things will go wrong.
May 28, 2022
A LOT of science and chemical references so quite an intense read. It's shame that complementary remedies and therapies weren't investigated more but a lot of interesting points. Just a bit long.
August 19, 2024
For someone who describes himself as a coward, and admits that his anxiety was bad enough that he worried about ruining his family's lives as well as his own, Tim Clare is a brave person for sharing the amount of personal detail that he does here. One chapter describes an anxiety attack, from start to exponential rise to finally fading away, from the inside as he experienced it. When it was over, he wrote it down just as depicted. If you've been lucky enough never to have gone through an emotional cycle this extreme, this section is quite the eye-opener. (Especially how little it takes to trigger it!)
I think we all can relate to some part of Clare's book, even if we've never personally experienced anxiety attacks as crippling as his. We've all had those times in our lives where it seems the butterflies in the stomach just won't go away; we've all had those nights when we wake up with racing thoughts and can't find sleep again. We'd all love to know what to do in those times. So, Clare has looked into it, not only for himself and his family, but for all of us. To his disappointment, there are no quick fixes. Every scientist he speaks with admits that headlines can be misleading, and there's a lot of unknowns in medical research and practice. Their current findings point to directions of new research that might turn out promising, but most of their answers don't give Clare solutions that will instantly help turn the anxiety off.
At the end, Clare sums up everything he's tried and whether it succeeded in lowering his anxiety. He also emphasises that any given reader may get different results, as there's also no panacea for all of us. What has worked the best for him were things like exercise and cold water swims, and these all took time and practice to do their work. An emotionally intense form of therapy uncovered trauma from his younger years that he's almost forgotten, but it was also hard, painful work. By this point, it's pretty evident that trying to avoid anxiety, or it's triggers and causes, is the thing that most definitely doesn't work. You have to change your brain, which takes effort, and plenty of it, over time. “What I’ve discovered is that the opposite of anxiety isn’t comfort. It’s curiosity. It’s appetite. It’s moving towards things that make you feel alive and embracing them, while doing your best to accept that things will go wrong.” Kudos to Mr. Clare for sharing this journey with us.
I think we all can relate to some part of Clare's book, even if we've never personally experienced anxiety attacks as crippling as his. We've all had those times in our lives where it seems the butterflies in the stomach just won't go away; we've all had those nights when we wake up with racing thoughts and can't find sleep again. We'd all love to know what to do in those times. So, Clare has looked into it, not only for himself and his family, but for all of us. To his disappointment, there are no quick fixes. Every scientist he speaks with admits that headlines can be misleading, and there's a lot of unknowns in medical research and practice. Their current findings point to directions of new research that might turn out promising, but most of their answers don't give Clare solutions that will instantly help turn the anxiety off.
At the end, Clare sums up everything he's tried and whether it succeeded in lowering his anxiety. He also emphasises that any given reader may get different results, as there's also no panacea for all of us. What has worked the best for him were things like exercise and cold water swims, and these all took time and practice to do their work. An emotionally intense form of therapy uncovered trauma from his younger years that he's almost forgotten, but it was also hard, painful work. By this point, it's pretty evident that trying to avoid anxiety, or it's triggers and causes, is the thing that most definitely doesn't work. You have to change your brain, which takes effort, and plenty of it, over time. “What I’ve discovered is that the opposite of anxiety isn’t comfort. It’s curiosity. It’s appetite. It’s moving towards things that make you feel alive and embracing them, while doing your best to accept that things will go wrong.” Kudos to Mr. Clare for sharing this journey with us.
June 20, 2022
“Coward: Why we get Anxious and what we can do about it” is excellent on anxiety, which as conditions go - let’s face it - feels very current and zeitgeisty. What is there to be *not* anxious about right now?
Clare offers himself up as a very anxious guinea pig. He talks to leading researchers in relevant areas of science and to practitioners of various therapies and interventions, trying out a good portion of what they are offering with mixed results. He has a knack for a good turn of phrase (a human is described both as “a macaque with an elaborate cover story” and as a “fragile robot, our most vulnerable organ defended by the equivalent of a an upturned pudding bowl wrapped in ham”). The book also contained a surprising number of poo stories and I enjoyed them very much. But this is not a frivolous piece of writing. Clare has written a nuanced, intelligent interrogation of this complicated state of mind.
