The Power of Positive Thinking in 1955. Meyer writes that "The Power of Positive Thinking" provides partial awareness to the limitations of the readers but does not supply the necessary self-confidence to overcome those limitations. He proceeds to compare Peale to a con man saying that the problem with Peale lies in the “paltriness of the confidence he preached. He did not really try to fool you into thinking you could do much, or be much, or live much. He did not make you aware of greater heights any more than of greater abysses.” Psychologist Martin Seligman, former APA president and founder of positive psychology,
The Year of Magical Thinking made his remaining time more meaningful. Fleeting memories of events and persistent snippets of past conversations with John take on a new significance. Her daughter's continuing health problems and hospitalizations further compound and interrupt the natural course of grief. Didion wrote "The Year of Magical Thinking" between October 4, 2004, and December 31 the same year, completing it a year and a day after Dunne died. Notes she made during Quintana's hospitalizations became part of the book. Quintana Roo Dunne Michael died of pancreatitis on August 26, 2005, before the publication of the book, but Didion told the press that