Normalizing the Mind and Why I Had to Write This Book
- Brainz Magazine
- May 6, 2025
- 3 min read
I’m Chiara Esposito, Master of Science in Psychology & Management, coach, and systemic-relational therapy trainee. I help women reconnect with themselves and build fulfilling relationships by addressing emotional patterns that lead to stress and unhealthy choices.
There are books we write with our head. And then, there are books that come from the body, from silence, from the part of us that has no words but a deep knowing.
Normalizzare la mente is one of those books. Written in Italian, but born in a language even older: the language of sensation, fragmentation, and slow repair.
I didn’t plan to become an author. I planned to be a psychologist. And I am one. A systemic-relational therapist, a researcher, a coach. But I also carry the lived experience of someone who, for years, thought something was fundamentally wrong with her. Too emotional. Too sensitive. Too intense. Too complicated.
Not because someone said so explicitly, but because the culture we grow up in rarely gives us the tools to understand our inner world. We are taught to analyze, label, suppress, or fix what doesn’t look "functional."
This book was born from a moment of stillness. After years of work with clients, of self-inquiry, of trauma-informed learning, I began to hear one sentence rise over and over again from within:
"You are not here to fix your mind. You are here to inhabit it."
That sentence became the seed of this book.
What does it mean to "normalize" the mind?
It means moving away from medicalized models that label and isolate. It means remembering that emotional chaos, nervous system dysregulation, shame, or confusion are not always signs of pathology. They are often signs of disconnection.
Normalizzare la mente is not a guide to becoming better. It’s a space to recognize your wholeness.
It invites the reader into a journey of embodied emotional literacy: learning to feel safely again. To name emotions. To meet them somatically. To understand where our fears of love, closeness, or softness come from. To notice how culture shapes what we call "normal."
My deepest intention with this book was not to explore isolated aspects of mental health.
But rather to reclaim mental health as a right.
A world that only addresses mental health once we are broken is not a world built for human well-being.
Mental health is not something we “treat” when it’s gone.
It’s something we need to build into the very structure of our lives, our communities, our systems.
This book is not about one technique.
It’s about what we, as human beings, truly need in order to live well.
Why I wrote it in Italian
Because Italian is my mother tongue, and this book needed warmth. Sensuality. Density. It needed to breathe like the landscapes of my country. And because I wanted to speak to the women, men, and young people I meet in my work, those who believe they are broken, when they are actually wise.
What the book contains:
Stories from therapy rooms and from personal life
Tools from systemic therapy, schema therapy, and embodied psychology
Reflections on trauma, shame, boundaries, love
A new way to look at our mental life: not through "what’s wrong with me?" but "what have I adapted to?"
For now, the book is only available in Italian. But the message is universal.
If you are someone who has ever felt like your mind is too much, too loud, or too tired, I see you. This book was written with you in mind. And heart. And gut.
You can read a free preview here, or join me for a free 30-minute personal resonance session.
Read more from Chiara Esposito
Chiara Esposito, Coach, Systemic Therapist in Training
I help women reconnect with themselves and overcome emotional patterns. These patterns often lead to unhealthy relationship choices and stress. My coaching approach empowers women to build authentic, fulfilling relationships. Together, we work to create more confidence and balance in their lives.
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