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Same Time Next Week?: Living with anxiety in the modern world
Same Time Next Week? is an unflinchingly honest guide to living with anxiety in an age of constant optimisation, digital overload and curated calm.
Millions now turn to AI for therapy before they turn to a human, often leaving them with more questions than answers. In this refreshingly human book, therapist Joshua Fletcher shares the stories of four brave clients who choose to bring their whole selves to his therapy room and learn to make space for the messy feelings that won't quite fit into an AI prompt box.
Alongside the stories of Miriam, Ruben, Liya Su and Magnus, Josh shares his experience of returning to practice after wrestling with his own mental health challenges. Through these hopeful stories, Josh offers invaluable insights on how to manage anxiety in our modern world and resist the overwhelming pressure to be perfect.
This is not a book about fixing yourself because you are not a problem to be solved. In this book you'll learn how to better understand your anxiety and, by slowing down and building the right support, find a way to live a fulfilling life alongside it.
Millions now turn to AI for therapy before they turn to a human, often leaving them with more questions than answers. In this refreshingly human book, therapist Joshua Fletcher shares the stories of four brave clients who choose to bring their whole selves to his therapy room and learn to make space for the messy feelings that won't quite fit into an AI prompt box.
Alongside the stories of Miriam, Ruben, Liya Su and Magnus, Josh shares his experience of returning to practice after wrestling with his own mental health challenges. Through these hopeful stories, Josh offers invaluable insights on how to manage anxiety in our modern world and resist the overwhelming pressure to be perfect.
This is not a book about fixing yourself because you are not a problem to be solved. In this book you'll learn how to better understand your anxiety and, by slowing down and building the right support, find a way to live a fulfilling life alongside it.
Kindle Edition
Published May 14, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
May 17, 2026
Such a great book! I really enjoyed it and I found it super helpful as a therapist in training. Such an important reminder that AI will never be able to fully replace human therapists, because humanity offers something that computers could never, which is connection. I liked how he explained how important it is to sit with feelings instead of jumping to something in order to ‘fix’ anxiety. It was humorous and so educational. I’m a bit sensitive to cursing but apart from that I did love it!
August 27, 2026
4.5⭐️
Josh has a way of writing that comes across vulnerable, raw and emotional yet hilarious at the same time.
Loved this (and his last book, podcast and ted talk…)
Josh has a way of writing that comes across vulnerable, raw and emotional yet hilarious at the same time.
Loved this (and his last book, podcast and ted talk…)
September 6, 2026
I really like Joshua Fletcher! I like the script style and how his own thoughts are woven in.
Engaging and he has a lot of useful things to say!
Engaging and he has a lot of useful things to say!
June 1, 2026
Absolutely loved this. I listened to it on audio, really captured me. Great insight into anxiety
September 19, 2026
- Learning to sit with your emotions, including anxiety.
- Real, human connection can never be replaced by a robot.
- Not being afraid of discomfort and the horrors of instant gratification.
- The idea that anxiety isn't something to get rid of but to be embraced. Anxiety keeps you human.
- Anxiety happens to everyone.
- Anxiety and self doubt are things that stop you from charging head first into things without thinking.
These are some of the ideas that I obtained from the book, some of which I admit will take me a bit longer to fully digest and truly understand.
Josh constantly talks about how detrimental social media and the phone is for reinforcing instant gratification, something I caught myself doing toward the start of the book. The short stories are split in a "cycle" of each client, so it seems like we, too are living Josh's life chronologically, session by session. My instant gratification needs were left unfulfilled — which left me moderately annoyed, after realising I had to wait all the way to the end of the book to get the full story of any client.
Throughout the book, the stories — which are very relatable if i say so myself, made me understand that anxiety is something that everyone, no matter how "successful" they may seem, goes through. Everyone has a different story and experiences and you never truly know what people are going through.
To contrast and highlight these melancholic stories, there are certain segments which makes the book absolutely hilarious. I've caught myself laughing in public on at least 5 different occasions. It's something which I found ties excellently into the book as it lightens the mood and go to show that anxiety isn't really all that serious or detrimental at the end of the day.
I've said alot of good things about this book, which I have found excellent, but, pardon me for being a cynic — I would liked to have a seen a case where a client fails to get anything valuable out of therapy, or even ended up worse than before. Because I'm sure in reality these do happen to people and therapy is not a 100% successful solution that the book makes it out to be.
