Untamed
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - OVER TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD! "Packed with incredible insight about what it means to be a woman today."--Reese Witherspoon (Reese's Book Club Pick)
In her most revealing and powerful memoir yet, the activist, speaker, bestselling author, and "patron saint of female empowerment" (People) explores the joy and peace we discover when we stop striving to meet others' expectations and start trusting the voice deep within us.
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY O: The Oprah Magazine - The Washington Post - Cosmopolitan - Marie Claire - Bloomberg - Parade - "Untamed will liberate women--emotionally, spiritually, and physically. It is phenomenal."--Elizabeth Gilbert, author of City of Girls and Eat Pray Love
This is how you find yourself.
There is a voice of longing inside each woman. We strive so mightily to be good: good partners, daughters, mothers, employees, and friends. We hope all this striving will make us feel alive. Instead, it leaves us feeling weary, stuck, overwhelmed, and underwhelmed. We look at our lives and wonder: Wasn't it all supposed to be more beautiful than this? We quickly silence that question, telling ourselves to be grateful, hiding our discontent--even from ourselves.
For many years, Glennon Doyle denied her own discontent. Then, while speaking at a conference, she looked at a woman across the room and fell instantly in love. Three words flooded her mind: There She Is. At first, Glennon assumed these words came to her from on high. But she soon realized they had come to her from within. This was her own voice--the one she had buried beneath decades of numbing addictions, cultural conditioning, and institutional allegiances. This was the voice of the girl she had been before the world told her who to be. Glennon decided to quit abandoning herself and to instead abandon the world's expectations of her. She quit being good so she could be free. She quit pleasing and started living.
Soulful and uproarious, forceful and tender, Untamed is both an intimate memoir and a galvanizing wake-up call. It is the story of how one woman learned that a responsible mother is not one who slowly dies for her children, but one who shows them how to fully live. It is the story of navigating divorce, forming a new blended family, and discovering that the brokenness or wholeness of a family depends not on its structure but on each member's ability to bring her full self to the table. And it is the story of how each of us can begin to trust ourselves enough to set boundaries, make peace with our bodies, honor our anger and heartbreak, and unleash our truest, wildest instincts so that we become women who can finally look at ourselves and say: There She Is.
Untamed shows us how to be brave. As Glennon insists: The braver we are, the luckier we get.
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Community Reviews
Untamed by Glennon Doyle
328 pages
What’s it about?
"Untamed" is the third memoir from Glennon Doyle- all recounting different phases of her life. I have only read the last two memoirs but they seem to follow this trajectory.
1. Struggling young Christian mother overcoming addictions and relying on herself and her faith to create a strong family unit.
2. Struggling wife and mother learning to trust herself as she tries to put her marriage back together.
3. Strong, confident woman who is now in control of her own life and narrative after divorcing and having found true love with another woman.
What did it make me think about?
Can I like and dislike a book at the same time? What happened to Glennon's sense of humor? Her ability to look at life seriously- and not take herself too seriously....
Should I read it?
Glennon Doyle's main message is that women need to be empowered. I enjoyed "Love Warrior" and found Glennon's journey and her message of empowering women to be inspirational. Her candid feelings about her family and her faith journey were really interesting in the last book. I am sure many women will also find "Untamed" inspirational. I found many parts of "Untamed" thought provoking, and for that I am glad I read it. None of Glennon's life choices offended me in any way. I am really happy that Glennon and her family have found such life balance. However, I often found Glennon to be SO sure of herself and her choices that I was put off. The older I get the more I find my truths are not applicable to everyone. The book was choppy to me- better in some parts that others. So this wasn't my favorite book- but I am still waiting for the next incarnation of Glennon, as she keeps me thinking!
Quote-
"I look hard at my faith, may friendships, my work, my sexuality, my entire life and asked: How much of this was my idea? Do I truly want any of this, or is this what I was conditioned to want? Which of my beliefs are of my own creation and which were programmed into me? How much of who I've become is inherent and how much was just inherited? How much of the way I look and speak and behave is just how other people have trained me to look and speak and behave? How many of the things I've spent my life chasing are just dirty pink bunnies? Who was I before I became who the world told me to be?"
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Everything Happens for a Reason and other Lies I have Loved by Kate Bower
I Miss You When I Blink by Mary Laura Philpott
And Now We Have Everything by Meaghan O'Connell
Like many other reviews, this is another "woke," privileged white woman telling the rest of us all how amazing she is and how horrible the rest of us are. Insufferable.
How this book was picked for Reese's Book Club and has so many positive reviews is beyond me. I hope this trend of dribble ends soon, not sure how many more of these kinds of books I can take.
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