Recent years have seen the inclusion of Eastern ideas into Western therapies and an increasing awareness that the cognitive behavioural emphasis on effort and activity can sometimes prove an incomplete treatment paradigm for mental health problems. An increasing literature on “third wave” cognitive behavioural therapies moves away from control and emotional avoidance and emphasizes the role of acceptance. In an insightful contribution to the literature, Germer provides a book full of ideas and techniques aimed at the reduction of self-critical thinking using self-compassion and mindfulness. He describes his book as “un-self-help book”, highlighting this notion of working less.

The book achieves a good balance between theory and practice. Explanations of different aspects of mindfulness and compassion are placed alongside “Try This” boxes containing strategies that relate to them. It is written for the client rather than the clinician and the author uses clear, everyday language to break down difficult and sometimes esoteric ideas. He illustrates the material with a wealth of different experiences from his own background, including cases from his clinical practice as well as his own Buddhist training in India and Sri-Lanka. In his subsequent life he has been a founding member of the Institute for Meditation and Psychotherapy and a Clinical Instructor of Psychology at Harvard Medical School, both of which have informed the writing.

The book is broken down into three parts. The first, “Discovering self-compassion”, describes the fundaments of both self-compassion and mindfulness. Included here is a wide range of mindfulness exercises that every practitioner should have in their tool-box: mindfulness of sound, the breath, body sensations and emotions. Germen describes how thought, images and how we relate to others may all be used to develop loving-kindness, and a section here details how the reader may cultivate positive emotions.

The second part, entitled “Practising loving-kindness”, explores loving kindness meditation as a means to increase self-compassion. The approach emphasizes that although we might sometimes construe compassion as an innate quality, it is actually a skill that can be acquired and increased through practice. The book seamlessly weaves ideas from the Western school, for example labelling emotions and Young's schema theory, with Eastern concepts such as common humanity, the creation of suffering and nourishing the spirit.

The final part is a briefer section, called “Customising self-compassion”. It explores how self-compassion can be tailored to 12 different personality types: the caregiver, the intellectual, the perfectionist, the individualist, the survivor, the workhorse, the butterfly, the outsider, the floater, the moralist, the introvert, and the extrovert. The types are described and the challenges for each one are stated, together with suggestions for overcoming them. Finally, more general obstacles are noted, such as compassion-fatigue, disillusionment and how one can measure progress.

One of the things that make the book interesting and engaging is the eclectic source material, which is built into a rich tapestry. Throughout the book, grey boxes describe research from social, clinical and neuro-psychology relating to the topics covered. Quotations from such disparate sources as the Bible, poets and philosophers sit alongside amusing newspaper-like cartoons, providing changes in tone and pace, which make the book eminently readable. Although positioned within the self-help literature, the book offers pragmatic strategies that could be adapted to fit a wider treatment program. Given this adaptability, I would recommend it to anyone with an interest in self-compassion, both clinicians and clients, whether they are beginners or experienced practitioners.