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The Importance of Suffering: The Value and Meaning of Emotional Discontent
In this book James Davies considers emotional suffering as part and parcel of what it means to live and develop as a human being, rather than as a mental health problem requiring only psychiatric, antidepressant or cognitive treatment. This book therefore offers a new perspective on emotional discontent and discusses how we can engage with it clinically, personally and socially to uncover its productive value. The Importance of Suffering explores a relational theory of understanding emotional suffering suggesting that suffering, does not spring from one dimension of our lives, but is often the outcome of how we relate to the world internally – in terms of our personal biology, habits and values, and externally – in terms of our society, culture and the world around us. Davies suggests that suffering is a healthy call-to-change and shouldn't be chemically anesthetised or avoided. The book challenges conventional thinking by arguing that if we understand and manage suffering more holistically, it can facilitate individual and social transformation in powerful and surprising ways. The Importance of Suffering offers new ways to think about, and therefore understand suffering. It will appeal to anyone who works with suffering in a professional context including professionals, trainees and academics in the fields of counselling, psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, psychiatry and clinical psychology.
208 pages, Paperback
First published November 18, 2011
15 people are currently reading
614 people want to read
About the author
James Davies
124 books98 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author with this name in the Goodreads database.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
February 17, 2022
Worthy of a read. Some important questions and observations, but a somewhat lacking analysis.
Partial summary : our culture adopted a largely negative view of suffering, in which suffering should always be avoided. Our economic paradigm and our cult of productivity, incompatible with a range of human experiences, promotes this negative view of suffering, as depression and self-reflection incapacitate the worker, subjugated by a rhythm which is not his own. This negative view manifest itself in the medicalization of depression, with the rate of diagnosed depression and antidepressants prescription reaching alarming heights and still increasing.
The author compares this negative view of suffering with the positive view of suffering, largely adopted in the past, promoted for example by Christianity, the Romantics or pessimists philosophers, although all in a different way, and not necessarily helpful either.
The author argues that antidepressants are mostly anaesthetics, just like the socially accepted (and even encouraged) over-consumption and workaholism. By medicalizing depression we are missing a vital part of human experience, and silencing the necessary and healthy pain signal that indicates that something with ourself or our environment is wrong. Depression is a mechanism which invites the sufferer to the cessation of activity to promotes the reflection needed to know what is causing distress, and/or give him the time to grieve, prior to self-actualization and action.
Those are all reasonable points. But the biggest issue with this book is that some fundamental questions are not even mentioned : Where should we now draw the line between the people who need medication and those who do not? The distinction between those who are "ill" and those whose depression is merely a symptom of an external cause, is extremely difficult to make, and like others nature/nurture problems, get increasingly absurd and ungraspable the more you think about it. What we know so far indicates that, depression tends to a moderate extent to be hereditary. Yet do this indicates that there is such a thing as a depression gene, limiting the amount of feel-good neurotransmitter than an individual can produce, or is it the gene of perfectionism, rendering its recipients more prone to be unsatisfied with themselves and the world around them? Is there even a difference between the two?
It quickly becomes evident that those are complex philosophical questions, but this is the discussion that needs to be had in order to get closer to some guiding principles in how we should perceive and handle depression. By not engaging with these questions, the book makes itself a lot less useful than it could have been. The stance of the author is that we should be more discriminate in the medicalization of depression, but since he doesn't provide any discriminating factors, this book alas serves merely as a conversation starter and avoids doing any of the hard-lifting.
Partial summary : our culture adopted a largely negative view of suffering, in which suffering should always be avoided. Our economic paradigm and our cult of productivity, incompatible with a range of human experiences, promotes this negative view of suffering, as depression and self-reflection incapacitate the worker, subjugated by a rhythm which is not his own. This negative view manifest itself in the medicalization of depression, with the rate of diagnosed depression and antidepressants prescription reaching alarming heights and still increasing.
The author compares this negative view of suffering with the positive view of suffering, largely adopted in the past, promoted for example by Christianity, the Romantics or pessimists philosophers, although all in a different way, and not necessarily helpful either.
The author argues that antidepressants are mostly anaesthetics, just like the socially accepted (and even encouraged) over-consumption and workaholism. By medicalizing depression we are missing a vital part of human experience, and silencing the necessary and healthy pain signal that indicates that something with ourself or our environment is wrong. Depression is a mechanism which invites the sufferer to the cessation of activity to promotes the reflection needed to know what is causing distress, and/or give him the time to grieve, prior to self-actualization and action.
Those are all reasonable points. But the biggest issue with this book is that some fundamental questions are not even mentioned : Where should we now draw the line between the people who need medication and those who do not? The distinction between those who are "ill" and those whose depression is merely a symptom of an external cause, is extremely difficult to make, and like others nature/nurture problems, get increasingly absurd and ungraspable the more you think about it. What we know so far indicates that, depression tends to a moderate extent to be hereditary. Yet do this indicates that there is such a thing as a depression gene, limiting the amount of feel-good neurotransmitter than an individual can produce, or is it the gene of perfectionism, rendering its recipients more prone to be unsatisfied with themselves and the world around them? Is there even a difference between the two?
It quickly becomes evident that those are complex philosophical questions, but this is the discussion that needs to be had in order to get closer to some guiding principles in how we should perceive and handle depression. By not engaging with these questions, the book makes itself a lot less useful than it could have been. The stance of the author is that we should be more discriminate in the medicalization of depression, but since he doesn't provide any discriminating factors, this book alas serves merely as a conversation starter and avoids doing any of the hard-lifting.
