Feeling Good: Overcome Depression and Anxiety with Proven Techniques by David D. Burns M.D. book cover for the Book of the Day mental health book review

Our score

4.5/ 5

Outstanding

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EDITION PUBLISHEDApril 1999

Genres

Non-Fiction Mental Health Self Help

Themes

Thoughts shape feelingsCatching cognitive distortionsFeeling better as a learnable skillSelf-directed cognitive tools

Feeling GoodOvercome Depression and Anxiety with Proven Techniques

Name: Feeling Good: Overcome Depression and Anxiety with Proven Techniques
Price: 12.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: David D. Burns M.D.

David D. Burns M.D.

David Burns's Feeling Good is the classic that brought cognitive behavioral therapy to the kitchen table. Decades on, its core move — catch the distorted thought, write it down, talk back to it — still holds up as a practical, do-it-yourself toolkit for low mood.

The Review

Our take

Feeling Good arrived as one of the first serious attempts to hand CBT directly to readers, and that mission still defines it. Burns's premise is that much of our suffering rides on top of automatic, distorted thinking — all-or-nothing judgments, catastrophizing, mind-reading — and that you can learn to identify and dismantle those patterns on the page. It's less a memoir or a manifesto than a course, complete with exercises, checklists, and worked examples, and it expects you to actually pick up a pen.

The heart of the method is its plainness. Burns names the common cognitive distortions, shows you how to spot them in your own self-talk, and walks through the daily mood log that turns vague despair into something concrete and answerable. For a lot of readers the first surprise is how mechanical the relief can feel: you write the harsh thought, label the distortion, draft a fairer response, and notice the weight shift a little. That repeatability is the book's real gift. It treats feeling better as a skill you practice, not a state you wait for.

It does carry its age and its tone. The writing is enthusiastic to the point of salesmanship in places, and the examples and references can feel dated. More importantly, this is a self-help book, not a substitute for care — Burns says as much, and the framing is best suited to mild-to-moderate low mood and everyday rumination rather than acute crisis. Some readers also find the relentless optimism a touch much when they're at their lowest. The fix is to take what works and leave the rest; the underlying techniques are sturdier than the packaging.

Why you should read

Great if you want concrete CBT tools you can practice
Great for readers who'll actually do the exercises
Great as a first low-cost step or a therapy companion
Great for everyday rumination and low mood

What to expect

A workbook-style course, not a narrative
Clear breakdowns of common cognitive distortions
Mood logs and write-it-down exercises
Dated tone but durable, practical methods

What keeps it in print is simply that the tools work for a great many people, and they cost nothing to try. Generations of readers and clinicians point to it as the book that first made their own thinking visible, and that gave them something to do at 2 a.m. besides spiral. It rewards a working reader more than a passive one — the value is in the worksheets, not the prose — but if you meet it halfway, it can genuinely change how you talk to yourself. As a first, low-cost step into evidence-informed self-help, or as a companion to therapy you're already doing, it remains one of the most useful and durable recommendations in the field. Few self-help books have earned their longevity this honestly. The reason it keeps getting handed down is that the central skill it teaches transfers to almost any setback: a job loss, a breakup, a spiral of self-criticism all yield, at least a little, to the same patient practice of examining the thought instead of obeying it. You don't have to believe every claim in these pages to walk away with a more skeptical, kinder relationship to your own inner monologue, and for a great many readers that single shift has been worth the whole book.

Reviewed by Jordan · How our reviews are written

Our verdict

4.5/ 5

Outstanding

Read it free on Kindle Unlimited Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

Filed underMental Health Self Help Browse the archive →

Common questions

What is Feeling Good: Overcome Depression and Anxiety with Proven Techniques about?: Feeling Good arrived as one of the first serious attempts to hand CBT directly to readers, and that mission still defines it. Burns's premise is that much of our suffering rides on top of automatic, distorted thinking — all-or-nothing judgments, catastrophizing, mind-reading — and that you can…
Is Feeling Good: Overcome Depression and Anxiety with Proven Techniques worth reading?: We scored Feeling Good: Overcome Depression and Anxiety with Proven Techniques 4.5 out of 5. David Burns's Feeling Good is the classic that brought cognitive behavioral therapy to the kitchen table. Decades on, its core move — catch the distorted thought, write it down, talk back to it — still holds up as a practical, do-it-yourself toolkit for low mood.