Geth and I have a good-sized pile of classic productivity and self-help books that were donated to us by Dad a few years back. Last year, when I was going through our books after the move, this one caught my eye, and I put it aside for reading.
It’s about human psychology, which I always find quite interesting – it focuses on the way that our experiences in the first five years of childhood, during which we are constantly told that we’re doing things wrong and are therefore ‘not OK’, form problematic habits in feeling and thinking that last into adult life. It also gives advice about ways of mitigating this problem – for instance, understanding that others’ reactions may be coming from their ‘not OK’ child inside – although I didn’t find that part hugely helpful.
The book was written in the ’60s, and so a lot of the context is hugely dated nowadays (for instance, an example of conflict is given where a white man gets upset about his daughter bringing a black boyfriend home, and this is presented as a normal thing!). As such, I’d be keen to read a modern discussion of what is introduced in this book, as I think it is an interesting way of looking at things.