Gratitude in Life's Trenches

How to Experience the Good Life Even When Everything Is Going Wrong

By: Robin Phillips

Narrated by: Deacon Kenneth Timothy

Length: 9 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

No end of books these days offer us techniques for self-improvement. Taking a different tack, Robin Phillips shows that God meets us where we are, in the pain and heartache of the present moment. Instead of looking for a way to escape from hardship, we can cultivate an attitude of gratitude, peace, and self-acceptance that will transform our experience of suffering.

Drawing on his own experiences and his work as a consultant in the behavioral health industry - as well as stories of saints and sufferers, teachings of the Fathers, and recent discoveries in neuroscience - Phillips shows us that the journey to personal well-being is one we can all travel, regardless of the hardships we may face.

©2020 Robin Phillips (P)2020 Robin Phillips

Search for meaning not happiness!

One can learn quite a bit by listening to this book. "Gratitude in Life's Trenches" helps one see that seeking happiness can actually cause one to be unhappy. Meaning is what makes life worth living. Additionally as a Christian, seeing life's harder moments through the lens of God's good and perfect plans for us and being grateful for His plans helps us "reframe", events and see the good that can come through these tough times. This is a simplified summary of the author's main points. Robin Phillips amplifies these points by giving us stories and quotes from saints, Christian authors, and persons such as Victor Frankl and Dietrich Bonhoeffer who endured the horrors of concentration camps. He doesn't stop there. He also includes the findings of scientific research on living with gratitude, attitude, and meaning. Although I enjoyed this audio book, I found myself wanting to have the traditional book form so that I might highlight some of the inspiring quotes, research, and stories that Phillips included. I found the narrator's voice was a bit too "perfect" at first yet it grew on me as I continued to listen. I highly recommend this book to those who are going through hard times presently and also to those who are not, as a preparation for rough patches that are sure to come.

A book we all could use

“Emotional wounds we experience can be far more devastating than physical pain. But while our society tends to take someone’s pain seriously if it correlates with visible physical injuries, we tend to marginalize a person’s pain when it is invisible. In our quick-fix culture, people who are hurting can be left thinking they are the problem for not being able to toughen up and get over it. Sometimes we need to actually take an approach that is counter to our feel-good culture and move towards our pain before we can move away from it.” ~ Cherie Calbom (Foreward)

Too often, our invisible wounds cause more damage and distress than anything external. What is seen can be tended to, and what others recognize, they can respond to. For the individual recovering from surgery, there are often meals, help with transportation, offers of encouragement and support. For those without visible external struggles and those internal struggles are fronted with a well-trained smile and “fine, how are you,” the support is not as readily offered.

Allowing others in, expressing vulnerability and sharing one’s internal suffering, whether it’s chronic pain, mental health, trauma is risky. Some may respond with disbelief, others with a dismissive “Things aren’t that bad” or a “well, at least it’s not….” Those who want to respond with genuineness and compassion may still not know how. This book offers some suggestions for all of us – sufferer and supporter (and we will all be in both roles at various points in our lives).

As a clinician I reference this book (directly at times, indirectly others) almost daily now. I find myself sharing information with friends and clients alike in discussions about self-esteem vs. self-compassion and how the choice toward self-compassion leads to a much richer life. We discuss how vulnerability is actually strength, and how pain can have purpose. Most of all, we talk about gratitude no matter what the situation; how avoiding rose-colored glasses and facing the reality of the landscape allows us to truly look for what we are thankful for and to grow toward acceptance and wholeheartedness; to change what we can and to be grateful for what we can. Many times, the situation doesn’t change – but resiliency does.

In the audiobook format of the book, I found that I needed longer listening periods than my usual audiobook experiences – There is a lot of content in each chapter, and it’s not easily picked up with 10-20 minutes of listening. I wanted every morsel of information, and it is rich. All of the information is grounded in research, and is explained in a way that one does not need to be an academic to understand it. Each chapter builds on the previous ones, but the chapters can also stand alone. There are many points where the author also describes how to apply the information.

I cannot recommend this book enough.