While the book taught me a lot about anxiety (even if a big chunk was how much we don’t know), I think it’s greatest achievement is as a kind of manual on how to engage with science and research as a lay person. In the internet age, research is more accessible than ever, but it takes a skilled reader to weigh the evidence, and Clare helps with that without ever being boring.
Fascinating stuff, especially (but not only) if you have a personal connection to the topic.
Clare offers himself up as a very anxious guinea pig. He talks to leading researchers in relevant areas of science and to practitioners of various therapies and interventions, trying out a good portion of what they are offering with mixed results. He has a knack for a good turn of phrase (a human is described both as “a macaque with an elaborate cover story” and as a “fragile robot, our most vulnerable organ defended by the equivalent of a an upturned pudding bowl wrapped in ham”). The book also contained a surprising number of poo stories and I enjoyed them very much. But this is not a frivolous piece of writing. Clare has written a nuanced, intelligent interrogation of this complicated state of mind.
While the book taught me a lot about anxiety (even if a big chunk was how much we don’t know), I think it’s greatest achievement is as a kind of manual on how to engage with science and research as a lay person. In the internet age, research is more accessible than ever, but it takes a skilled reader to weigh the evidence, and Clare helps with that without ever being boring.
Fascinating stuff, especially (but not only) if you have a personal connection to the topic.
July 18, 2022
A few nuggets of information but more of a autobiography of someone trying to deal with his anxiety rather than a self help guide for the reader to deal with anxiety
November 27, 2022
I listened to this on audiobook format.
This is a very dense book. There’s a lot here to take in, as the author is very thorough with his investigations into anxiety disorders and mental health in general. It’s not easy reading and the author’s personal accounts of panic attacks is excruciating, but kudos to him for his honesty. As someone who has an anxiety disorder, I’m glad books are being written and published about it, by people who suffer from it.
This is a very dense book. There’s a lot here to take in, as the author is very thorough with his investigations into anxiety disorders and mental health in general. It’s not easy reading and the author’s personal accounts of panic attacks is excruciating, but kudos to him for his honesty. As someone who has an anxiety disorder, I’m glad books are being written and published about it, by people who suffer from it.
July 29, 2023
This book was a wonderful combination of science and story, and the final chapter was especially good at bringing it all together. I appreciated this passage from the last chapter: “What I’ve discovered is that the opposite of anxiety isn’t comfort. It’s curiosity. It’s appetite. It’s moving towards things that make you feel alive and embracing them, while doing your best to accept that things will go wrong.”
December 13, 2023
One of the best books on anxiety I've read. It approaches anxiety from every possible angle and concludes that there are no easy answers, or rather, that the answers are different for everyone, and may be a combination of many different things.
For someone who describes himself as a coward, Tim Clare's been very brave.
For someone who describes himself as a coward, Tim Clare's been very brave.
May 14, 2024
Good book, still anxious tho.
May 20, 2022
This book starts with a promise, but ultimately doesn't deliver any real answers - but it's still a good read.
It is an interesting foray into the current views on the causes of anxiety, and to some extent, depression. It also looks at some of the history around treatments, or butchery, that has been practised on the poor souls blighted with anxiety issues.
However, all you will walk away with is what the author did to get better. The rest is various experts basically saying 'Dunno!' to any question he asked them, or answers that relate to mice.
One bit I did like was a discussion on Scientism. With what has happened with COVID and is happening with Climate change, it makes you realise that scientist don't know everything - even if they think they do.
Actually, his discussion about SSRI's is good, and the first time I've seen someone find an expert that would confirm that drugs don't always work - going to show my GP that one!!!
Worth a read, even if it is just to learn that the experts aren't much more knowledgeable than we are!
It is an interesting foray into the current views on the causes of anxiety, and to some extent, depression. It also looks at some of the history around treatments, or butchery, that has been practised on the poor souls blighted with anxiety issues.
However, all you will walk away with is what the author did to get better. The rest is various experts basically saying 'Dunno!' to any question he asked them, or answers that relate to mice.
One bit I did like was a discussion on Scientism. With what has happened with COVID and is happening with Climate change, it makes you realise that scientist don't know everything - even if they think they do.