Overall an excellent read for anyone who wants to improve or understand their mental health better.
- Real, human connection can never be replaced by a robot.
- Not being afraid of discomfort and the horrors of instant gratification.
- The idea that anxiety isn't something to get rid of but to be embraced. Anxiety keeps you human.
- Anxiety happens to everyone.
- Anxiety and self doubt are things that stop you from charging head first into things without thinking.
These are some of the ideas that I obtained from the book, some of which I admit will take me a bit longer to fully digest and truly understand.
Josh constantly talks about how detrimental social media and the phone is for reinforcing instant gratification, something I caught myself doing toward the start of the book. The short stories are split in a "cycle" of each client, so it seems like we, too are living Josh's life chronologically, session by session. My instant gratification needs were left unfulfilled — which left me moderately annoyed, after realising I had to wait all the way to the end of the book to get the full story of any client.
Throughout the book, the stories — which are very relatable if i say so myself, made me understand that anxiety is something that everyone, no matter how "successful" they may seem, goes through. Everyone has a different story and experiences and you never truly know what people are going through.
To contrast and highlight these melancholic stories, there are certain segments which makes the book absolutely hilarious. I've caught myself laughing in public on at least 5 different occasions. It's something which I found ties excellently into the book as it lightens the mood and go to show that anxiety isn't really all that serious or detrimental at the end of the day.
I've said alot of good things about this book, which I have found excellent, but, pardon me for being a cynic — I would liked to have a seen a case where a client fails to get anything valuable out of therapy, or even ended up worse than before. Because I'm sure in reality these do happen to people and therapy is not a 100% successful solution that the book makes it out to be.
Overall an excellent read for anyone who wants to improve or understand their mental health better.
June 22, 2026
“Compassion fatigue is something that affects all of us, even us therapists. It’s a hurdle we all must jump over from time to time.”
— Joshua Fletcher, Same Time Next Week?
Same Time Next Week? by Joshua Fletcher is an unflinching account of what happens inside a therapy room in a world where AI has the upper hand. We see technology permeating every aspect of our lives and penetrating different fields.
“Anxiety doesn’t disappear through logic or willpower alone.”
Fletcher also acknowledges the voices in his head, even when he is talking to other people. By opening up about his own mental health struggles, he offers valuable insights into how to navigate them. He has coined the term “Internal Commentators,” which spans eleven elements. Some of them include Anxiety, the Critic, the Analytical Mind, Biology, and even Empathy.
The book opens with a scenario in which Fletcher feels like “garbage” and senses his imposter syndrome kicking in. This is when his supervisor, Gail, intervenes. One of her statements that goes like - ”Now you're talking about what you uniquely can offer. That's the difference between a therapist who's hiding behind techniques and one who's learned to trust themselves.”
The narrative then goes on to describe the case studies of Miriam (an aspiring therapist), Ruben (someone facing financial difficulties), Liya Su (a social media enthusiast), and Magnus (who has been diagnosed with agoraphobia), whose real identities have been hidden to maintain confidentiality.
Reading this book reminded me, in parts, of the autobiographical account I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Se-Hee. Reading Baek Se-Hee’s work was a therapeutic experience—one that invited introspection.
Overall, Same Time Next Week? does not read like a conventional self-help manual. Instead, it aims to help readers find emotional balance. It is a valuable resource for anyone seeking to live with anxiety in a fast-paced world.
“This book doesn’t promise to eradicate feelings you don’t like; instead, it invites you to allow more.”
— Joshua Fletcher, Same Time Next Week?
Same Time Next Week? by Joshua Fletcher is an unflinching account of what happens inside a therapy room in a world where AI has the upper hand. We see technology permeating every aspect of our lives and penetrating different fields.
“Anxiety doesn’t disappear through logic or willpower alone.”
Fletcher also acknowledges the voices in his head, even when he is talking to other people. By opening up about his own mental health struggles, he offers valuable insights into how to navigate them. He has coined the term “Internal Commentators,” which spans eleven elements. Some of them include Anxiety, the Critic, the Analytical Mind, Biology, and even Empathy.
The book opens with a scenario in which Fletcher feels like “garbage” and senses his imposter syndrome kicking in. This is when his supervisor, Gail, intervenes. One of her statements that goes like - ”Now you're talking about what you uniquely can offer. That's the difference between a therapist who's hiding behind techniques and one who's learned to trust themselves.”
The narrative then goes on to describe the case studies of Miriam (an aspiring therapist), Ruben (someone facing financial difficulties), Liya Su (a social media enthusiast), and Magnus (who has been diagnosed with agoraphobia), whose real identities have been hidden to maintain confidentiality.
Reading this book reminded me, in parts, of the autobiographical account I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Se-Hee. Reading Baek Se-Hee’s work was a therapeutic experience—one that invited introspection.
Overall, Same Time Next Week? does not read like a conventional self-help manual. Instead, it aims to help readers find emotional balance. It is a valuable resource for anyone seeking to live with anxiety in a fast-paced world.
“This book doesn’t promise to eradicate feelings you don’t like; instead, it invites you to allow more.”
August 6, 2026
It's been a long time since I read a nonfiction book this good that actually gets what anxiety looks like right now, in this exact messy, AI-online-dominated world.
The part that got me most was the DPDR section, and how directly it ties to social media. DPDR stands for depersonalisation and derealisation, basically feeling detached from your own body or like the world around you isn't fully real. Fletcher explains it as one of anxiety's most common symptoms and also one of the least talked about, which honestly checks out because I'd never come across the term until now.
We already live our lives through screens, build relationships out of text bubbles and filtered photos, and somewhere along the way we normalized a version of derealisation without ever calling it that. Social media asks us to perform for an audience and turn our emptiness into something engaging enough to post. The line between what's real and what's staged keeps getting thinner, and we've basically been trained to treat our bodies like images and our thoughts like captions. Once Fletcher laid that out, I couldn't unsee how much of my own scrolling habit might be feeding that same detachment.
The idea that your brain disconnects you from reality as a form of protection, not a malfunction, reframed how I think about anxiety as a whole.
The part that got me most was the DPDR section, and how directly it ties to social media. DPDR stands for depersonalisation and derealisation, basically feeling detached from your own body or like the world around you isn't fully real. Fletcher explains it as one of anxiety's most common symptoms and also one of the least talked about, which honestly checks out because I'd never come across the term until now.
We already live our lives through screens, build relationships out of text bubbles and filtered photos, and somewhere along the way we normalized a version of derealisation without ever calling it that. Social media asks us to perform for an audience and turn our emptiness into something engaging enough to post. The line between what's real and what's staged keeps getting thinner, and we've basically been trained to treat our bodies like images and our thoughts like captions. Once Fletcher laid that out, I couldn't unsee how much of my own scrolling habit might be feeding that same detachment.
The idea that your brain disconnects you from reality as a form of protection, not a malfunction, reframed how I think about anxiety as a whole.
July 31, 2026
I found this book when I was spending large parts of my day trying to find some meaning into recent events - with Chat gpt and Claude. I was grasping at straws, looking for crutches, anything to help me with my anxiety. I spent months like that, even hacking astrology via gpt and asking it to plot my months. After month 6 it was clear that this wasn't gonna work. Gpt doesn't have any answers, cannot predict the future and cannot make me feel better. It starts sounding the same very quickly - that's when I broke out of my trance and found this book.
So to me, the book carried a lot more meaning and purpose and hence my rating is very high.
As a story, it's pretty average, but what the author explains in between the story - that's gold to someone like me who has had little to no brush with actual therapy.
What I do however understand very well is that hard work builds skills and hence I understood slowly building resilience is the only way out of anxiety - I have to build the muscle in the silence, every day, with intention. But that is my take away. I'm sure there is a lot here for those who are using their Gen AIs for emotional companionship of any kind or social media hacks for their wellness and growth.
Read this now.
So to me, the book carried a lot more meaning and purpose and hence my rating is very high.
As a story, it's pretty average, but what the author explains in between the story - that's gold to someone like me who has had little to no brush with actual therapy.
What I do however understand very well is that hard work builds skills and hence I understood slowly building resilience is the only way out of anxiety - I have to build the muscle in the silence, every day, with intention. But that is my take away. I'm sure there is a lot here for those who are using their Gen AIs for emotional companionship of any kind or social media hacks for their wellness and growth.
Read this now.
August 30, 2026
I genuinely don’t know when a nonfiction book has ever touched me this deeply. 🫠
As someone who lives with an anxiety disorder, this book felt like a big, warm hug — and, at the same time, like looking into the far-too-bright mirror you really don’t want to look into first thing in the morning.
It’s comforting, validating, and incredibly human. But it also doesn’t let you hide behind your own patterns. It makes you look at the things you’d rather avoid, question the stories you tell yourself, and recognise the ways you might be keeping yourself stuck.
And I think that’s what I loved most about it. It doesn’t just tell you that you’re okay. It gently reminds you that things can get better — but that sometimes you have to be willing to look at the uncomfortable stuff first.
There were so many little things in this book that made me stop, think, laugh, or quietly go, “Oh. Fuck. That’s me.”
So… thank you Josh, I guess. 😂
A genuinely beautiful, thoughtful, compassionate book. I’m very glad I read it. ❤️
As someone who lives with an anxiety disorder, this book felt like a big, warm hug — and, at the same time, like looking into the far-too-bright mirror you really don’t want to look into first thing in the morning.
It’s comforting, validating, and incredibly human. But it also doesn’t let you hide behind your own patterns. It makes you look at the things you’d rather avoid, question the stories you tell yourself, and recognise the ways you might be keeping yourself stuck.
And I think that’s what I loved most about it. It doesn’t just tell you that you’re okay. It gently reminds you that things can get better — but that sometimes you have to be willing to look at the uncomfortable stuff first.
There were so many little things in this book that made me stop, think, laugh, or quietly go, “Oh. Fuck. That’s me.”
So… thank you Josh, I guess. 😂
A genuinely beautiful, thoughtful, compassionate book. I’m very glad I read it. ❤️
June 15, 2026
I enjoyed this and thought it was well timed considered the amount of AI we find surrounding ourselves these days.
Especially interesting to me was the warning against relying on AI agents for self help, conversation, and substitutes for real people. This resonated with me as I'm someone who has played around with a kind of self help agent. I think I'm skirting just on the healthy side but he makes some great points about the quiet creep of fake experiences.
I wonder if the author played Disco Elysium because the way he narrated his internal thoughts from the perspectives of different aspects of his personality worked really well and I'd not encountered it in serious writing before.
The biggest takeaway, and it really isn't a new concept, is that anxiety is a survival mechanism - just allow it to do it's job - but don't be ruled by it.
Especially interesting to me was the warning against relying on AI agents for self help, conversation, and substitutes for real people. This resonated with me as I'm someone who has played around with a kind of self help agent. I think I'm skirting just on the healthy side but he makes some great points about the quiet creep of fake experiences.
I wonder if the author played Disco Elysium because the way he narrated his internal thoughts from the perspectives of different aspects of his personality worked really well and I'd not encountered it in serious writing before.
The biggest takeaway, and it really isn't a new concept, is that anxiety is a survival mechanism - just allow it to do it's job - but don't be ruled by it.
June 8, 2026
Another brilliant Josh Fletcher book! I could relate to so much of it - not just as a trainee therapist but as a client too.
June 22, 2026
It was great to read about a therapists point of view of what therapy involves. Very insightful.
June 26, 2026
compassion fatigue is an epidemic x
July 2, 2026
Another excellent book by Joshua Fletcher - heart felt, insightful and empathetic
July 14, 2026
For a book that’s about coping in a world with AI, it really feels like this has been written with the aid of ChatGPT??
Good messaging but terribly bland, boring writing. 👎🏻
Good messaging but terribly bland, boring writing. 👎🏻
July 28, 2026
This was a refreshing read. While many books I’ve read appeal to the mind, this book nourishes the soul.
September 11, 2026
Incredible, important and just as good if not better than his first.
September 14, 2026
I love this author's books. Hoping for more.
September 21, 2026
Invaluable for trainee therapists like myself
September 24, 2026
This was so genuine, human and helpful. Joshua Fletcher deserves 5 stars for this book, and more generally for everything he does 💛
June 21, 2026
Witty, insightful, perfect ! I feel like this book was also some kind of catharsis for the author , and reading it as a student practitioner makes me feel better, like we all human, with same doubts , fears and whatever else makes us who we are . Sitting with anxiety makes a lot of sense as much as we don’t like it. Looking forward to the next one!
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews