Assessment:
Idea/Concept: An unusually flexible and helpful self-help book, Alexander's Lighten Your Day offers dozens of stress-management tools and exercises for readers to experiment with and adapt to their individual needs, from facing imposter syndrome to taking "microbreaks" to learning to "declipse" worries. While centered on Alexander's own trademarked "LIGHTEN" model, the book at heart is an inviting treasury of techniques. This approach -- and Alexander's upbeat coaching -- results in a book that's much more practical than many of the more prescriptive and dogmatic titles in its genre.
Prose: Alexander's writing is at its clearest and most persuasive when the author is detailing the many stress-management exercises that are this book's heart. He excels at offering unambiguous instructions, at demonstrating the utility of each exercise, and at emphasizing at each step that the readers are the true arbiter of whether or not these techniques apply to their lives. Elsewhere, the prose tends toward passability rather than inspiration. His introductions and personal anecdotes are less crisp, engaging, original, and polished than his exercises.
Originality: While many of Alexander's techniques and exercises are familiar (he suggests affirmations, reflections, reframing negative thoughts, tips for decision making, and unplugging from social media) his curation and promotion of stress-management tools is inspired. The book bursts with positive, calming advice. Sometimes, Alexander even recontextualizes our curious habits as vital self-care: He convincingly positions watching silly animal videos online as a stress management technique rather than an idle time killer. The author's "Lighten" model (rendered in a memorable illustration as "the hairy light bulb") is unique, intuitive, and crucial to the organization of the text's many stress-management techniques.
Execution: Thorough, friendly, upbeat, and well-organized, Alexander's Lighten Your Day is a cornucopia of stress-management techniques. It offers more tools than any one reader could ever use ... and also is so rich in tips and exercises that even the most cynical reader should find something helpful. (Disarmingly, Alexander gets apologetic, more than once, when his exercises take on the whiff of "woo-woo.") Early on, Alexander attempts to draw lines between failures of stress management and actual medical diagnoses received by him and a dear friend; the author is shrewd enough not to insist that stress causes cancer, but the text allows for readers to infer a clear relationship, without incorporating clinical studies or the views of medical professionals.
Date Submitted: January 22, 2020
Going through this amazing book as I reviewed it, literally made me sober, when I realized that many of the things I felt doesn't matter, were actually of critical importance. This book is indeed an eye opener and could prove very helpful to lots of people. Unfortunately for us, our generation unlike the others several decades ago is a very fast paced one. Some of us struggle with multiple jobs in order to pay bills while at the same time multitasking at every giving opportunity just because we all want to achieve more in less time.
This book will likely make you to have a sober reflection on your life just as it did to me. I have always known that stress is never good for anyone and ought to be avoided but I have never come across a well detailed, result oriented and practical-steps-solution stress relief book such as this.
The author did not just stop at merely restating the demerits of stress but equally went the extra mile of proffering real life solutions with parallels drawn along personal experiences and how each stress related problem was overcome.
Another thing I like about the book is the way the author began each chapter with powerful and inspiring quotes from notable people, with each quote making reference on how one stress related issue or the other could be dealt with for the good of our body. Likewise, there were lots of research and study reports from reputable organizations such as United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which the author quoted in order to drive home his point.
There are "Lighten Your Day" activities which are basically exercises the reader is expected to partake in, as a way of putting into practice what has been learnt so far.
This book indeed has the potential to positively change peoples' lives and make individuals to lead happier and healthier lives!
-- Official Review, ILoveUniqueBooks.com (5 out of 5 stars)
