I also have found books to be a lot of help. I started going through the biography section of a local public library, starting with the A's (Asimov ) and going all the way through to the Z's, just picking books that looked interesting -- mostly books written by the subject themselves. I was surprised how many prominent people have had bad episodes in their own lives, and how many of them were honest and sensitive observers of themselves and others. I am now in the second library going through its biography section.

I also have found books on mental health issues, both written by those who more or less abandoned the mental health system after suffering under it, and other books written about survivors and types of abusers. You find descriptions of your own experiences coming from the pens of entirely separate people!

Then there are fiction and non-fiction books that describe the lives of people in distant countries such as Afghanistan or Iran or China, where the writers are more familiar with and perhaps more accepting of social conditions that Americans seem to distance themselves from. I think that without all this reading I would have had a much harder time coming to terms with my own rather "different" point of view.

I find a good source of books is the used books on Amazon.com. I don't know how effective this resource is for people in other countries.