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I know that human brains gobble up patterns and ritual like there’s no tomorrow, and while there is technically no difference between the December 31st of one year and the January 1st of the next it nevertheless feels like the turn of the year is when I am granted a brief reprieve from physical reality in which I get to believe that I’m the kind of person who can effect change just by wanting it a lot.

I read 104 books this year! Not including 10 books that I started and gave up on. Goodreads tells me that’s 32,886 pages, which seems like an awful lot of pages. I’m pretty proud of the fact that I averaged a steady clip of 2 books per week, but I’m also starting to suspect that I’ve been approaching these reading challenges as an end in and of itself—that is, as a metric to be tracked and gamified, not for the pure enjoyment of reading. Growth mentalities are unsustainable everywhere, even in beloved hobbies. In 2020, I’d like to make a conscious effort to read fewer books more deeply, to re-read books that have shaped my thinking, and with any luck, to write more about them.

One of my absolute favourite things to be asked is whether I have any advice for finding a therapist. This is because:

1. I’m a huge fan of mental health and people getting help and treatment.
2. I’m extremely honoured that people trust me to treat their question with care, to keep their confidence, and to provide good advice.
3. I really love telling people what to do.

I’ve been getting this question more frequently recently so I thought I’d write up a guide for easy reference. I’m located in Toronto, Canada, but most of this advice applies across the board. There’s also a list of self-guided resources at the bottom if you’re not quite ready to take that plunge.

Disclaimer: I have no professional training in health care of any variety. My credentials mainly consist of having had five therapists in four cities in two countries and interviewed many more, so I’ve done this a lot. Comments and suggestions super welcome.

I read 84 books this year ! Holy shit! That is more books than I have ever read in any previous year. Goodreads says that amounts to 25,596 pages and that sounds like a lot of pages. I attribute this mostly to the Toronto Public Library and its excellent and extensive ebook library, because I read 68 of those 84 books in the last seven months of 2018 after moving back to Toronto. Support your local public library, y’all. Also, I got a job in an office where after work I go home and don’t continue working forever, so that helps. Plus, I’m not running three other side projects at the same time. Aren’t you proud of me?

I know that practically every generation has thought that the end times were nigh, but it’s hard for me not to think that maybe this time we could be right. After all, we have Science now, more information than our brains were ever meant to absorb, and if I think too much about the bees and the coral reefs and the antibiotics and the cellphones in our hands and in our oceans and the borders and walls and cages and guns and bombs —