BECOME SMARTYR NOT A MARTYR

A guide provides a comprehensive look at reinvention through self-hypnosis.

Kerr and Virdee believe that “the first step to satisfy curiosity in all aspects of mental health is psychoeducation.” To that end, they offer readers a detailed questionnaire right at the start of their discussion of that psychoeducation, with prompts like “I never know what I want for myself; I always let others make choices for me, and I hate that” and “I find it really hard to ask anyone to take care of my needs.” Their goal is to facilitate personal transformation, to enable people to create new realities for themselves—in their terms, to stop being a martyr to the negative forces trying to pull apart their inner contentment and instead create a “smartyr Self.” The means of doing this is self-hypnosis, a much-used, although often misunderstood, therapeutic technique. This is shaped by the authors for the broader purpose of helping their readers to assess what parts of their lives are currently displeasing and work on strategies to get from where they are to where they want to be. The authors can be prone to clichés, including one of the oldest and most debatable of them all: “Real change happens from within.” They make the occasional gaffe (rendering Edward Albee’s famous play Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?as Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe, for instance). And although they’re fond of what could charitably be called counterintuitive ideas (“Your personal values, good or bad, are innate within you,” goes one such. “They are not deliberately chosen or selected”), they compensate with a cheerful, informed tone of encouragement. In their absorbing and thought-provoking work, they aim this comforting reassurance squarely at readers who feel hopeless. “Life is boring when nothing changes,” they write. “Change happens as you step out of your place of familiarity.”

An immersive and intellectually engaging plan for achieving personal change.