Actually, his discussion about SSRI's is good, and the first time I've seen someone find an expert that would confirm that drugs don't always work - going to show my GP that one!!!
Worth a read, even if it is just to learn that the experts aren't much more knowledgeable than we are!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 23, 2023
Tim Clare (2022) COWARD (AUDIOBOOK)
BorrowBox - Canongate Books
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5 out of 5 stars
The sleeve reads, "Tim Clare has suffered from extreme anxiety and panic attacks for a decade. At their worst, his attacks would see him curled on the floor, screaming at his wife for help. This was something the couple just got used to and were able to manage, until they became parents. With the arrival of Tim's daughter came a new wave of extreme anxiety, triggered by the knowledge that his own mental ill-health could be negatively impacting his child. It was at this point that Tim made a promise to himself—that he would try everything he could to get better, every method and medicine. In Coward, Tim explores all the possible treatments for anxiety, from SRIs to hypnosis, from running to extreme diets. He interviews experts in each field and becomes a guinea pig, testing their methods on himself. By the end of the audiobook, Tim will know what helps him and what doesn't, and what might help others, but most of all, he'll come to rethink anxiety and ask all of us to do the same."
=====
This isn't to sound picky. But, for me this was to wordy/academic/jargon-heavy to work as an audiobook. By that I mean an audiobook that I could easily follow. It's a stonking book on mental health - anxiety/depression - and I would bet my life that if I had read it in book-book format I am certain I would've gotten more from it. Hope that makes sense. It's still a solid 5 stars!
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#TimClare #Coward #Books #Read #Reads #Reading #Review #Reviews #BookReview #BookReviews #GoodReads #Audiobook #Audiobooks #BorrowBox
BorrowBox - Canongate Books
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5 out of 5 stars
The sleeve reads, "Tim Clare has suffered from extreme anxiety and panic attacks for a decade. At their worst, his attacks would see him curled on the floor, screaming at his wife for help. This was something the couple just got used to and were able to manage, until they became parents. With the arrival of Tim's daughter came a new wave of extreme anxiety, triggered by the knowledge that his own mental ill-health could be negatively impacting his child. It was at this point that Tim made a promise to himself—that he would try everything he could to get better, every method and medicine. In Coward, Tim explores all the possible treatments for anxiety, from SRIs to hypnosis, from running to extreme diets. He interviews experts in each field and becomes a guinea pig, testing their methods on himself. By the end of the audiobook, Tim will know what helps him and what doesn't, and what might help others, but most of all, he'll come to rethink anxiety and ask all of us to do the same."
=====
This isn't to sound picky. But, for me this was to wordy/academic/jargon-heavy to work as an audiobook. By that I mean an audiobook that I could easily follow. It's a stonking book on mental health - anxiety/depression - and I would bet my life that if I had read it in book-book format I am certain I would've gotten more from it. Hope that makes sense. It's still a solid 5 stars!
=====
#TimClare #Coward #Books #Read #Reads #Reading #Review #Reviews #BookReview #BookReviews #GoodReads #Audiobook #Audiobooks #BorrowBox
October 25, 2023
I really enjoyed those passages where the author discusses his subjective experience of anxiety and the feelings and emotions surrounding it. By writing down and elaborating on his thoughts during his panic attacks and constant worries, the author provided me with solace and helped me feel less mad about my own struggles with anxiety. He also employs humor to mock his anxiety and the ludicrousness of it which created a better reading experience for me. In a funny way, even though this book is riddled with painstaking stories and facts about anxiety it ends up providing an optimistic outlook on anxiety that is rather reassuring.
With that said, this book gets exceedingly technical in some parts which are hard to follow. While I appreciate the length to which the author researches anxiety and his effort to provide a holistic explanation of its origins and innate mechanisms, I struggled to retain a lot of the technical information and in certain situations felt discouraged to continue reading. Hence, I'd recommend to new readers to focus on those chapters that interest them.
With that said, this book gets exceedingly technical in some parts which are hard to follow. While I appreciate the length to which the author researches anxiety and his effort to provide a holistic explanation of its origins and innate mechanisms, I struggled to retain a lot of the technical information and in certain situations felt discouraged to continue reading. Hence, I'd recommend to new readers to focus on those chapters that interest them.
