Charlotte Francis knows that when the time is right, the right book will appear to guide us on the path to truth and healing. She shares some of the titles that have most inspired her.

Among the hubbub of office workers rushing around in their lunch break in Melbourne's CBD the other day, a man with a message wove his way through the crowd: "We've got Howard's sedition laws - next it'll be the thought laws," he shouted, tapping his temples forcefully to get our attention. Having just seen the film Good Night and Good Luck starring George Clooney about McCarthy-era journalist Ed Morrow and the constraints placed on freedom of thought and speech at that time, it made me shudder.

Leaving political debate aside, the man's lunchtime rant and fear of the State taking Orwellian control of our thought processes made me appreciate just what a wonderful gift we are blessed with in the power of thought. Thankfully, no one can penetrate the depths of our minds and we have a wonderful resource at our disposal, 24 hours a day, to think, to create, to learn, to dream, to visualise, to plan and to manifest what we want.

And yet how easy it is to sabotage our thinking and switch our inner voice to the negative, focusing on our limitations, both perceived and real, on what we can't do, what we haven't achieved, what we haven't got, on a poor self image and on futile comparisons with others. Forget Big Brother, we need to police our own thoughts and steer them back on course away from such untruths!

I have found self help books (and by self help I mean everything from popular psychology to the more esoteric and New Age titles) to be a particularly valuable resource in helping me not only to understand myself, but to negotiate life's ups and downs and twists and turns. This kind of literature tends to stimulate enquiry and encourage us to question our values, thinking and behaviour, our speech patterns and even our postural habits.  I wonder how many people have been inspired by a book to change their life and embark on a journey of self discovery?

We are all familiar with the incredible power and energy of positive affirmations, but sometimes we need to work a bit harder if we are to tackle that persistent inner critic and prosecutor - the part of us that sabotages our efforts to change, to break habits, to build our self belief. Reading the right book at the right time can help us to see the truth about ourselves and our situation, giving us insight into any destructive patterns we may be stuck in. Power plays and emotional dramas are held up to us like a mirror and we begin to see why we have invested in them and what we are doing both to create and perpetuate them.

On a visit to the UK last year, I was disappointed and a little cross to read an article in The Times slating self help books, belittling those who read them as gullible, lost individuals seduced by marketing hype and false promises. The author claimed that the very fact that a "self helper" reads not just one but several of these books and keeps on reading them, shows they don't work.  The same criticism is, of course, not meted out to a reader of cookery books, thrillers or romantic novels!  I would hazard a guess that the author has never read a popular psychology or self improvement title and is deeply resistant to change.  Maybe I should have sent him a gift of Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway! Facing the truth about ourselves can be painful and quite confronting and often we choose not to acknowledge it, preferring to sort everyone else out instead.  "Auntie Jean should get this book - she's a classic victim type," we say leafing through The Celestine Prophecy in the bookshop and putting it firmly back on the shelf.

My first encounter with a self help book was back in the '80s and it was my grandmother's copy of The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale - "You are not what you think you are, but what you think, you are." A great believer in prayer and positive talk, I thought of my grandmother when I bought my first book, You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay. Driven by the need to understand and treat digestive problems holistically, Louise Hay's book presented me with a whole new way of thinking about the inter-connectedness of mind, body and spirit. It all made such sense!  The realisation that I had contributed to my health problems through the thoughts, actions and choices I had made up to that point provided ample food for thought and stomach, the stomach of course being the seat of emotion.

From there I went on to read many, many more inspiring books, not because I was being exploited by marketing hype, but because I began to peel off layers and to discover self truths. I began to be more open to ideas, to manifesting what I wanted, to energy work, to other like-minded people and I started to value experiences, both good and bad, as learning opportunities.

Quite effortlessly, and via the synchronistic grapevine, I then started to be lent, given or directed to the book I most needed when I was ready for it. Now I not only had access to a wonderful Pandora's Box of wisdom, but I began to share it with others and still do. I dread to think where I would be emotionally, physically and spiritually had I never got beyond Page One! Perhaps I would be blaming everyone and everything, clinging on to bad habits, getting bogged down in negative self talk, saying "I can't, I won't, I ought, I should, I must - if only.............." I'd certainly never have jumped off my familiar and safe merry-go-round and moved from the UK to Australia in a spirit of experimentation and adventure. "Life's a bitch," I might be saying, and worst of all, believing it to be true.

