Thank you to Jen Billock for including me in her article for Your Tango, “10 Most Helpful Divorce Books — Recommended By Actual Divorced Women”
“Reading books helps — these ten are some of the best lesser-known books to read, as recommended by writers and divorcees:”
6. Supersurvivors: The Surprising Link Between Suffering and Success by David B. Feldman and Lee Daniel Kravetz
Written by two psychologists, this book explores a phenomenon often undiscussed after trauma: when someone “bounces forward,” or pushes past traumatic events like divorce to become even better and more successful. Give yourself a post-tragedy confidence boost with this read.
“During my divorce, I felt like a failure. I felt embarrassed and worried about what to tell people. I read books like a lifeline to the future. I wanted something to make me feel better. I told everyone I was living in CrazyTown and I could not stop crying. When I read David Feldman and Lee Daniel Kravetz’s book Supersurvivors: The Surprising Link Between Suffering and Success, I was shocked to learn that “the disorientation and groundlessness experienced by many people after trauma can ultimately be advantageous.”
I figured that my post-traumatic growth was going to be superb since I had leaned in so hard to my feelings I had dug underground. A huge shift for me was when I read this: “Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could be any different. … Forgiveness means breaking the psychological ties that bind you to the past, giving up the quest to change what has already happened. … Rather than dwelling on the past, she found herself asking the hopeful and forward-looking question ‘What now?’”
I was stuck in a loop in my head that said, “If only I had never met him.” Once I read that part of the book, I remembered that you cannot drive into the future if you only look through the rear-view mirror.”
—Lisa Niver, journalist