"Rarely have I read a book that challenged me to see myself in an entirely new light, and was at the same time laugh-out-loud funny and utterly absorbing." (Katie Couric)

"This is a daring, delightful, and transformative book." (Arianna Huffington, founder, Huffington Post and founder & CEO, Thrive Global)

"Wise, warm, smart, and funny. You must read this book." (Susan Cain, New York Times best-selling author of Quiet)

From a New York Times best-selling author, psychotherapist, and national advice columnist, a hilarious, thought-provoking, and surprising new book that takes us behind the scenes of a therapist's world - where her patients are looking for answers (and so is she).

One day, Lori Gottlieb is a therapist who helps patients in her Los Angeles practice. The next, a crisis causes her world to come crashing down. Enter Wendell, the quirky but seasoned therapist in whose office she suddenly lands. With his balding head, cardigan, and khakis, he seems to have come straight from Therapist Central Casting. Yet he will turn out to be anything but.

As Gottlieb explores the inner chambers of her patients' lives - a self-absorbed Hollywood producer, a young newlywed diagnosed with a terminal illness, a senior citizen threatening to end her life on her birthday if nothing gets better, and a 20-something who can't stop hooking up with the wrong guys - she finds that the questions they are struggling with are the very ones she is now bringing to Wendell.

With startling wisdom and humor, Gottlieb invites us into her world as both clinician and patient, examining the truths and fictions we tell ourselves and others as we teeter on the tightrope between love and desire, meaning and mortality, guilt and redemption, terror and courage, hope and change.

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone is revolutionary in its candor, offering a deeply personal yet universal tour of our hearts and minds and providing the rarest of gifts: a boldly revealing portrait of what it means to be human and a disarmingly funny and illuminating account of our own mysterious lives and our power to transform them.

Listening Length

14 hours and 21 minutes
Author

Lori Gottlieb
Narrator

Brittany Pressley
Audible release date

April 2, 2019
Language

English
Publisher

Audible Studios
ASIN

B07PYJB9Z9
Version

Unabridged
Program Type

Audiobook
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Product details

Listening Length	14 hours and 21 minutes
Author	Lori Gottlieb
Narrator	Brittany Pressley
Whispersync for Voice	Ready
Audible.com Release Date	April 02, 2019
Publisher	Audible Studios
Program Type	Audiobook
Version	Unabridged
Language	English
ASIN	B07PYJB9Z9
Best Sellers Rank	#246 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals) #2 in Medical General Psychology #5 in Love, Dating & Attraction #12 in Love & Romance (Books)

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2 star		2%
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Scott Herb H

Surprisingly insightful as well as entertaining!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 2, 2022

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I rarely give five stars; it is well earned in this case.
Superficially, this is a wonderful, readable story.. The writing is fantastic,, each character unique and their journeys, all of them, so interesting and compelling.
yet there is so much more than a great story here..
I will reread this immediately in an effort to more closely appreciate the subtle tips and processes used to better see the reality of hidden issues we struggle with. Through a therapist lense we see many different patients and many different problems and issues. Keys / strategies to see and identify the issues we struggle with and a better view to interpret these issues are demonstrated using basic terms and easy to understand scenarios. The characters, their problems and stories are familiar and relatable. We see real life examples of how past experiences sabotage our current reactions to new experiences. The reader needs only to carefully examine their own life to gain (almost certainly!) better understanding and with that insight, an informed clarity with which to newly see their own life
This is not a "self help" book; its not that simple. To really appreciate the benefits, it will take far more reflection and personal candor to find the guidance to improve or help yourself. The map is there if you choose to dig for it.
Ultimately, what I came to find I may have missed on my first pass. Even so, if its only that one issue that eludes me, there is still a vast treasure worth uncovering within these stories. And if your not looking for anything more than a good book, these stories are beautiful, personal and so moving. Its a great read!

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

I Highlighted SO Many Passages!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 13, 2019

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Do you know how difficult it is to whisper an ugly cry? I do. There I was at 3:30am, relaxed and enjoying the insight and surprising humour of this book, caught up in a ‘just one more chapter’ loop. Then, out of nowhere, I was ugly crying as quietly as possible so I didn’t wake up the sensible people in my home, those who actually sleep when it’s considered an acceptable time to do so. Okay, so it wasn’t exactly ‘out of nowhere’; I knew it was coming at some stage with that particular patient but I wasn’t expecting it right then.

That wasn’t the only time I cried during this book (there may have been another four tissue grabs and some very dignified sniffling involved) and it wasn’t the only time my tears caught me off guard (who knew I’d cry about the patient I initially loved to sneer at!) but it did remind me of some of the reasons why I never formally used my psychology degree.

Reason #1: Although I don’t cry a lot about my own stuff, I am a champion crier when it comes to pretty much anything else. Movies. TV shows. Songs. Books. When you cry about your stuff. When I think about your stuff and consider how brave, resilient, [insert any number of adjectives here] you were, are or are going to be. Who wants to come to therapy and feel like they need to console their therapist about their reaction to their patient’s problems?!