An incredible read

Gratitude in Life’s Trenches written by Robin Phillips is an amazing book for the times we are in. It shows how life can be seen in a new way. It shows us how even the small things are something to be grateful for he uses the examples like clean drinking water, freedom of worship, a warm place to sleep at night, accessibility of music and books, medical care, not having to go hungry and these are things we should always be thankful for, and that being grateful for these things is not something we normally think about, but that we should as it will remind us how many things we truly have to be grateful for

In Chapter ten - struggle to find your true self he talks about how two decades of solitary confinement can cause mental and physical issues, that once he was released were still affecting but that he was able to get better with the help of his daughter. We have the choice to either be our true self or just a shell of that self. Its easy to fall into that well of despair but we have to choose to be positive and we have to keep that inner peace I really agree with this. I suffer from complex PTSD, there is a lot I can no longer do, and working right now isnt possible which is very hard for me to accept, but there are still things I can do. I can still be a friend to others, I can still enjoy reading and my pets, and I can still have a good attitude and remember what to be grateful for. Its not always easy but really books like this truly help to retrain how i look at things. Sadly that retraining isnt done once and done, but reminding myself how to appreciate things and letting go of those things that are harmful to me really do help.

I recommend this book to everyone. There are certainly people who will be further ahead on their journey to their true self than others but it can be done. My only regret on this book was the audio version I would like to be able to have made notes in the book for my own benefit, and I will get a paperback version but otherwise the author wrote and incredible book and the narrator was a perfect choice for this book.

A book about gratitude that feels rule

This is a great book for those struggling to find contentment in difficult circumstances. None of that wishy washy modern self indulgent me time. The author relies on the writings of those who struggled in real adversity, such as Bonhoeffer, to articulate a path to thankfulness in spite of suffering. He also lays out a path to self acceptance in our brokenness that leads to real healing.

It Would Be Better to Read Than to Listen to This Book

I’m going to preface my review by saying that I received an audio copy as a gift, and chose to do the review based on the title alone. I don’t know any of the author’s previous works, so my opinion is both unbiased and maybe a little shallow.

The author has gathered and presents a wide variety of material from scientific research, the Scriptures, pastors, priests, and influencers in varying faith traditions, as well as his own social circle. He also offers practical exercises. It seems to be a combination of clinical and personal approach.

The book does read as far more academic than I was expecting based on the title, almost like I’m reading a college paper, as it is full of references, quotes and sidebars, often citing from only a small handful of source material. I might have preferred he recommend we read George MacDonald and then come to this book as it came across as largely a commentary on MacDonald’s thoughts.

He does share “anecdotes” from people he seems to know personally, but the conversations he quotes honestly sound made-up to me - they read not so much as actual conversations between two people but rather a fictionalized rendering written a little too properly.

So.... overall..... I wanted to get more out of this book, but I think having consumed it in the audio format was not the right approach to get out of it what I would have liked. Unfortunately, I do not believe this book lends itself well to being an audiobook. There are a LOT of quotes and sidebars, which made it really difficult to keep track of when it was the author speaking from his own mind, and when he was quoting or referencing somebody else. He also skips around frequently between stories, starting them in one chapter and then finishing them later, which I at least personally found quite distracting.

But it’s not all negative and I know some folks really benefit from having an audio choice! This would be a great book for a discussion group, and one day I may give it a try in physical form so I can better digest it and use the journal/discussion prompts. Because he does quote from so much other source material, if one wanted to dig deeper into this topic, a research trip to the library would be an easy task.

(As a practical note, I benefited from listening to the book at a 1.3 speed, as this seemed to give the reader a more natural gait.)

I can only give the audiobook 3 stars as I can’t recommend it in this medium, though I think I’d likely give the hard copy 4.

I Tried Really Hard

I tried very hard and multiple times to read this book. I failed. I am sure that someone will glean something from this book and from this format, but it simply was not for me.

As for the narration...I had to speed up the narration after falling asleep twice. The narrator reminded me of the voice-overs on those deadly boring movies and videos we had to watch in school.

I stalled on this one.

2.5 stars on what I did manage to complete.

Full Disclosure: I was given a copy of this book in return for an honest review. Thank you for the opportunity to do this, AFP!