Froggatt - Choose to Be Happy

Of the people who have contributed to this book, many will remain anonymous. They are the clients who have shared with me their thoughts about the self-help methods I have taught them. In this way, they have in turn taught me how to refine these methods to the point where they are ready to be presented to a wider audience.

There are colleagues who have spent many hours reading drafts and providing constructive comment. My special thanks to Terri Smith and Stefan Thevessen, who met with me regularly and helped me set the direction for the book, and encouraged me when the task began to seem dauntingly long-term; to Audrey Adams, for her support and the help she gave me on the writing process; to Linda Kennington and Judy Wilford, who have edited the book in its entirety, providing extensive comments both from the point of view of the professional social worker and the professional editor; and to David Ramsden and Dr Tom Flewett, for feedback and guidance on specific chapters relating to their fields of expertise.

Perhaps the person who knows the book best is my wife, Glenys, who has edited each chapter so many times she can almost recite them from memory. I owe a great debt to my family for the way they have kept the home running over the years I have been locking myself away to write.

Finally, this book owes much to the work of two people whom I have met only through their writings: Drs Albert Ellis and Aaron Beck. It is to Dr Beck I owe my understanding of the ways in which human beings distort reality; and to Dr Ellis that crucial insight into how we apply personal meanings to our interpretations of reality. I hope that my book, in the way it has attempted to integrate their thinking, has done justice to the parallel but related systems of psychotherapy they have so elegantly developed over the past four decades.

Wayne Froggatt, 1992