How to Be Your Own Best Friend

By Mildred Newman, Bernard Berkowitz and Jean Owen

What is real, lasting happiness? How does one achieve it? And why are so many people holding themselves back? At the heart of this profound, simple, beautiful book is the wisdom of Mildred Newman and Bernard Berkowitz, married psychoanalysts who encourage readers to both love themselves and to confront life’s hardest truths. A classic for more than three decades, How to Be Your Own Best Friend has already changed millions of lives. Now, open up your mind, and let it change yours.
 
Praise for How to Be Your Own Best Friend
 
“I want to tell you that it’s magic, but the whole point of the book is that there is no magic. So instead let me simply say that I can’t live without it.”—Nora Ephron
 
“A wonderful prescription for the blahs . . . an antidote to weariness, discouragement or loneliness.”—Los Angeles Times
 
“What the Berkowitzes unearthed . . . is a too-often-forgotten form of human intercourse called getting to know me.”—Chicago Tribune
 
“A kind of psychiatric pep talk . . . directed at people who [are] learning how to operate themselves.”—The New York Times
 
“Seductively jargon-free, presented in neat question-and-answer format.”—Houston Chronicle

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Sep 6, 2016
• ISBN: 9780425286777

Book preview

Book cover image

"There is no pill made that is as simple, effective and fast-working as How To Be Your Own Best Friend. If I’m gloomy, I read it twice a day with a glass of water. It has never failed to uplift me."

NEIL SIMON

I want to tell you that it’s magic, but the whole point of the book is that there is no magic. So instead let me simply say that I can’t live without it.

NORA EPHRON

At a time of trouble and confusion in my life, this book seemed to be a deep breath of mountain air.

BERRY BERENSON

A wonderful prescription for the blahs…an antidote to weariness, discouragement or loneliness.

Los Angeles Times

They explain in simple layman’s terms that each person has both the innate ability and the power to be happy…to make emotional choices freely, and to realize one’s potential more fully.

Book-of-the-Month Club News

"What the Berkowitzes unearthed…is a too-often-forgotten form of human intercourse called getting to know me."

Chicago Tribune

Read it over and over. It’s truly enjoyable, leaving the reader with a sense of relief, knowing there is logical reason for anxiety and frustration.

Hartford Courant

A kind of psychiatric pep talk…directed at people who have the patience to learn to operate a car but won’t be bothered learning how to operate themselves.

The New York Times

A formula to help people live more meaningful lives and give them the courage in overcoming the hang-ups that keep them from being happy.

Oakland Tribune

Seductively jargon free, presented in neat question-and-answer format.

Houston Chronicle

Sensible advice on how to give up childhood, accept yourself and your own maturity and deal with life on your own two feet.

Dallas Times Herald

By Mildred Newman & Bernard Berkowitz

HOW TO BE AWAKE & ALIVE

HOW TO BE YOUR OWN BEST FRIEND

A Conversation with Two Psychoanalysts How to Be Your Own Best Friend Mildred Newman & Bernard Berkowitz with Jean OwenA Conversation with Two Psychoanalysts How to Be Your Own Best Friend Mildred Newman & Bernard Berkowitz with Jean Owen

Copyright © 1971 by Mildred Newman and Bernard Berkowitz

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

BALLANTINE and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

Originally published in hardcover and in slightly different form in the United States by Random House, an imprint and division of Penguin Random House LLC, in 1971.

ISBN 9780425286395

Ebook ISBN 9780425286777

randomhousebooks.com

Cover design: Marietta Anastassatos

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Contents

Cover

By Mildred Newman & Bernard Berkowitz

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

The Conversation

About the Authors

To those who have helped us become our own best friends—each other, parents, children, patients, teachers, friends, and colleagues

Introduction YIntroduction Y

When Thoreau remarked that most men live lives of quiet desperation, he could not have foreseen how noisy that desperation would become. Modern man may suffer, like his forebears, but he does not suffer in silence. Our malaise is articulate; we talk about our troubles. More escape hatches may be open to us today, and we eagerly jump the chute. Work has always been available; we can now take further refuge in infinite varieties of entertainment or let an airplane remove us from the scenes of our discontent. But more and more, what’s bothering us is up for discussion.

We talk, of course, about what’s wrong with the world, about war and welfare, prices and pollution. But we also talk more frankly than ever before about what’s awry in our inner world, about frustration and boredom and anxiety, about difficulties with marriage and sex, about the lack of fulfillment in our lives. We may not be any unhappier than our ancestors, but one thing is clear: we do not accept misery as our natural state. Resignation