BOOK REVIEW - Detox Your Thoughts by Andrea Bonior
by Fran Hauser
Guest Editor
Detox Your Thoughts by Andrea Bonior.
Due to the pandemic and everything else going on in the world, my negative thinking has been at an all-time high and this book couldn’t have been published at a better time. Detox Your Thoughts offers specific, concrete practices to help improve the way we relate to our brains. I greatly appreciated the insight of “you are not your thoughts,” and I think it’s really important to remind ourselves of this.
A few of my favorite insights:
A thought can’t be toxic on its own. A dysfunctional thought only starts to poison us when we give it undeserved power.
Negative thoughts are sometimes just the equivalent of a party crasher or the drunken loudmouth behind you at the stadium. And anxious thoughts are often unreliable narrators.
One way to disempower your thought is to engage in “self-distancing”, where you take a step back and become an impartial observer of your thoughts.
Dr. Bonior has studied, taught, and practiced the science of thoughts, emotions, and behavior for more than 20 years. She teaches on the faculty of Georgetown University and writes a column for the Washington Post called Baggage Check. She drops so many pearls of wisdom in this book, one of my favorites being: “You have the capacity to grow deeper, more engaged, and more authentic than you can even imagine. Don’t be afraid to get to know yourself, and to look with an open heart and fully opened eyes at what you find.”
Fran Hauser is a bestselling author, startup investor and champion of women. For more of her book recommendations, follow @fransbookshelf on Instagram.
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