Book · 1995
Mind Over Mood
by Dennis Greenberger
A CBT workbook that trains you to catch and rewrite the thoughts behind depression, anxiety, and anger, one logged hour at a time.
What does Reddit think of Mind Over Mood?
Four mentions across three subreddits over seven years is a thin signal, but the signal is clear. r/therapists accounts for two of those four, and both point to Mind Over Mood as a standard CBT workbook recommendation alongside Feeling Good — starting-out reading for clinicians who want to know what their patients might encounter. The r/AcademicPsychology thread situates it in a list of basic clinical handbooks, behind Jesse Wright and Judith Beck as the canonical texts. The r/CPTSD mention (↑19) is the most useful data point. Someone who had spent years unaware of their own dissociation described doing the workbook's hourly mood-logging exercise as the thing that finally made the pattern visible. That's the book functioning exactly as designed: structured self-monitoring producing insight that conversation alone hadn't. Not a therapy replacement. A structured tool.
Community feedback & reader fit
Themes
- · Cognitive behavioral therapy self-help
- · Structured mood tracking and logging
- · Depression and anxiety management
- · Clinician-recommended workbook reading
- · Thought record exercises
Common praise
- + The hourly mood-logging exercise surfaced dissociation patterns one r/CPTSD commenter hadn't caught in years of living with them.
- + r/therapists recommends it consistently alongside Feeling Good as foundational CBT reading for new clinicians.
- + r/AcademicPsychology places it in the same tier as Jesse Wright and Judith Beck as a basic clinical handbook.
Common criticism
- − Four total mentions across seven years means Reddit hasn't discussed it enough to surface meaningful criticism.
- − It appears mostly as a list item in clinician reading threads, not as a book people finish and report back on.
- − The workbook format demands sustained logging effort; threads don't show whether readers actually complete it.
Who it's for
If you're a trainee therapist trying to get a feel for what your CBT clients will be working through, r/therapists treats this as essential alongside Feeling Good. If you've been in therapy and your therapist has handed you a workbook, this is likely what you're holding. For the r/CPTSD commenter whose mood patterns only became visible through the hourly logging exercise, that's the right use case: someone who needs structure to see what introspection alone hasn't shown them. Academic readers wanting clinical depth should look at Judith Beck or Jesse Wright instead — r/AcademicPsychology lists those as the more rigorous options.
Mentions over time
Top subreddits
Which Reddit comments matter for Mind Over Mood?
Top-upvoted quotes across the subreddits where this book is mentioned. Click through to read the full thread.
“I was reading the book "Mind over mood" (it's like an activity work book for CBT) and it had a section where you log what you do each day and what your mood is when you are done doing the task. I logged this for a few weeks and it became very clear that I would go from really high to really low in …
“Basic Handbooks for clinicians (these books are written mainly with depression and anxiety in mind): **Learning Cognitive Behavior Therapy - Jesse Wright** **Cognitive Behavior Therapy - Judith Beck** Beck is more focused on the structure of the sessions and has slightly more techniques. Wright …
“Mind over Mood is a good CBT workbook.
“Just another thought beyond the great comments you've already had. It looks like from your wording you're being brought up into a psychodynamic-ish orientation at the moment. If you haven't already, you might read a few CBT basics like Mind Over Mood and Feeling Good. When I was starting out I found…
“The book “mind over mood” really helped me in my practicum. it’s a CBT based book with lots of worksheets and I found when I felt stuck having a book to flip through for a worksheet was helpful. Be kind to yourself:)
“Mind Over Mood is a great CBT book. I use it for clients who like worksheets and also some of the exercises just in general.
“So when they said that CBT helped chronic pain, they didn't tell you it was a specific type of CBT and completely different to CBT for anxiety and depression? That really irks me that they did that. Mind over mood is for anxiety and depression. A CBT for chronic pain book would have chronic pa…
Convinced? Pick up Mind Over Mood
What else does r/therapists read?
Other books mentioned in the same sub, ranked. Shared-sub overlap with this title breaks ties.
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Mind Over Mood — frequently asked
What does Reddit think of Mind Over Mood?+
Broadly positive but thinly discussed. Four mentions across r/therapists, r/AcademicPsychology, and r/CPTSD over seven years. Therapists recommend it as a standard CBT workbook; an r/CPTSD comment (↑19) describes the hourly mood-logging exercise as the thing that finally made a years-long pattern visible. No one is arguing against it — there just isn't much volume to draw from.
Is Mind Over Mood good for self-therapy without a therapist?+
Depends on what you need it to do. The r/CPTSD account (↑19) describes using it independently and getting genuine insight from the logging exercises. But r/therapists mentions it in the context of clinician training reading, not as a standalone replacement for therapy. The workbook structure works; whether working through it alone is enough depends on severity.
How does Mind Over Mood compare to Feeling Good?+
r/therapists names both in the same breath as foundational CBT workbooks for starting-out clinicians. Feeling Good gets slightly more standalone mentions across Reddit broadly; Mind Over Mood appears more often as a workbook exercise tool, with the hourly mood log being its most cited concrete feature. Neither is treated as strictly better — they serve similar functions.
Who recommends Mind Over Mood on Reddit?+
Primarily therapists and clinicians-in-training. Two of the four tracked mentions come from r/therapists, one from r/AcademicPsychology in a list of basic clinical handbooks, and one from r/CPTSD where a user described using it independently. The recommendation pattern skews professional rather than casual reader.