These are three books that have really helped me with depression, anxiety, grief, relationships, love, and suicidal ideation: The Power of Now Mating in Captivity Why People Die By Suicide
Rachel Havocos has struggled with depression, anxiety, complex ptsd, sexual trauma. She shares three books that have dramatically helped her with her mental health. If you have books that you love, please put them in the comments.
Three Books that Help with My Mental Health hi, my name is Rachel Havocos. I'm a writer and mental health advocate and I share my experiences with mental health online in hopes of helping one person feel less alone. So today I'm going to share with you three books out of many, many, many that I've read. So I might make a series on this that have dramatically helped me with my mental health. I have struggled with depression, anxiety, complex ptsd, sexual trauma. I have also experienced a lot of grief in my life and these books have really helped me in a variety of ways.
I'm going to share them with you. The first one is the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. So this book is about learning to be in the present and letting go of staying attached to the past and ruminating and fixating on the future. So this book is really powerful if you struggle with anxiety because it helps you sort of get out of those spiraling thoughts that have to do with nothing that's happening in the present moment or depression because it helps us to find what's happening right here and now and find gratitude for what's in this moment.
It also really helps with grief because it helps us honor what we've been attached to or letting go of in the past and bringing us back into the present moment. So again, that's the power of now. Second book that has really helped me is Mating in Captivity by Esther Perel. Oh my, she is brilliant. Esther Perel is a Belgian marriage and family therapist. She has a podcast called Where Do We Begin? She is just a brilliant, brilliant relationship expert. And in this book she talks a lot about relationship dynamics and how relationships have changed in the modern world and what is important now and what creates a lot of conflict for us in those relationships.
So even though it's a book about relationships, it really does help you better understand who you are as a human being and as an individual. And it reduces a lot of shame, I think as well around what we want, what our desires are, what feels good. It kind of like allows us to soften some pieces that feel perhaps dark or taboo in our internal sexual, relational world. So again, Mating in Captivity and finally, why People Die by Suicide by Thomas Joyner. So this book is is difficult to read. So please know that you don't need to read this book.
And if you are someone that has struggled, struggled with depression, suicidal depression, borderline personality disorder, or if you know somebody that has this book has a beautiful theory to understand why people die by suicide. And it wasn't until I read this book that I truly felt like I understood my suicidal ideation and suicidal thinking and it it shifted how I felt about it in a way that has allowed me to not be suicidal since. So I'm not saying this is a cure, and I'm saying it can create a deep sense of relief and understanding around that really complicated, nuanced experience of being suicidal.
So again, really, really difficult to read, but incredibly insightful why People die by suicide. I hope that was helpful. If you have books that you love, please put them in the comments. I'm always excited and eager to read more, and I will probably share some more with you in the future.