Reason #2: There would be certain types of people and life experiences where I just know I couldn’t remain impartial.

Reason #3: The goodbyes. See Reason #1.

Full disclosure: I started reading this book while my own therapist was on leave. Besides confirming my decision to not actually be a therapist (you’re so welcome, all of the people whose lives would have crossed my path in this way. I hope you found a Wendell instead!) I also got a glimpse of what it’s like behind the scenes for therapists, something I’ve always been interested in, something that’s difficult to obtain because of that pesky ‘confidentiality’ thing.

I’m not ashamed to say that I have my very own Wendell, who is awesome, by the way. None of us get out of life unscathed and I think pretty much everyone could benefit from therapy at some point in their lives. One of the perks this book offers is a therapeutic ‘try before you buy’; if you’ve been considering therapy but are hesitant to schedule that initial appointment, then reading this book will give you some idea of what to expect - from the therapist, from the experience, and how it looks when it’s done right.

“Sitting-with-you-in-your-pain is one of the rare experiences that people get in the protected space of a therapy room, but it’s very hard to give or get outside of it”

I enjoyed Lori’s down to earth approach, her compassion and ability to bring truth to a situation, while still making me smile along the way. She humanises our experience of pain and even when she’s talking about her own therapy, her insight and openness had me smiling in recognition much more frequently than the narrative made me cry.

Of her own therapy: “Yes, I’m seeking objectivity, but only because I’m convinced that objectivity will rule in my favor.”

Of her therapist: “He looks at me meaningfully, like he just said something incredibly important and profound, but I kind of want to punch him.”

A quote I love: “defenses serve a useful purpose. They shield people from injury … until they no longer need them.
It’s in this ellipsis that therapists work.”

And another: “People often mistake numbness for nothingness, but numbness isn’t the absence of feelings; it’s a response to being overwhelmed by too many feelings.”

Oh, and I have to share this one too: “When the present falls apart, so does the future we had associated with it. And having the future taken away is the mother of all plot twists. But if we spend the present trying to fix the past or control the future, we remain stuck in place, in perpetual regret.”

I highlighted so many passages in this book that each time I started another binge read it felt like I was experiencing my very own mini therapy session. I saw myself in Lori and in her patients, even the initial ‘love to sneer at’ one, probably because I saw something of myself in them as well. I saw my own therapist in Wendell and felt probably too much pride in having found myself such an amazing ‘Wendell’ to help me navigate my presenting problem as well as the real issues behind the facade.

From the presenting problem to the “doorknob disclosures”, “what-aboutery” and self-sabotage, all the way to the “termination” (seriously, can therapists collectively find a less aggressive way to label someone’s graduation from therapy?), I ‘just one more chaptered’ my way through this book.

Although at times I felt voyeuristic, have some outstanding questions about Lori’s patients I’m not entitled to know but still want to (Would you please tell me John’s real name or at least the name of the TV show you kept referencing so I can binge watch it?) and had at least one ugly cry headache as a result of reading this book, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to pretty much anyone.

Much like the way Lori talks about who therapy can’t help, I think the only people who wouldn’t benefit in some way by reading this book are those “who aren’t curious about themselves.”

I’ll leave you with what’s currently my favourite quote: “There’s no hierarchy of pain. Suffering shouldn’t be ranked, because pain is not a contest.”

Content warnings are included in my Goodreads review.

25 people found this helpful

Helpful

naturaldog

Enjoyable

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 17, 2022

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I enjoyed reading this book, and recommend it to others interested in the experience of therapy, with one caveat: The renditions of patients’ stories, here and there, seemed inauthentic, a little too conveniently evolved for effect and to successfully wrap up the various therapeutic relationships. An absorbing and rewarding book, nonetheless. The author’s, a therapist, discussion of her own therapeutic journey was actually the one that appeared the most honest and authentic.

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Wendi Gwaltney

Thank you

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 25, 2022

Verified Purchase

So much in our heads. Peace comes when we let it be. Let us each dance like no one is watching even if they are. A definite must read!

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Surbhi Sinha

This is not a self help book, it's even better!

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on May 21, 2020

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I started reading Maybe You Should Talk to Someone to be a part of a read-along and participate in it’s discussions. Here’s a thing I've realized about read-along’s – while they’re really good for you to read through a book quickly and have in-depth conversations about them, sometimes it may pull you out of your depth and turns out that this one was a bit too ambitious for me. As I read the book it occurred to me that that's okay and I’m quite glad to have finished the book at my own pace. It’s also the first time that I was reading two books simultaneously and now I have come to know myself better and also understood why I am a mono-reader – it’s because I enjoy savoring the story of an entire book before I move on to the next.