March 29, 2023
This book cleverly mixes science with personal experiences. The personal anecdotes and contemplations were the highlights in this book for me. I really appreciated how brutally honest the author was about his own experiences. Even if certain stories might have been embarrassing to tell, he doesn’t shy away from telling them anyway. Hearing how he perceived certain treatments for anxiety was insightful and sometimes even fun to read about. I did get lost in the scientific parts quite often or just didn’t find them as interesting as the anecdotes (I personally am not that interested in the causes for anxiety or how robots get taught about it) so after while I did skim certain chapters. Especially as, after a while, the focus becomes a lot more scientific and personal experiences fade to the background a bit more. Thankfully towards the end it does wrap up nicely. All in all this was a good blend though, and this makes for an interesting, thought-provoking read.
December 30, 2022
This book says its not a science book and thats a bit fat lie, luckily I enjoy science books and found this super insightful! Sadly this book didn’t suggest anything that I hadn’t already tried but it was interesting to read why all the methods i’ve also explored, in theory, should help. I found his personal experiences draining so watch out for this if you’re not in the mood, but in fairness I expected it as it’s clearly advertised as discussing the author’s personal journey and it doesn’t go into excruciating detail.
August 26, 2022
Only of interest if you care about the author's own anxieties. It won't really guide you to resources to cope with your own. (Not that it promises to, to be fair, but probably does not add to what you have researched yourself.)
August 17, 2022
This is an important book, not just because of the amount of work and research that went into making it but for the first-hand account of someone on an incredible journey to "fix" his own mental health for the love of his daughter. I just can't fathom how much bravery and strength it took to go through all this and then to share it with us, to lay bare his own fragility for us all to see. Absolute hero.
The access to scientists and researchers is great. It is insightful, inspiring and disheartening in equal measure to hear how much and how little we know. To me this makes it all the better, there are no easy answers and the author is honest about it. There are countless self-help authors/charlatans out there that will tell you differently so if that's what you are looking for go somewhere else. If you want an honest look at where the current scientific research is then this is the book for you.
If you want to know more about one person’s struggle with debilitating panic attacks, it’s impact on his life, and his family all told with funny self-awareness then this is well worth getting.
The access to scientists and researchers is great. It is insightful, inspiring and disheartening in equal measure to hear how much and how little we know. To me this makes it all the better, there are no easy answers and the author is honest about it. There are countless self-help authors/charlatans out there that will tell you differently so if that's what you are looking for go somewhere else. If you want an honest look at where the current scientific research is then this is the book for you.
If you want to know more about one person’s struggle with debilitating panic attacks, it’s impact on his life, and his family all told with funny self-awareness then this is well worth getting.
September 23, 2022
I heard Tim Clare be interviewed on a podcast (The Allusionist, Ep. 160) and really enjoyed him. I’m glad I got this on audiobook and recommend it for anybody who feels the anxiety of the present age.
In a hilarious and humble pseudo-memoir of his own anxiety, Clare tells the complex history of humanity’s relationship to anxiety and fear including the truly incredible (and in many cases) barbaric ways we’ve “treated” sufferers. Ultimately, his journey leads to a realistic expectation and invitation to avoid pathologizing fear responses and to compassionately expand our definition of “normal.”
I especially appreciated his use of “Coward” as his title and his description/deconstruction of “cowardice” as a form of social control.
In a hilarious and humble pseudo-memoir of his own anxiety, Clare tells the complex history of humanity’s relationship to anxiety and fear including the truly incredible (and in many cases) barbaric ways we’ve “treated” sufferers. Ultimately, his journey leads to a realistic expectation and invitation to avoid pathologizing fear responses and to compassionately expand our definition of “normal.”
I especially appreciated his use of “Coward” as his title and his description/deconstruction of “cowardice” as a form of social control.
March 31, 2024
I'm not a very numbers and logistics person, so for the sake of managing my own anxiety, I would skim through data provided to get to the content that relates to me. I recommend those who may be put off by certain parts of the narrative to do the same, because I believe this book is meant to be pluralistic. It covers so many perspectives and history on the topic of anxiety, processed through the lens of the author, that different parts of it will connect to different people.
