This book offers a succinct model of recovery from serious mental illness, synthesizing stories of lived experience to provide a framework for clinical work and research in the field of recovery. * Places the process of recovery within the context of normal human growth and development * Compares and contrasts concepts of recovery from mental illness with the literature on grief, loss and trauma * Situates recovery within the growing field of positive psychology - focusing on the active, hopeful process * Describes a consumer-oriented, stage-based model of psychological recovery which is unique in its focus on intrapersonal processes