Performance Addiction: The Dangerous New Syndrome and How to Stop It from Ruining Your Life

"The best book I've seen on how we can stop sabotaging our need for balance. Compulsive achievers will find here everything they need to gain the sense of satisfaction that's eluded them. This book is a must-read for men and women struggling with the mystery of why they're not happy. This is a most wise, helpful, and important book, and it's wonderfully readable."
-Mira Kirshenbaum
author of Everything Happens for a Reason and The Emotional Energy Factor
"Every perfectionistic, hypervigilant person wondering why peace of mind is so elusive should read this book. Dr. Ciaramicoli totally nails the issue of performance addiction and offers all the help you need. A life-changing book."
-Dr. Charles Foster, author of Feel Better Fast
"A much-welcome, reader-friendly, utterly unpretentious call to sanity. With clarity and disarming simplicity, Dr. Arthur Ciaramicoli exposes the futility and indeed the harm of our collective compulsive ride on the achievement treadmill. . . . Performance Addiction is a crash course in essential wisdom for today. Read it and give it to anyone about whose mental health and happiness you deeply care."
-P. M. Forni, Professor at Johns Hopkins University and author of Choosing Civility
"Integrating theory with compelling stories from his clinical practice, Dr. Ciaramicoli provides concrete, practical methods to address the growing problem of performance addiction."
-Richard Kadison, M.D.
Chief, Mental Health Services, Harvard University Health Services
Do you achieve goals without feeling fulfilled?
Do you think your hard work will win you love and respect?
Do you feel as if you're never doing well enough?
In this intriguing and prescriptive guide, Harvard Medical School instructor Dr. Arthur P. Ciaramicoli explains this new psychological issue, revealing the reasons why the label of success so rarely leads to happiness. Performance Addiction gives you action steps for freeing yourself from the obligation to excel, finding new meaning in your work and relationships, and going beyond material reward to obtain genuine, healthy accomplishment throughout your life. Through illuminating self-evaluations and writing exercises, you'll gain a stronger sense of self, learn to balance your work and your personal life, and at long last find the satisfaction that comes from breaking your patterns of addictive behavior and finding new, better ways to accept and give love.

ARTHUR P. CIARAMICOLI, Ed.D., Ph.D., a clinical psychologist and Instructor of Psychology at Harvard Medical School, is the coauthor of The Power of Empathy. He has a substantial private practice, does corporate lecturing, and has appeared on The O'Reilly Factor as well as numerous national radio programs.