first, we make the beast beautiful

Book excerpt: "Probably the best book on living with anxiety that I've ever read" Mark Manson, bestselling author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck Sarah Wilson is a New York Times and Amazon #1 bestselling author, entrepreneur and philanthropist. She's the founder of IQuitSugar.com, whose 8-Week Program has been completed by 1.5 million people in 133 countries. A former news journalist and editor of Cosmopolitan, she was the host of the first series of MasterChef Australia and is the author of the international bestsellers first, we make the beast beautiful, I Quit Sugar: Simplicious, I Quit Sugar and I Quit Sugar For Life. Her latest book is I Quit Sugar: Simplicious Flow. She is ranked as one of the top 200 most influential authors in the world. Sarah blogs in an intimate fashion - on philosophy, anxiety, minimalism and anti-consumerism - at sarahwilson.com, lives in Sydney, Australia, rides a bike everywhere, is a compulsive hiker and is eternally curious. In first, we make the beast beautiful, Sarah directs her intense focus and fierce investigatory skills onto this lifetime companion of hers, looking at the triggers and treatments, the fashions and fads. She reads widely and interviews fellow sufferers, mental health experts, philosophers, and even the Dalai Lama, processing all she learns through the prism her own experiences. Sarah pulls at the thread of accepted definitions of anxiety, and unravels the notion that it is a difficult, dangerous disease that must be medicated into submission. Ultimately, she re-frames anxiety as a spiritual quest rather than a burdensome affliction, a state of yearning that will lead us closer to what really matters. Practical and poetic, wise and funny, this is a small book with a big heart. It will encourage the myriad sufferers of the world's most common mental illness to feel not just better about their condition, but delighted by the possibilities it offers for a richer, fuller life. MORE PRAISE FOR FIRST, WE MAKE THE BEAST BEAUTIFUL "at once a nomadic journey, a cri de coeur and a compendium of hard-won wisdom ..." Professor Patrick McGorry AO MD PhD FRCP FRANZCP FAA FASSA, 2010 Australian of the Year "A witty, well-researched and often insightful book about negotiating a new relationship with anxiety." Andrew Solomon, Professor of Clinical Psychology and author of The Noonday Demon: An Anatomy of Depression