Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression, Julian L. Simon

Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression - Julian L. Simon, Open Court Publishing Company, 320 pages (May 1993), ISBN:0812690982

Title & Author:	Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression Julian L. Simon
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Julian L. Simon is a renowned economist, famous for thinking deeply and radically about some of the world's most pressing economic and environmental problems. In this book he turns his mind to solving the problem of his own depression. The book has  forwards by two of the world's most renowned psychologists, who sing the praises of this book. They are Albert Ellis and and Kenneth Colby.

In the optimism found in his economic writings, Julian L. Simon suffered badly from depression for over a decade. He applied his exceptional mind to the problem, consulted many psychologists, and read widely in the psychological literature, desperate to find some therapy to banish his depression. 

He eventually found the writings of cognitive therapists like Aaron Beck, Albert Ellis, and Martin Seligman. They argued that emotional problems often arise from specific habits of thought that can be changed. Applying this insight in a novel manner, Simon developed and applied a permanent cure for his depression

Julian L. Simon describes his technique in Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression. He calls it Self-Comparisons Analysis. Simon argues that depression results from negative self-comparison-- the contrast between our actual state and a hypothetical benchmark state. 

Techniques can be employed to improve the actual state and, more importantly, reduce the level of over-demanding benchmarks.  Julian Simon, together with Ken Colby, developed an interactive computerised program for combating depression which provides psychotherapy in the form of instruction/dialogue in everyday language. The disk is provided with the book.

• Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression by Julian L. Simon provides a novel approach to over-coming depression that should attract intelligent depressives who may be setting self-performance benchmarks that are too demanding.