What can we do to feel better? How can we appease unhappiness and anxiety? How can we make such profound changes in ourselves that we will be capable of recreating our lives? Perhaps all that is required is one simple gesture. But what should it be and where to begin?

First of all, we must free ourselves of the prejudices and certainties of therapists. Contrary to popular belief, psychotherapy need not be long. But it is essential to overcome - or to get around - the barrier erected by language. Roustang argues that it is not really possible to be cured by talking, and that it is through hypnosis that we can have access to another form of perception of ourselves and of the world.

In this highly original work by the author of such celebrated classics as Un destin si funeste and Qu'est-ce que l'hypnose?, readers will discover what to do in order to “feel life”.

François Roustang trained as a philosopher and as a psychoanalyst. For two decades, he has been involved in questioning the meaning and the results of psychoanalysis. His earlier books published by Editions Odile Jacob are Comment faire rire un paranoïaque (1996) and La fin de la plainte (2000).