Tag Team Review No. 8: David Burns's Feeling Good Together

Deborah Bigelow and Fran Mentch -- Library Journal, 11/18/2008 7:18:00 AM

Oprah flogs it, the New York Times tracks it, and for the last eight years, LJ has reviewed it in earnest. I’m talking, of course, about self-help, an American obsession if there ever was one. Because it has as many proponents as it does detractors, the genre deserves to bleed on top of the barely dried hemoglobin of last month's romance loser. Enter, then, David Burns’s Feeling Good Together: The Secret to Making Troubled Relationships Work (December, Broadway).—Heather McCormack

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Contender No. 1: Who better than LJ’s Self-Help columnist of three years, Deborah Bigelow, to beat down this sequel to Burns’s four-million best seller Feeling Good? Director of the Leonia P.L. (NJ), Bigelow recently honed her critical acumen as a judge on the 2008 Books for a Better Life Awards committee. And, she’s not afraid to get creative with a jigsaw (see her picture below—that's the galley getting sliced, not a piece of wood).

First of all, you have to realize there’s a formula for writing self-help books. It goes like this: state the problem; stress that your approach is the answer; state why your book isn’t like other books on the subject; proceed to offer the same thing as your competitors; come up with a number of stages or steps and a clever acronym (e.g., an "E.A.R." checklist for listening techniques); and provide glowing case studies that demonstrate how lives were changed using your advice.

 So flows David Burns’s Feeling Good Together, which is not to say the author wastes the reader’s time. Not at all. In the first few chapters, Burns develops the theme that unhappy couples really don’t want change—it’s more rewarding to scapegoat, foster anger, and wallow in self-pity. Interesting.

What would you do if you could push a magic button, and your partner would have all the qualities you’d want him or her to have? Hmmmm.Wouldn’t that be just a little weird? And, truthfully, isn’t there some pleasure in complaining? Think about it. Would you push the button or not?

Burns says that if you do want a change, you have to examine your own role in the problem. Good solid psychology there. He goes on to explain how couples should express feelings openly and directly, listen nondefensively, and treat each other with respect. Good stuff here. So are the five secrets of effective communication. They include having empathy, giving positive strokes, and using "I feel" messages.

Where Burns gets a little carried away is when he proposes "intimacy drills" in which partners take turns being talker and listener, and analyzing verbatims using codes such as "DT" (disarming technique), or "FE" (feeling empathy). When I review relationship books, I always give them the WWC&D do test—What would Charles (my husband of 37 years) & Deborah (me) do? Somehow, I cannot see coming home from work and unpacking an "intimacy toolkit" or doing a "Blame Cost-Benefit Analysis." But someone might.

In the end, Feeling Good Together would be a valuable purchase for most public libraries. Even if someone just picked up a few good tips, it would be worth its cover price.

Contender No. 2: An LJ reviewer since 2006, Fran Mentch holds a special place in my print roster for being able to tackle psychology, social science, child rearing, and even medicine with equal skill. This academic librarian at Cleveland State University embraced the Tag Team concept so much—check out her book wrestling persona, the Muckraker!—I felt like I was in a headlock.

Some social scientists would argue that in America we find ourselves and the possibilities for self-improvement endlessly fascinating. The popularity of self-help books gives credence to the idea that we constantly consume in the hopes of attaining "perfection." In other words, self-help books give me heartburn.

Part of it’s my age; after 50, it’s hard to find yourself fascinating, and clearly no one else does. It’s been said that once women hit middle age, they become invisible, and it’s true in my experience. Beyond the fact that navel-gazing eventually loses its charm, the self-help genre also loses its grip on you once you decipher the formula. The recipe for the successful self-help book is two parts touchy-feely, two parts interesting vignettes, one part self-recrimination, one part self-disclosure, one part pep talk, and, finally, a pinch of "scientific" proof. The icing on the cake is usually a chart, guide, or checklist that helps you understand and remember the Main Principles.

I felt this specific case of heartburn coming on when I first picked up Feeling Good Together and realized that I would have to type the words "physician author" into the review. That said, Burns’s book is better than most. Why? Because Burns has been in the trenches of psychiatry providing cognitive-behavioral therapy for a long time, and he has the wisdom and ability to reflect on his experiences. He is also an experienced author. In this work, he is building on the synergy of his best seller Feeling Good, six other self-help books, and a very busy workshop schedule. And, it is a great idea for a book, because who among us doesn’t want a better relationship with someone?

Burns approaches the subject of helping people with some humility and admits that not all people are willing to change. This is refreshingly honesty in a genre where "understanding" cures all and the myth that everyone can be changed is vigorously and mindlessly propagated. And, his anecdotes are entertaining, although everyone in them is rich, just like in the movies.

Why else do I like this book? Because it contains "Your Intimacy Toolkit." Calm down, people—it’s not what you think. It’s a set of verbal and written exercises designed to help you improve communication and evaluate your relationships.

David Sedaris tells a story about his mother getting tired of David and his siblings after they spent too many snow days home from school. She decided that they needed some fresh air and sent them out, locking the door behind them. I never did that exactly, but when my kids were little, and I got tired of their endless needs, I would occasionally yell, "You figure it out!"

We need more of this—people figuring things out for themselves, and Burns clearly states that readers have to work on the exercises he provides and try to understand their experiences, or their relationships will not improve.

Will this book change your life? Who knows? I doubt it, but it is harmless, and you are going to buy it anyway for your library’s self-help aficionados. In complete fairness, reading it did make me a kinder and gentler person, for a few hours, and heaven knows the world needs all the kinder and gentler people it can get.

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