How to survive when you’re at breaking point: BEL MOONEY reviews a psychologist’s guide to stress – and why it can leave even the strongest of us teetering on the edge

How we break

by Vincent Best (Allen Lane £25)

A friend moans, “I just feel broken,” which means she is very tired. “It’s heartbreaking,” says another, referring to something rather sad.

We can break even, which is good, but when lovers break up, that’s bad.

There are several expressions that contain the word breaking, but when waves break on the shore, the meaning is not in dispute: they crash and change. In the same way, a truly ‘broken heart’ person will feel, physically, mentally and spiritually, that life can never be the same again. And they are right.

But what about the journey to the breaking point? What tension must be placed on the elastic band before it breaks?

In How We Break, health psychologist Vincent Deary suggests some answers for “navigating the wear and tear of life.”

He shows how social circumstances combined with individual genetics and unexpected external shifts can make each individual’s stress experience unique.

No one – not even the confident and strong – should think they are immune. Events can combine and overwhelm you. A sudden jolt can cause almost anyone to teeter on the edge and then fall.

How We Break is the second in a proposed trilogy: How To Live. The first part, How We Are, was published about ten years ago.

This unusual (for publications) gap is significant, because the author had something of a breakdown (the word is precise) while writing this volume.

Since his subject is exhaustion, the physiology of stress, and how many of us seem to live in permanent “fight or flight” mode, it is perhaps no surprise that Deary’s writing style becomes more charged as the book progresses.

There are moments in the second part when it becomes unclear whether he is writing ‘shrink-speak’ for professional colleagues or information for the general reader. Nevertheless, depths of pain are quietly plumbed in these pages.

How We Are was about the acute difficulty of coping with change, and the first part of How We Break continues with the analysis of how ‘alstatis’ (or ‘the work of maintaining stability in the face of change’) can put such a strain on our minds, bodies and spirits that we face, ‘tremble’ before they ‘break’. These are the areas of parts one and two of this book: ‘what happens when we are pushed beyond our limits’.

As well as his extensive experience in an NHS clinic specializing in fatigue, Deary uses case studies to show how people can suddenly be pushed over the edge.

He introduces us to ‘Sami’, a young care assistant (who was also his partner); ‘Anna’, a middle-aged woman who suddenly has no meaning in her life anymore; and his own mother, Isobelle, whose emotional strength was eroded by frustration, bitterness and regret.

Deary continually invites the reader to ask questions about his or her own life, and yet at times he also seems to warn against overthinking – when we can ‘work hard for ourselves’.

Listening to a pernicious inner ‘chorus’ of blame and doubt was disastrous for his mother. “Rumination and withdrawal contributed to her depression, which in turn caused more withdrawal and rumination; each of these then reinforced the other, and so on, in a process that increasingly acquired a momentum and a spirit of its own.’

Deary explores how our fast-paced, hyperactive, over-connected, multi-platform, anxious way of life is cutting people out – using the analogy of pulling on an elastic band

That process – a downward spiral of negativity – can happen to anyone. Alarmingly, Deary points out that there are 16,400 accepted profiles “that qualify for a diagnosis of major depressive disorder.” No wonder that ‘thought has become its own self-perpetuating problem’.

Deary is painfully honest about his own psychological struggles as an effeminate child growing up in a working-class neighborhood on the west coast of Scotland, teased mercilessly in high school, mocked for his appearance, turned into a ‘misfit’ and easily frightened.

This essential self-examination underlines the deeply human plea that is the heartbeat of the book: for more self-compassion. Some readers will find it encouraging that Deary’s sometimes complex theorizing can be summed up in the simple title of a Dionne Warwick song: Make It Easy On Yourself.

There is much wisdom in the fact that Deary laments that this society has neglected the idea of ​​recovery. Rest and recovery are essential – but are increasingly (it seems) being neglected. There is no time for the recovery of strength after childbirth, illness, family problems, and so on.

For all the modern emphasis on ‘mental health’, not enough is known about the points at which people (to use Deary’s terms) ‘tremble’ and then ‘break’.

Some happy, better-adjusted souls are resilient and able to cope, but others fall apart, with major consequences for themselves, their families and (sometimes) society. Our fast-paced, hyperactive, over-connected, multi-platform, anxious way of life leaves people with no slack.

What we can do about this will be the subject of the third book in this series, How We Mend – but until then, Deary offers some tips: ‘Beware of mirrors. That is, be careful not to get too caught up in your own opinions, stories, and concerns.

“Be careful not to become too concerned with yourself, thus excluding the world. When we prepare for life by looking in the mirror, we lose sight of who we really are and what we are preparing for.”