July 18, 2025
كتاب "أهمية المعاناة" كتابٌ مُناسبٌ يُعالج جوانب إشكالية في كيفية تعامل المجتمعات الغربية الحديثة مع تحديات الحياة النفسية ومعاناتها، كبيرةً كانت أم صغيرة.
يتمحور كتاب ديفيز حول أن جزءًا كبيرًا من المعاناة النفسية التي نختبرها اليوم يرتبط بالحاجة إلى التغيير البيئي والتطور الشخصي، لا بكونها علاماتٍ على أمراضٍ تحتاج إلى علاج طبي.
يُقدم الكتاب أمثلةً لا تُحصى على كيفية تشخيص ردود الفعل الطبيعية لتجارب الحياة الشائعة على أنها مرض أو خلل وظيفي، في ظلّ منظومة مُتنامية من أساليب التضليل والتدخّل الطبي.
من الجوانب المهمة في كتاب ديفيز مفهوم المعاناة التخديرية ففي المجتمع الحديث، حيث تُعطى الأولوية للتكامل السلس والمتعة، غالبًا ما نرفض حتى أدنى مستويات المعاناة. فكما أن الألم الجسدي قد يكون إشارةً إلى حاجة أجسادنا إلى رعاية، فكذلك يمكن أن تكون المعاناة العاطفية مؤشرًا على ضرورة التغيير في المجالين العقلي والروحي. إذا لم تُؤخذ هذه الإشارات على محمل الجد، فإن النتيجة النهائية غالبًا ما تكون مشاكل ثانوية تُؤدي بدورها إلى ما يُطلق عليه ديفيز "أنظمة التخدير الإستهلاكية ". تستفيد هذه الأنظمة بوعي أو بغير وعي من توفير العلاجات لمن يعانون من أعراض ثانوية ناجمة عن مشاكل أولية لم تُحل.
يتمحور كتاب ديفيز حول أن جزءًا كبيرًا من المعاناة النفسية التي نختبرها اليوم يرتبط بالحاجة إلى التغيير البيئي والتطور الشخصي، لا بكونها علاماتٍ على أمراضٍ تحتاج إلى علاج طبي.
يُقدم الكتاب أمثلةً لا تُحصى على كيفية تشخيص ردود الفعل الطبيعية لتجارب الحياة الشائعة على أنها مرض أو خلل وظيفي، في ظلّ منظومة مُتنامية من أساليب التضليل والتدخّل الطبي.
من الجوانب المهمة في كتاب ديفيز مفهوم المعاناة التخديرية ففي المجتمع الحديث، حيث تُعطى الأولوية للتكامل السلس والمتعة، غالبًا ما نرفض حتى أدنى مستويات المعاناة. فكما أن الألم الجسدي قد يكون إشارةً إلى حاجة أجسادنا إلى رعاية، فكذلك يمكن أن تكون المعاناة العاطفية مؤشرًا على ضرورة التغيير في المجالين العقلي والروحي. إذا لم تُؤخذ هذه الإشارات على محمل الجد، فإن النتيجة النهائية غالبًا ما تكون مشاكل ثانوية تُؤدي بدورها إلى ما يُطلق عليه ديفيز "أنظمة التخدير الإستهلاكية ". تستفيد هذه الأنظمة بوعي أو بغير وعي من توفير العلاجات لمن يعانون من أعراض ثانوية ناجمة عن مشاكل أولية لم تُحل.
February 18, 2023
Psychology has always been a great interest of mine. Yet, only after I read author David Smail I reached a more profound understanding of psychology. For this reason I recommend most of Smail's books. Similarly, this author, James Davies, has helped me expand my understanding of this subject beyond contemporary misconceptions offering insightful ideas on our relationship with modern psychology.
The anaesthetising practices discussed in the book are an invaluable lesson for me. This book has in turn re-introduced to James Hillman whose books I heard of before. This time I have decided to take up the challenge and expand my understanding of the history of psychology by picking Hillman's Re-visioning Psychology as my next read.
Suffering is explored from an anthrolopolical perspective and I recommend this book to those who are looking for aspects of suffering such as:
why do we keep on suffering and refuse to change
why offering positive narratives about society to depressed people may not be the right approach.
why are some emotions not accepted by others in particular social contexts
The anaesthetising practices discussed in the book are an invaluable lesson for me. This book has in turn re-introduced to James Hillman whose books I heard of before. This time I have decided to take up the challenge and expand my understanding of the history of psychology by picking Hillman's Re-visioning Psychology as my next read.
Suffering is explored from an anthrolopolical perspective and I recommend this book to those who are looking for aspects of suffering such as:
why do we keep on suffering and refuse to change
why offering positive narratives about society to depressed people may not be the right approach.
why are some emotions not accepted by others in particular social contexts
October 16, 2024
This book presents some compelling and straightforward arguments on the value of mental suffering. Davies suggests that by confronting and exploring suffering directly and deeply a greater capacity of self-realisation and self-knowledge may be obtained. While certain sections drifted, an overall narrative argument presenting the benefits of adopting a social and positive model of emotional discontent landed well. The book draws from a variety of sources in philosophy, sociology/anthropology and psychology and benefits from it's broad reference.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews