The widely-loved international bestseller that offers readers - men as much as women - a rare chance to understand and balance our two great emotional needs: for intimacy and for a sense of emotional security and independence. Six years in the writing, this wise, inclusive and healing book, now updated and expanded (2002), shows that at the heart of many of our most painful problems is a need to understand and appreciate ourselves, in order to be able to reach out to other people and receive and enjoy what they can offer us. This is a book that is as useful and validating for people who are on their own as it is for those wishing to deepen and develop an intimate relationship. Self-understanding and genuine appreciation of others is made possible through a compelling combination of story-telling and and an unusual depth of psychological insight. More than 100,000 copies have been sold. "Intelligent, eloquent and wise" Metro "Offers penetrating insights into some of the most basic paradoxes of human relationships" The Guardian "A book of tremendous depth and power" Maxine McKew, The Bulletin "She leads the reader from restriction to freedom through self-reliance" The Australian "Like the great sages, Dowrick is aware that...true wisdom comes from experiencing all that life can bring, and reflecting deeply upon it'" Anne French, The Listener