Thankfully, mental health is being spoken about more and more openly as the years go on. There is no longer a negative stigma attached to it and people are much more willing to share their problems and seek health. It’s such an important topic because we all struggle from time to time. Here are my favourite books to read when you’re not 100% feeling yourself…
1. Mad Girl by Bryony Gordon
Bryony Gordon shares a beautiful account of her life struggling with mental illness, in an unpredictable, heart-rending and sometimes hilarious way. She suffers from extreme OCD so this book will be extremely helpful for other OCD sufferers out there. She gives honest and deep insights into how OCD control her life, through her thoughts that she couldn’t get rid of. Even to the most ridiculous things, such as her family dying if she doesn’t repeat a phrase three times. It shares the small steps she took on the road to recovery with a step by step guide to help others too.
2. Reasons To Stay Alive by Matt Haig
There’s ALWAYS a reason to stay alive and Matt Haig will remind you of this throughout the book. This book centres around depression, it’s something that everyone should read, whether they suffer from a mental illness or not. He shares his experiences with depression, feelings of hopelessness and thoughts of suicide. It goes on to tell of all of the reasons he found to live and why everyone needs to hold on and hope for better days. Because they WILL come. It’s a celebration of living as much as a look into the dark side of life.
3. The Little Book of Mindfulness by Patrizia Collard
Patrizia Collard gives many small steps you can take day by day to improve your mindfulness and overall happiness in life. It follows seven main steps that will help you with different aspects in your life. They are as follows:
⦁ Being in the Now
⦁ Accept and Respond
⦁ Making Your Mind Up
⦁ Simply Be
⦁ Mindful Eating
⦁ Gratitude and Compassion
⦁ Everyday Mindfulness
4. The Upside of Stress by Kelly McGonigal
We all are taught how stress is bad for us and to avoid it as much as possible. But as we have all probably experienced, stress is sometimes unavoidable and life is bound to chuck stressful scenarios at us from time to time. McGonigal gives us insights into how we can change our mindset on stress so that when unavoidable stress comes our way, we can gain something positive out of it. She gives many examples of the advantages of experiencing stress and even stressful periods in our lives. And many tips on how to reduce stress when it arises. There’s an upside!
5. May The Thoughts Be With You by Charlotte Reed
This book is oozing with positivity and might just be the positivity boost that you need! Charlotte Reed has recovered from depression and wants to share her now bright and positive outlook on life in the hope to help others. She does this with colourful characters and stories of hope. You’ll find that each message in the book will mean something different to you, depending on where you are at in life. Meaning it’s a truly unique experience for everyone.
6. The Anxiety Solution by Chloe Brotheridge
Brotheridge wrote this book to give hope to all anxiety suffers. She tells her story of what life was like stuck in an anxiety cycle slowly losing hope that the nightmare would eventually end – but it did. This book will help you to come to terms with the fact that anxiety is just a temporary problem and you are so much more. It advocates how anxiety is never a permanent part of someone and it will get better eventually. In the meantime, you can follow her small steps to help overcome this horrible mental illness that so many suffer from.