I am not for a minute claiming that reading inspirational books is a cure-all for our problems and challenges, but it can be an integral part of the journey to truth, self-awareness and healing alongside other therapies and treatments. I have created my own journal, a comforting place of emotional refuge, where I stick in or copy down inspirational thoughts, sentences and sayings. One such sentence comes from Women who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. She looks at the female soul through ancient myths, legends and fairy tales and inspires us all (male readers too!) to rediscover our wild, creative side in a modern world that values sticking to rational facts and the system over emotional truth and intelligence. The sentence is: "A career grows out of who we are; who we are does not grow out of a career." It may seem obvious to some of us now, but try telling that to someone who is pushing hard to get good exam grades and secure a foot on the first rung of the corporate ladder or stressing and striving their way up to managerial heights.

Jaded by going through the motions of a marketing job a few years ago, a friend insisted it was time (she had been recommending it for a while) that I bought myself a copy of The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. Julia guides you through a 12 week spiritual journey to rediscover your creativity and deals with all the issues that get in the way such as guilt, self sabotage, judgement, anger, money, risk taking, rejection, time and lack of it. Exhorting readers to leap because the net will surely appear, she encourages you to connect with your natural God-given creativity. I found it a richly rewarding process and shortly afterwards went on to read Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg. Natalie describes writing as "a place that you can come to wild and unbridled, mixig the dream of your grandmother's soup with the astounding clouds outside your window." What wonderful words - how could I resist picking up my pen and starting on my first novel!

Preparing to leave the UK and move to Australia was the biggest leap of faith I have ever taken and it was not one taken without fear. Once again, guidance came in the form of a borrowed book. The Tibetan Book of the Living and the Dying is one of those seminal works that you can dip into again and again and learn something new.

I found the passages on the passing of time, accepting change andletting go of the past incredibly helpful as I prepared to say goodbye to a way of life and to separate myself geographically from friends and relatives.

One of the criticisms often levelled at self help literature is that it is a poor modern day substitute for those with a spiritual quest, filling the vacuum left by the decline in conventional religion. I have found the opposite to be true as some of these books have reconnected me to the sacred and re-awakened a sense of awe at the wondrousness of life and the natural world. In The Anatomy of the Spirit, Carolyn Myss, intuitive medic, looks at the body's energy system in relation to the ancient wisdom of three spiritual traditions - the Hindu chakras, the Christian sacraments and the Kabbalah's Tree of Life. Many other self help books draw on wisdom and parables from the Bible. What could ring truer than "Love thy neighbour as thy self?"

If we cannot accept and love ourselves as we are and if we end up giving credence to false perceptions, we run the risk of running round in circles of illness, depression, angst and general discontent. When I find myself in a tail-chasing, stressy, striving, self critical, swimming against the tide kind of phase I remind myself of another Clara Pinkola Estés gem: "All that you are seeking is also seeking you. And if you lie, sit still, it will find you." At such times, I also find it reassuring to know that I am not alone, that getting it "wrong" is part of the learning process and part of being human. Sarah Ban Breathnach tells us in Simple

Abundance, to be kinder to ourselves, more forgiving. Like unwrapping a square of the most exquisite chocolate and savouring it, I find her book, set out with a mini-essay for each day of the year, wonderfully nourishing and reassuring with its mix of spiritual, domestic and seasonal wisdom. It's a book that inspires gratitude for simply being alive.

My older brother, Charlie, who lives in Devon and is babysitting my well-thumbed copy, proudly told me he had read it in one sitting. Sorry, but I didn't award him a gold star or medal for effort!

Instead, I recommended that he slowed down and pondered over the entry for each day. Like mastering any new skill, reading and learning essential truths about ourselves and about the vast complexities of life and death takes time, and it needs to be a gradual, measured and selective process. It's tempting to want to learn it all overnight, fix it and get it right.

Perhaps that pile of self help books on your bedside table stares accusingly at you as you ignore it in favour of doing the chores, watching television or endlessly being busy. It can beyet another thing to fit in and juggle in our busy lives.

But the truth is that we have a lifetime to learn our lessons - Barbara Sher's book, I Could Do Anything If Only I Knew What It Was sets an interesting timeline as an exercise. You plot out what you've done so far in your life and then, based on living a long and healthy life, what you would like to do in the future. It opens up huge opportunities and possibilities and helps you to appreciate how much time you have to do it all.

For example, you may decide to focus on yoga this year, perhaps Pilates next year, you might decide to do that road trip in five years' time, maybe gospel singing and photography when you're 55, South America when you're 60 or even 70! In themeantime, aim to live in the moment and to thine own self be true!

Suggested Reading List:

The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale - Simon & Schuster
You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay - Hay House
Feel The Fear and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers - Vermillion Books (Random House)
Women Who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés - Rider Books
The Tibetan Book of the Living and the Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche - Rider Books
The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron - Pan Books
Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg - Shambhala
Simple Abundance by Saran Ban Breathnach - Hodder
I Could Do Anything If Only I Knew What It Was by Barbara Sher - Hodder
The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield - Bantam Publishers