I applaud the honest and vulnerable investigation as well as the validation of uncertainty in life being useful, that anxiety is useful. The entire spectrum of the human experience is incredibly vast, and none are villains.
Highly recommend for a breakthrough in perspectives.
I applaud the honest and vulnerable investigation as well as the validation of uncertainty in life being useful, that anxiety is useful. The entire spectrum of the human experience is incredibly vast, and none are villains.
Highly recommend for a breakthrough in perspectives.
August 1, 2022
What a slog, but worth it. The anti-Sarah Wilson, Clare is, sometimes excruciatingly, methodical and detailed in unpacking the science around each of the mainstream (and some less conventional) approaches to reducing anxiety. The final two chapters, effectively the book’s conclusion, are probably a super effective TLDR if you don’t have 14 hours to listen/ages to read. I think I got more out of them than anything else in the book.
December 29, 2022
I was never going to finish it quickly as there is a lot of science and concept in it, but I enjoyed moving from theory to funny (and bittersweet) anecdotes and back again. I found that made it more accessible, and when I got to the end I felt like I'd been on a journey. I felt like the swinging pendulum between gritty theory and deeply personal anecdote was very relevant to the conclusion of the book.
April 6, 2023
Interesting book about anxiety. It has a lot of research behind it so can be a bit heavy at times. It doesn’t provide any answers per se, but these books shouldn’t. Everybody is different and what might help one person won’t impact another. However, it does bring up some points that might be useful try. I liked the author and including his own life experience made this book more personal and relatable.
September 28, 2023
I love Tim and have listened to his Death of a thousand Cuts writing podcast for years. So I bought this on kindle and then got the audio at a reduced price; it seems only right to hear him read it to me.
It is more of a memoir as he talks to people on his podcast that can assist him, and then he runs off and tries it out; everything from psychedelic mushrooms to wild river swimming.
3 stars
It is more of a memoir as he talks to people on his podcast that can assist him, and then he runs off and tries it out; everything from psychedelic mushrooms to wild river swimming.
3 stars
March 28, 2024
While this is an extremely interesting book and I learned a lot, it is quite long, heavily scientific and presenting more facts than one can remember. This makes it a demanding read and I think the key messages could have been presented similarly interesting in a bit shorter and easier to read. What I love however is the way in which Tim Clark describes a panic attack in such a relatable way that without ever having had one you can relate and empathize.
September 26, 2024
Mental health is a terribly complicated and difficult subject. This book makes it easy to read about, partly because the writer has put his vulnerability on display and partly because he is funny. He talks about the debilitating type of anxiety episodes, and the more generic ones. He talks about the kind of solutions that are thrown about, like meditation, hypnosis, exercise, religion and others. He talks from experience. Each experience with the domain expert is absurd and hopeful in its own way.
January 6, 2023
Clare doesn't offer easy answers but instead presents science's current best understanding of anxiety from every possible angle, elucidated and illustrated with his own experiences along the way. Whether you yourself struggle with anxiety or you know someone who does, this book will give you valuable insight and encouragement.
October 20, 2023
This is one of those books that helps put things into perspective. If you think you’re suffering from anxiety, read this book and find out that maybe you aren’t or that you’re just “normal” anxious. I appreciated how well researched it was and how genuine, though the many technical terms and explanations made a little long and heavy to read.
March 8, 2024
A decent book on the various touted cures on anxiety. One good thing is the author does not give any promises. He just says these are stuff I looked into. They might or might not help you based on research. The book goes around quite a bit with the jargon and all.
Overall, not a bad read but not something I can gush over.
Overall, not a bad read but not something I can gush over.
March 18, 2024
I found the science and research parts of this book fascinating, and personally would have enjoyed it more without the author sharing his personal experiences. The inclusion of his stories demonstrates his motivations to research and write the book, and provides some breaks from the dense research which some readers might appreciate.
June 12, 2022
Marvellous. Clare approaches the problem (and its possible solutions) from all angles, with an authoritative, if at times self-deprecating, tone. Like a concerned friend drawing you aside for a helpful chat.
August 17, 2022
Very interesting book a roller coaster ride through anxiety, causes and treatments. Delivered in a personal and revealing telling. Well done Mr Clare I thoroughly enjoyed your book!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews