A Survivor’s Common Sense Approach to Recovery from Social Anxiety By Dr. Robert F Mullen
Today, I wanted to share my review of A Survivor’s Common Sense Approach to Recovery from Social Anxiety by Dr. Robert F. Mullen. He’s someone I look up to and admire. He’s been through so much with his social anxiety disorder and still came out on top and now he’s dedicated his life to helping others do the same. If that’s not amazing, I don’t know what is. When he published this book, I knew I had to read it and since I had so many thoughts on it I decided to share my review here too.
Summary
Social anxiety robs you of your autonomy, hopes, and dreams. The most underrated and misunderstood health issue, SAD thrives on your irrational thoughts and behaviors, upending the rules of logic. Like salmon swimming upstream, you must constantly push against the flow of your groundless fears and avoidance of social and performance situations. Recovery demands a unique and specialized approach from an expert who has personally experienced severe social anxiety and prevailed, bringing practical, firsthand knowledge of its unique obstacles.
Visualize your emotional well-being as an overgrown garden. Your negative self-beliefs are deeply embedded, destructive weeds.
This book provides tools to uproot your emotional entanglements and nurture new growth, but it is up to you to take them out of the shed and put them to use, cultivating new mindsets, skills, and abilities. This book is not an academic or theoretical journey through the various psychological approaches of today’s mental health industry, but a practical, straightforward, and easily digestible guide to recovery.
Drawing on a variety of clinical and unconventional approaches, you will learn to counteract the excessive negative information in your brain’s metabolism, replace self-sabotaging thoughts and behaviors with healthy, productive ones, and reintegrate into society with compassion and confidence.
About The Author
Dr. Robert F. Mullen is a behaviorist and published academic author who now offers those suffering from Social Anxiety and Depression a program to resolve this debilitating disability. Having overcome his own severe SAD, he has created an overview that ensures the reader that their disability is not uncommon, not their fault, and a remedy is available to anyone with the courage and commitment to make a change.
For over thirty years, Robert Mullen navigated the challenges of severe social anxiety. Often referred to as the neglected anxiety disorder, SAD was a new, underrated, misunderstood, and frequently misdiagnosed condition. Bewildered, angry, and depressed, Robert was a social pariah convinced there was something wrong with him, experiencing first-hand the controlling, devious, and manipulative nature of his disorder.
In his mid-forties, Robert Mullen returned to university, challenging SAD’s grip on his emotional well-being. It was a journey of trial and error, but the answers eventually revealed themselves. He now dedicates his career to the millions of people worldwide who struggle with anxiety and depression. His commitment to this cause is a beacon of hope for many.
My Thoughts On A Survivor’s Common Sense Approach to Recovery from Social Anxiety
“Anxiety is an abstract concept; it has no power by itself.”
I had quite high expectations going into this book because I’ve followed Dr. Mullen’s blog for a long time now and have always found his posts incredibly helpful. I was not disappointed, I think he outdid himself with this book.
A Survivor’s Common Sense Approach to Recovery from Social Anxiety by Dr. Robert F. Mullen is a guide for those suffering from social anxiety disorder that shares advice on how you can better handle your symptoms and live your best life despite SAD.
General Summary
I found the book to be very well written. It was quite easy to follow along, chapter by chapter. Which is something I sometimes struggle with when it comes to non-fiction books. However, this one wasn’t written in a way that would be difficult for the regular person to read. It wasn’t written for only those in the profession. Although Dr. Mullen does mention numerous scientific terms etc, it’s still written in a way that made it easy for me to understand.
I particularly liked that Dr. Mullen shares experiences from his own life and some experiences from patients. This made the book more relatable because I think many of us that suffer from SAD have similar experiences overall.
Having suffered from SAD himself, Dr. Mullen is able to fully understand what it’s like having SAD and shares helpful but realistic advice. I’ve read a lot of self-help books especially when I was at my lowest. And one thing I noticed was that regardless of how much you’ve studied mental health or how many patients you’ve seen, if you’ve never experienced SAD yourself, you can never truly know what it’s like.
One of my favourite things about the book were the journaling activities at the end of each chapter. They really helped put what we’ve learnt in each chapter into practice. I also find that writing what we’ve read helps us remember it better. I did every single journaling lesson because I was so locked in as I read the book.
Specific Things That Stood Out To Me
The first thing I wanted to mention was that Dr. Mullen started out by stating that recovery is a personal choice. And I very much agree. Social anxiety isn’t something anyone wishes for however sitting down and doing nothing about it isn’t helping anyone. We have to make a conscious choice to make changes if we want to recover. Even if that may be uncomfortable at times. He also talks about accountability which I think is a must.
I admired that in chapter 4, he honestly points out that there is no permanent cure for social anxiety. But the symptoms can be managed. That’s how I look at it too. I don’t think it’ll ever fully go away. But we can do our best to live despite it by learning to manage our symptoms. A lot of self-help books try to sell a “cure” or teach us how to magically rid ourselves of all our problems. I despise those kind of books because they’re just selling you snake oil.
I was first introduced to the term neuroplasticity thanks to Dr. Mullen’s blog many years ago. Since then, I’ve been able to put it into practice and already see my thought patterns changing. I’m able to be more social naturally without constantly being anxious. In chapter 8, he mentions how once we begin to recover we start reconnecting with happy memories and activities we enjoyed. I thought that was relatable because I’m literally doing that this year. I’m back to reading daily, doing art, singing and so much more.
Chapter 13 is one of my favourites, it talks about the “fallacy of fairness” which was something I majorly struggled with and still sometimes struggle with. Many of us wish we lived in a perfectly fair world and it hurts to realise that we don’t. However, accepting the world (and people) as it is instead of what we want it to be can take a huge weight off our shoulders.
I found the coping mechanisms in chapter 20 to be realistic and helpful. I even use multiple of them myself such as controlled breathing and distractions and diversions. Funny story, I’ve recently found that singing helps me relax so I randomly break out in song when I’m anxious. Sure, my neighbours and the birds outside my window hate it but it brings me a lot of joy. So, if you ever see me at a mall or something randomly singing, mind your own business. Oh and singing is mentioned in one of the chapters (chapter 25) as a great distraction.
Finally, I loved that the book reminded us to have compassion and empathy while still have strong boundaries. It’s important not to lose our compassion/empathy and it’s also just as important to set boundaries when needed because compassion/empathy towards ourselves is also vital.
A Personal Experience
I wanted to share a little personal story which I think showcases the power of the advice in this book.
One of the journaling activities in the book was to make small talk. Since I was invited to a tasting event, I thought this would be the perfect place to go out of my way to be more social and put into practice the skills I’ve learnt.
So, instead of sitting like a wallflower as I normally do at social events, I went out of my way to connect and chat with everyone. At first, it was terrifying and I was sweating through my anti-perspirant because of how nervous I was. But the more I chatted, the less scary it got.
And you know what? The person sitting next to me actually said I was really easy to talk to! I couldn’t believe my ears. No one has ever described me as easy to talk to, most people would probably go with awkward and makes a lot of inappropriate jokes lol. This was such a HUGE moment for me.
I even ended up making a friend with whom I’m still chatting with and hope to hang out with soon.
If you need proof that the advice shared in this book works, I’m here to tell you that it does.
Overall
This is one of the best books I’ve read about social anxiety disorder and how to recover from it. Not only is it realistic and down-to-earth, it also shares very practical step by step advice that most people would be able to follow on their own. If you’re looking to read more non-fiction books, especially self-help books, I very highly recommend this one. And if you suffer from social anxiety and are looking to improve your life, this book is a must-read.
If you are interested in reading A Survivor’s Common Sense Approach to Recovery from Social Anxiety by Dr. Robert F. Mullen, you can find it on Amazon. Check out his blog here.
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