First, We Make the Beast Beautiful

A New Journey Through Anxiety

By: Sarah Wilson

Narrated by: Sarah Wilson

Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins

Publisher's summary

The New York Times best-selling author of I Quit Sugar transforms cultural perceptions of the mental health issue of our age - anxiety - viewing this widespread condition not as a burdensome affliction but as a powerful spiritual teacher that can deepen our lives.

While reading psychiatrist Kay Redfield Jamison's groundbreaking account of bipolar disorder, An Unquiet Mind, Sarah Wilson discovered an ancient Chinese proverb that would change her life:

To conquer a beast, you must first make it beautiful.

Wilson, a best-selling author, journalist, and entrepreneur, had spent years struggling with her own beast: Chronic anxiety. And the words of this proverb would become the key to understanding her condition.

First, We Make the Beast Beautiful charts Wilson's epic journey to make peace with her lifetime companion and to learn to see it as a guide rather than as an enemy. With intensive focus and investigatory skills, Wilson examines the triggers and treatments, the fashions and fads. She reads widely and interviews fellow sufferers, mental health experts, philosophers, and even the Dalai Lama, processing all she learns through the prism of her own experiences. Pulling at the thread of accepted definitions of anxiety, she unravels the notion that it is a difficult, dangerous disease that must be medicated into submission and reframes it as a divine journey - a state of yearning that will lead us closer to what really matters.

Practical and poetic, wise and funny, First, We Make the Beast Beautiful is a small book with a big heart. It will encourage the myriad souls who dance with this condition to embrace it as a part of who they are and to explore the possibilities it offers for a richer, fuller life.

©2017 Sarah Wilson (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers

Love love love

Anyone who struggles with anxiety needs to read this book! Sarah is brilliant, intuitive, funny and authentic. A great listen!

The big picture

This book I don’t think will change my life in anxiety, but it has made sense of my journey with it. Parts of it are full of research, others stories, and the rest her theories on anxiety. She tries to stay somewhat neutral in religion but sense she feels that spirituality is closely tied to anxiety, she dances around the theories a lot. Read with your own mind and beliefs to get the most out of it but also keep an open mind! It’s like she has put a lot of puzzle pieces together and I’m more on my way to seeing the big picture. I am hoping to implement some tips she does give to possibly ease the day to day struggle.

Better than your average

Liked everything about this book from the incredibly vulnerable content, empathetic and honest messaging and Sarah’s reading style.

I have started countless books on anxiety and mental health and finished few. I loved every minute of this journey and this book is one I plan to revisit again and again.

So beautifully crafted

As someone who deals with anxiety, this book felt like a warm hug. I felt so much less alone in my world hearing someone else speak on this subject without reservation. Such a beautiful and inspiring read. I’ve already recommended it to so many people!

Will go back to it regularly

This is a very helpful book for anyone suffering from anxiety as well as their loved ones so that they can have a better understanding of what it is and mostly how it feels.

The production is not very good, the volume is lower than normal and the chapter numbers don't coincide with what audible shows you. However, those are minor things that didn't impede me from enjoying the book.

There's a lot of information (at the beginning I felt it was kind of allover the place) and I wish I was able to have a notepad to write it all down, so that is why I think I will be going back to this regularly.

I cannot tell you if there's an order or a storyline, but somehow it still works because of all the useful quotes and information she gives.

Amazing!!!! Very helpful.

Amazing book. Can’t recommend it enough. The way she describes anxiety and what to do about it is like I have never heard it before.

Great Listen!

Thank you Sarah for sharing your story! A perfect book to listen to on my walks home. Your story encouraged me to see my mental illness in a whole new way 🙏

Insightful

I picked this book up in the midst of a personal crisis with my own anxiety. Its a broad topic, and not everything Sarah encounters in her story and research fully applied to my situation. However, I found a lot of solace in what she had to say, and found answers to a lot of the questions that we're bouncing around my head. All in all, it made facing my Beast a little easier, which is exactly what I needed.

I continue to listen to it now and then, sometimes specific chapters, when I need a reminder that I'm not alone with my anxiety, or a refresher on a better tactic in facing it.

Read this book!

I mean it! Read this book! It’s so beautifully done and is that perfect combo of story and advice. I’ve read a lot of books on anxiety and this one has given me, by far, the most to take away. I don’t want to give too much away but how the author finishes everything up makes you feel a sense of calm that I’ve never found in another book.

Overwhelming

If you're looking for a book that tries, and mostly succeeds to say everything about anxiety that can possibly be said, then this could be the book for you. Early on in listening she revealed her Hashimoto's diagnosis, and combined with her anxiety and depression, I figured it was a book I could really relate to, but that didn't turn out to be the case. I'm more on the depression side of depression/anxiety, and for me it was all very overwhelming. I think it would be a good text for Overachievers Anonymous. I could see it being a good sourcebook, but listening for me was just too much. And yet, I can't give her a bad rating, because it is obvious she did a lot of research and put an incredible amount of effort into the book, and it is a valuable book for people with severe anxiety.

I would say that, while she presents some good science, there are times when she also presents pseudo-science as science. Also I just have to say that as far as I can find out, Diane Fossey never studied chimpanzees. One item of note is that she mentions the good research done by Sheena Iyengar and Barry Schwartz on how too many choices can cause anxiety and dissatisfaction, and yet this book has about 500 suggestions for how to deal with your anxiety. For me it would have been a better listen if she had followed their advice.

I thought that the last two chapters were the best ones in the book. She revealed some things about herself that, frankly, I would like to have learned more about, but it was interesting and brave of her to include. And the ending was very well-written. My heart goes out to her as it's clear she has gone through some real hell between her anxiety and bipolar. I wish her well. I'm glad I listened to the book, even if it was too much for me at times.