The Myth of Normal - Trauma, Illness and Healing in a Toxic Culture by Gabor Mate

I’m a full Gabor Mate stan, I love his work, and find his vulnerable Self exposing approach to his teaching blended with his medical and therapeutic mastery quite astounding. The Myth of Normal is one of his most powerful teachings, as it literally covers the experience of being a human animal from in utero to adulthood, what we need, what happens when we don’t get it, how both the presence of trauma and more critically almost the absence of connection dramatically impact how we are in the world.

As will all Gabor’s work, there is a reflective look at not just the people, but the systems we operate in, and how our contexts contribute to our complex developmental decisions. We can’t ignore these impacts, and Gabor unpacks them and gives us space to make our own connections with out experiences.

As a therapist, I use his compassionate inquiry frameworks with my clients and strongly believe in the premise that most of us are living from the wounds and ruptures of our childhood and infant experiences. I highly recommend this text as a precursor to doing therapy, simply to get a wide scope understanding of what it is to be human in a world that operates often from a place of fear and isolation rather than collective kindness.

One of the most influential books on trauma and what a medicalised, commercialised, symptom driven pathologised approach to mental wellness can turn into and a call to action for hope and change.