The User's Guide to the Human Mind: Why Our Brains Make Us Unhappy, Anxious, and Neurotic and What We Can Do about It

by Shawn T. Smith PsyD

Overview

Your mind is not built to make you happy; it’s built to help you survive. So far, it’s done a great job! But in the process, it may have developed some bad habits, like avoiding new experiences or scrounging around for problems where none exist. Is it any wonder that worry, bad moods, and self-critical thoughts so often get in the way of enjoying life?

Based in acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), The User’s Guide to the Human Mind is a road map to the puzzling inner workings of the human mind, replete with exercises for overriding the mind’s natural impulses toward worry, self-criticism, and fear, and helpful tips for acting in the service of your values and emotional well-being—even when your mind has other plans.

•Find out how your mind tries to limit your behavior and your potential

•Discover how pessimism functions as your mind’s error management system

•Learn why you shouldn’t believe everything you think

•Overrule your thoughts and feelings and take charge of your mind and your life

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781608820528
Publisher:	New Harbinger Publications
Publication date:	12/01/2011
Series:	Unassigned Series
Pages:	216
Sales rank:	674,867
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Shawn T. Smith, PsyD, is a psychologist in private practice who has enjoyed a lifelong fascination with the mind. He has done clinical work in diverse locations, including a rape crisis clinic, the International Commission on Missing Persons in Bosnia, and the Colorado prison system. Smith lives in Denver, CO, with his wife, daughter, and their dog.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction 1

What This Book Is About

Part 1 The Worry Machine

1 Protection at a Price 9

Luke's Struggle

My Mind, My Bodyguard

The Argument Trap

The Paradox of Thought Suppression

2 A Day in the Life of a Mind 23

What Is the Mind?

Why the Mind Worries

How the Mind Speaks

Anxiety and Depression: Ancient Tools for Modern Times

The Mind Is Always Rational, from a Certain Point of View

3 Letting the Mind Do Its Job 35

From the Mind's Point of View, Survival Matters Most

Thoughts Are Not Facts

Observing Your Thoughts

Observing Your Emotions

Part 2

Happiness Is Not Your Mind's Job

4 How the Mind Uses History 51

How Penelope Lost Track of Her Values

The Past Is Not the Problem

The Mind's False Dilemmas

5 The Mind's Skewed View and Biased Memories 65

What the Mind Fears and How It Responds

The Survival Value of Biased Recall

How the Mind Makes Rules to Keep Us Safe

6 Values and Action 75

Training the Mind to Tolerate the Pursuit of Values

The Higher Mind

Finding Your Values

Control Your Life, Not Your Mind

The Trap of Waiting for Thoughts and Feelings to Change

Take Your Mind with You on the Road to Valued Living

Part 3 Four Ways Our Minds Coerce Us-and What We Can Do About Them

7 That Was Then and This Is Then 97

What Meg Doesn't Know About Andy

Why Our Minds Rely on History

8 Trump Cards and Double Standards 111

Trump Cards

Responding to Trump Cards

Double Standards

Staying Observant and Maintaining Distance

9 Pessimistic Thinking 129

It Isn't Pessimism-It's Error Management

Pessimism: The Ancient Cure for Modern Times

Living with a Pessimistic Mind

10 Quick Fixes 143

How the Mind Competes with Itself

Breaking the Quick-Fix Habit

Managing the Drive for Quick Fixes

Part 4 Mood, Lifestyle, and Psychological Flexibility

11 Welcome to Your State of Mind 159

Mallory's Mood

Don't Trust Every Mood You Meet

My Mind Might Be Wrong

Opposite Action: Moving Toward Values

To Medicate or Not to Medicate?

12 Mind the Basics 173

How Healthy Habits Insulate Us from the Mind

One Final Exercise: Increasing Psychological Flexibility for a Lifetime

References 193

Editorial Reviews

You’ve been using the tool between your ears your whole life, but how often have you considered what it is and what it is good for? No user’s manual came with it, but this book helps make up for that shipping mistake. You would not use your dishwasher without cracking the manual. Come on. Time to take a look!”

—Steven C. Hayes, PhD, Foundation Professor of Psychology at the University of Nevada and author of Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life

From the Publisher

Smith, a clinical psychologist and blogger at ironshrink.com, defines the mind as "the combined systems that churn away beneath our conscious awareness." Because of a genetic history that reaches back to prehistoric days, our minds continually try to protect us from environmental dangers. These protection mechanisms, which can include anxiety, depression, instant gratification, pessimistic thoughts, and immobilizing thoughts, are the mind's way of attempting to regulate our behavior and stop us from doing what it perceives as dangerous. Smith explains that only after we have found a set of values, i.e., "the principles and standards that drive us toward meaningful action," can we act deliberately against what the mind dictates. Many exercises in introspection (some quite difficult) are provided to help achieve this aim, as well as strategies, case studies, and suggestions of lifestyle changes. VERDICT Despite plenty of humor and numerous examples, this discussion of the human psyche is complex—covering emotions, thoughts, moods, and the internal battle between our primitive and higher minds. Still, though it lacks the simple explanations necessary for wide appeal, the book will nevertheless please serious readers of psychology.—Maryse Breton, Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales du Québec, Montreal

Library Journal

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