Self-help: This Is How

Overview
Augusten Burroughs delivers a blunt, candid self-help manifesto that mixes memoir, practical advice, and tough love. The book offers terse rules and wry anecdotes aimed at helping readers confront fears, break destructive habits, and pursue a more honest, functional life. Rather than promising a one-size-fits-all formula, the narrative centers on psychological insight and hard-won strategies for emotional survival and growth.

Author and Approach
Augusten Burroughs writes from a lifetime of personal struggle, using his trademark dark humor and self-deprecating candor to make difficult ideas accessible. The approach is direct and unapologetic: advice is often delivered as short, punchy chapters or aphorisms, paired with illustrative stories from the author's experiences. The goal is pragmatic change rather than inspirational platitudes, with an emphasis on accountability and behavioral shifts.

Structure and Content
The book is organized into brief, focused sections that address specific problems, grief, addiction, relationships, self-deception, and anxiety among them. Each section blends anecdote and prescription, moving quickly from personal confession to actionable suggestion. Exercises, prompts, and clear directives appear intermittently to encourage immediate application of the ideas discussed.

Tone and Voice
The voice is caustic, wry, and at times confrontational, which can feel liberating to readers tired of soft-pedaled advice. Humor is used to defuse pain and to make uncomfortable truths more palatable, yet the text never shies from emotional rawness. That combination of wit and seriousness creates a tone that is simultaneously comforting and galvanizing.

Key Themes and Advice
Central themes include radical honesty with oneself and others, the necessity of setting boundaries, and the importance of small, consistent habits over grand proclamations. Burroughs urges readers to dismantle denial, accept responsibility for repetitive patterns, and choose manageable actions that gradually change the shape of daily life. Practical advice ranges from strategies for dealing with loss and loneliness to concrete steps for breaking dependencies and improving interpersonal dynamics.

Psychological Perspective
Underlying much of the guidance is an awareness of trauma and its long-term effects on behavior and thinking. Burroughs acknowledges that pain can masquerade as identity and that recovery often requires a reorientation of self-concept alongside practical change. The book favors cognitive honesty, naming the problem accurately, as the first move toward healthier coping and decision-making.

Who Will Benefit
Readers who respond to frankness and dark humor will find the book energizing and clarifying, particularly those wrestling with chronic self-sabotage, complicated grief, or stalled personal growth. It is suited to people who prefer direct, actionable counsel over therapeutic theorizing, and to those willing to confront uncomfortable truths rather than seek soothing reassurance. The practical focus makes it useful as a companion to therapy or as a standalone prompt for self-directed change.

Criticisms and Reception
The book's bluntness can alienate readers who prefer gentler guidance, and some critics note that quick, aphoristic advice sometimes oversimplifies complex psychological issues. Skeptics argue that personal anecdotes cannot substitute for individualized therapeutic care. Still, many readers and reviewers praise the candor, humor, and motivational spark that the book provides, especially when paired with an openness to doing the often difficult work of change.