Telling Yourself the Truth - by William Backus & Marie Chapian

About the book:

The truth will set you free!
I dropped the ball and feel like a failure as a parent/spouse/friend, or, I lost my job; I am useless. This is negative self-talk at its finest. Negative thinking produces negative emotions, negative reactions, and negative behavior. Don’t be a victim of circumstances; self-destroying lies will keep you from achieving true happiness.

But true happiness is possible if you stop believing your lies. The authors explain Misbelief Therapy, a life-changing method, in an easy-to-understand way. Learning to deal with your thoughts, they say, is the first step to healthy thinking. They’ll help you stop the misbelief, I’m so lonely and miserable, and replace it with the truth: I’m alone, but not lonely. God loves me with an everlasting love, and I am invaluable to Him. Once you pull the negative thoughts out and replace them with the truth, you will see that you can lead a satisfying and fulfilling emotional life. Based on the Bible, Telling Yourself the Truth has continuously helped thousands of people for more than thirty years. This newest edition now includes a helpful study guide.

My review:

This is a wonderful, insightful book I think everyone needs to read!  When I decided to read it, I thought it looked interesting, but wasn't sure how much of it would really apply to me.  However, I started to realize that I need to work on some of the areas in this book.  Probably everyone engages in negative self-talk in one form or another and this book really makes you pay attention to every word you tell yourself.  Is this thought true or is it a lie?  Some of the topics are misbeliefs in depression, anger, anxiety, lack of self-control, fear of change and relationships with others.  The authors back up their claims with a lot of Scripture and take you step-by-step through realizing the misbeliefs you have, removing them and replacing them with the truth.  They also give helpful advice for how to deal with different situations.  They give a lot of examples of people so it's easy to see it played out.  These techniques have been proven to work in the author's own practice and these principles are actually from the Bible and have been around since before King Solomon. There's a wonderful study guide included with space to write in answers and thoughts.  I highly recommend this book to everyone!

I received a free copy of this book from Bethany House Publishers in exchange for an honest review.