Hmmmm…. Well, I am in fact as miserable as when I started but it is still an often helpful book. Ma relies a lot on stories about her late mother who was a Chinese immigrant and her extended family, as well on the advice of experts on everything from Buddhism to the vagus nerve to forest bathing and lots of psychological studies.

At times the stories felt dismissive. For instance, she writes about her great grandfather being beheaded in the street and her great grandmother being seized as a consort who was allowed to milk a cow every day for years and buy her freedom. Ma’s grandmother and other relatives taught her to just “eat bitter” and accept the unpleasantness of life. It’s hard to justify feeling sad about your own grief and trauma after a story like that, and it reminds me of the high school friend who told me that there were people who were locked in basements their whole lives and were now happy so I should get over the traumas and abuse that I was struggling with.

This isn’t a book that will necessarily help if you are mourning, dealing with severe depression or complex PTSD, recovering from abuse, or struggling with other real mental health issues. Ma is the editor of Psychology Today and this is reflected in the book. However, it does go into helpful tools and interesting stories.

I read a digital version of this book for review.