Despite what the title may suggest, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone is NOT a self-help book. It isn’t a book where the author imposes their idea of something on you AND it definitely is NOT a book asking you to go see a therapist! It’s rather a memoir of the author and therapist – Lori Gottlieb. It’s a narrative about her sessions with her therapist along with the journey of some of her patient’s – an obnoxious TV show writer, an alcoholic, a dying newly wed and a 70 year old depressed artist.

This week is mental health awareness week and the title of the book subtly addresses the stigma around mental health, subtly suggesting that if you feel like you need help, there’s nothing wrong in asking for it. Who you ask that help from is entirely up to you.

There were many enlightening moments in the book for me. The emotions that one faces in life are quite similar to those faced by many other’s as well. We're different people but all human, different OS on similar hardware. At times, the questions and feelings expressed by each patient and Lori had me subconsciously acknowledging that emotion too or it had me asking the same questions to myself. Some times it would also feel as if the author was calling me out on some of my toxic behaviors too.

In my opinion, the book is not to convince anyone to go see a therapist; rather it’s to help us question and understand our own entire humanity through the author’s journey. As the patient’s progressed in their journey’s I too became more affirmed that whenever I do need help, I will always have an option, and more importantly the choice, to to ask for it – which to me seems like the secondary intent of this memoir. I could be wrong about all of this but what I really want to say is that after quite a prolonged period, I’ve found a profound read and I am giving it nothing less than 5 bookmarks!

64 people found this helpful

Anukriti chaturvedi

Engaging & Insightful. A must read to understand therapy better.

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on February 3, 2021

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"Besides, aren't therapists, of all people, supposed to have their lives together?”

As I turn the last page of the book, there's this sort of lightness in my chest and dampness on my face. I can't help smiling and ruminate about what a therapeutic experienced l'd.

As opposed to what pop culture might make us believe, therapy is not about just lying on the couch, spilling out everything to a therapist. Therapy is a process, an arduous journey. There needs to be an establishment of some sort of trust first and a therapist is not a vending machine, that they give an answer on the platter on Day 1.

Why are we so scared of discussing our mental state of mind, the invisible storm brewing in our heads but are quick to divulge our physical health issues and even sex lives? is what Lori starts of with.

Through the medium of her 4 clients, their lives and painful experiences, along with her own experience with therapy, Lori Gottlieb, a psychotherapist, weaves an utterly human narrative, peeling back layers in order to help her patients reach the deepest and darkest parts of themselves and the deep rooted insecurities, which they are too afraid to confront. She gently steers them in the right direction, making them make sense of their jumbled up thought processes, helping them overcome the obstacles and convincing them that their worth is not associated with the choices they've made. In this manner, she compels the readers to the same.

She gives us a glimpse into the nature of a therapist's workings, as well as what people perceive of her, teaching us a lot about compassion and empathy, not only with others but also ourselves, and making us understand our relationship with others around us. She also touches upon the topic of seeking therapy on the basis of gender, in a patriarchal society like ours.

It's an absolutely riveting and intimate book, eloquently put together, relatable and hilarious, making you either laugh out loud or chuckling ever so often and making you feel all sorts of emotions as you cheer for everyone in the book and is not at all preachy. She even touches upon a few disorders and common terms in therapy, explaining them quite succinctly and theories by certain scholars.

"As I heal inside, I'm also becoming more adept at healing others.”

In the end I would just like to say

You are valid
You matter
You are enough
You are appreciated and loved.
Whatever you are going through right now, will pass soon so just hang in there and keep fighting and going after things you want.
Please do seek help if you feel like.

36 people found this helpful

Sarah

Terrific read. Thought provoking. Humorous.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on May 11, 2019

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An absorbing read, written intelligently and compassionately with humour and insight. I read this book in a day and a half. I learnt, I laughed, I pondered and I was provoked numerous times to think again, reflect, see myself and others differently.
Lori is both an entertaining writer and a sensitive skilful therapist. I wish I could sit on her couch one day. 😊

19 people found this helpful

Fiona

Great read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on June 3, 2019

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This book is great! I don’t have much time for reading but I’ve looked forward to opening it every evening since purchase... and read as much as I can before falling asleep. It’s written beautifully. Really entertaining but informative too. As a therapist myself, it’s a reassuring reminder that we all struggle at times, and we are only human too. I really recommend this book!

17 people found this helpful

Maz

Pedestrian

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on December 11, 2021

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A memoir encapsulated as a book beholding self-help therapeutic thoughts and interventions. A rather disappointing read from the perspective of someone who is familiar with the therapy scene. The tidbits of ‘enlightenment’ are wistful and lacklustre and leave a longing of more depth.
The author takes ample opportunities to inform readers of her biography and journey to becoming a psychotherapist but not so much on the psychology of being one.
There is some saving grace within the different characters/patients in the book, but they’re all quite pedestrian (I guess for the relatability) and after a while become quite banal.
That being said, it’s not completely horrible as a read, but it’s also not earth-shaking.

One person found this helpful

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