I'm Ok--You're Ok

by Thomas A. Harris and Amy B. Harris

Book Overview

The Classic Bestseller that has Changed the Lives of Millions

Extraordinary. Harris has helped millions find the freedom to change, liberate their adult effectiveness, and achieve joyful intimacy with others. --Los Angeles Times

Transactional analysis delineates three ego-states (Parent, Adult and Child) as the basis for the content and quality of interpersonal communication. "Happy childhood" notwithstanding, says Harris, most of us are living out the not OK feelings of a defenseless child wholly dependent on others (parents) for stroking and caring. At some stage early in our lives we adopt a "position" about ourselves and others that determines how we feel about everything we do. And for a huge portion of the population, that position is I'm Not OK-You're OK. This negative life position, shared by successful and unsuccessful people alike, contaminates our rational adult capabilities, leaving us vulnerable to inappropriate, emotional reactions of our child and uncritically learned behavior programmed into our parent. By exploring the structure of our personalities and understanding old decisions, Harris believes we can find the freedom to change our lives.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060724277
• ISBN13: 9780060724276
• Release Date: July 2004
• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.63 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.3" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

A return to roots

As good as it was when first published...even more meaningful after 30 years. As valid now as it was then.

Very stimulating and enlightening book!

I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand his or her behaviour in situations.The "A-Ha" feeling you get when you start reading it comes when you understand why so-and-so makes you feel small or angry and why certain situations make you start playing some game.It discusses the basic terminologies and vocabulary needed and then goes on to discuss in different social contexts and developmental contexts the application of Transaction Analysis.This is not just a vague psychology book like Freud. It is extremely practical and insightful.

It works

This is a must read for people who want to understand themselves and other people better. I agree that the idea of child-adult-parent may not reflect the exact way how our brains work but it provides an easy-understandable terminilogy to describe and think about our behaviour. The most interesting thing in any reading is not just getting some information but thinking about what you read and this book opens you a new way to do it. It really works for me, thanks to Thomas Harris and Eric Berne.

We're OK

An outstanding self-help book discussing human behavior based on transactional analysis, in an easy to understand language while still technical.

The truth about how our minds work

I read this book when I was eleven years old, and somehow, I was just old enough to understand it. While Freud uses smoke and mirror terms like "id", "ego" and "super ego", Harris uses simple terms like "child", "adult" and "parent", meaning roughly the same thing but being more accessible. He starts the book off with a chapter on experiments that were performed, involving electrical stimulation to certain areas of exposed brains during surgery. These experiments yielded some of the first and most important discoveries ever made into how our minds work. Then he uses the findings to explain the rest. This is good stuff, beautifully done. Having read this book almost thirty years ago, I can promise you, you'll never forget this one.