Today we look at how to help patients live better lives, with or without recovery from mental illness.

Welcome to the Carlet Psychiatry Podcast, keeping psychiatry honest since 2003.

I'm Chris Akin, the editor-in-chief of the Carlet Psychiatry Report.

And I'm Kelly Newsom, a psychiatric MP and a dedicated reader of every issue.

In 1964, Joanne Greenberg published a book about her experience with mental illness.

I never promised you a Rose Garden would go on to sell millions of copies

who was adapted into a movie, a play, and a hit country song.

The title comes from something her psychoanalyst, Frida Fran Rickman, told her when she was a patient at Chestnut Lodge.

I never promised you a Rose Garden.

It echoes Freud's comment that the goal of psychoanalysis is to replace

neurotic misery with ordinary unhappiness. And why do we start a podcast on flourishing on such a

dour note? Because we're about to look at how to help people with mental illness lead more fulfilling

lives, and I want to keep this grounded as we go forth.

Life is hard. Mental illness is hard. Full recovery isn't always possible, and part of recovery

is learning to ride the ebb and flow of ordinary unhappiness, something we all do, but is a little

more difficult when the symptoms you're

used to seeking medical treatment for, anxiety, depression, insomnia, bear an uncanny resemblance

to the symptoms of everyday life.

Today we're going to look at what science has found about flourishing and how we can help

our patients use that knowledge to convert some of that ordinary unhappiness into joy,

inspiration and contentment. It's the final coda to our interview series with Margaret

Chisholm, who wrote about flourishing in her book, from Survive to Thrive, Living Your Best

...