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lovetlr's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, and Eating disorder
deetabz's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
3.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Bullying, Eating disorder, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, Xenophobia, Grief, Religious bigotry, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, and Alcohol
Minor: Fatphobia, Gun violence, Sexual content, Police brutality, Mass/school shootings, and Murder
kelly_e's review against another edition
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
Title: Untamed
Author: Glennon Doyle
Genre: Non Fiction
Rating: 4.00
Pub Date: March 10, 2020
T H R E E • W O R D S
Digestible • Reflective • Empowering
📖 S Y N O P S I S
Four years ago, Glennon Doyle—bestselling Oprah-endorsed author, renowned activist and humanitarian, wife and mother of three—was speaking at a conference when a woman entered the room. Glennon looked at her 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. Soon she realized that they came to her from within.
Glennon was finally hearing her own voice—the voice that had been silenced by decades of cultural conditioning, numbing addictions, and institutional allegiances. This was the voice of the girl Glennon had been before the world told her who to be. She vowed to never again abandon herself. She decided to build a life of her own—one based on her individual desire, intuition, and imagination. She would reclaim her true, untamed self.
💭 T H O U G H T S
I read Untamed in small weekly sections along with a handful of other women as part of an online group, and I am not sure if I would have picked it up otherwise. Reading and discussing it with other women really enhanced the experience as a whole and I definitely got more out of it than I would have had I read it along.
I decided the best way for me to consume this book would be by listening to the audio, which is read by Glennon herself. While I couldn't relate to many of the chapters and topics, the ones that I did relate to really struck a chord. Part memoir, part self-help, part essay collection, it is written in a way that is easily digestible. However, there really isn't a consistent timeline or flow to how it is organized. I didn't mind this, but I know it will not work for some people.
After listening to Untamed there is no doubt in my mind Glennon is an incredibly powerful activist and speaker. I could see how this book could easily rub some people the wrong way, yet for me there were parts which were empowering. I have since started listening to Glennon's podcast, and I would consider reading something else she writes in the future.
📚 R E C O M M E N D • T O
• Brené Brown fans
• book clubs
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"She said this: 'I've spent the past week considering your question. I can imagine a thousand easier stories about mothers and sons. I can think of a million happier ones. But I cannot imagine a single story truer or more beautiful than the heartbreaking one I'm living now, with my boys.'"
"The truest, most beautiful life never promises to be an easy one. We need to let go of the lie that it's supposed to be."
"Perhaps the only thing that makes grief any easier is to surrender completely to it. To resist trying to hold on to a single part of ourselves that existed before the doorbell rang. Sometimes to live again, we have to let ourselves die completely. We have to let ourselves become completely, utterly, new."
"Depression and anxiety are not feelings. Feelings return me to myself. Depression and anxiety are body snatchers that suck me out of myself so that I appear to be there but I'm really gone. Other people can still see me, but no one can feel me anymore - including me. For me, the tragedy of mental illness is not that I'm sad but that I'm not anything. Mental illness makes me miss my own life."
Author: Glennon Doyle
Genre: Non Fiction
Rating: 4.00
Pub Date: March 10, 2020
T H R E E • W O R D S
Digestible • Reflective • Empowering
📖 S Y N O P S I S
Four years ago, Glennon Doyle—bestselling Oprah-endorsed author, renowned activist and humanitarian, wife and mother of three—was speaking at a conference when a woman entered the room. Glennon looked at her 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. Soon she realized that they came to her from within.
Glennon was finally hearing her own voice—the voice that had been silenced by decades of cultural conditioning, numbing addictions, and institutional allegiances. This was the voice of the girl Glennon had been before the world told her who to be. She vowed to never again abandon herself. She decided to build a life of her own—one based on her individual desire, intuition, and imagination. She would reclaim her true, untamed self.
💭 T H O U G H T S
I read Untamed in small weekly sections along with a handful of other women as part of an online group, and I am not sure if I would have picked it up otherwise. Reading and discussing it with other women really enhanced the experience as a whole and I definitely got more out of it than I would have had I read it along.
I decided the best way for me to consume this book would be by listening to the audio, which is read by Glennon herself. While I couldn't relate to many of the chapters and topics, the ones that I did relate to really struck a chord. Part memoir, part self-help, part essay collection, it is written in a way that is easily digestible. However, there really isn't a consistent timeline or flow to how it is organized. I didn't mind this, but I know it will not work for some people.
After listening to Untamed there is no doubt in my mind Glennon is an incredibly powerful activist and speaker. I could see how this book could easily rub some people the wrong way, yet for me there were parts which were empowering. I have since started listening to Glennon's podcast, and I would consider reading something else she writes in the future.
📚 R E C O M M E N D • T O
• Brené Brown fans
• book clubs
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"She said this: 'I've spent the past week considering your question. I can imagine a thousand easier stories about mothers and sons. I can think of a million happier ones. But I cannot imagine a single story truer or more beautiful than the heartbreaking one I'm living now, with my boys.'"
"The truest, most beautiful life never promises to be an easy one. We need to let go of the lie that it's supposed to be."
"Perhaps the only thing that makes grief any easier is to surrender completely to it. To resist trying to hold on to a single part of ourselves that existed before the doorbell rang. Sometimes to live again, we have to let ourselves die completely. We have to let ourselves become completely, utterly, new."
"Depression and anxiety are not feelings. Feelings return me to myself. Depression and anxiety are body snatchers that suck me out of myself so that I appear to be there but I'm really gone. Other people can still see me, but no one can feel me anymore - including me. For me, the tragedy of mental illness is not that I'm sad but that I'm not anything. Mental illness makes me miss my own life."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Drug abuse, Eating disorder, and Mental illness
Moderate: Homophobia, Infidelity, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, Police brutality, and Religious bigotry
Minor: Vomit, Grief, and Pregnancy
sjduncan's review against another edition
emotional
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
3.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Homophobia, and Religious bigotry
buffyali's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
3.75
Content Warnings
Moderate: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Self harm, Sexism, and Pregnancy
Minor: Racism and Suicidal thoughts
marisa_n's review against another edition
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
3.0
This felt like a book-length version of those cheesy quotes on Facebook that say things like "a flower cannot blossom without rain." Overall, the book was cheesy, superficial, and disorganized.
To be fair, it wasn't all bad. The author has clearly lived many different lives as she's worked to find herself. She's turned her story into a series of easily digestible anecdotes and life lessons. There were a few powerful reminders about self-love, romantic love, and parenting. There were some empowering messages about trusting your intuition, defining happiness for yourself, and challenging oppressive systems.
That said, the actual book itself was a mess. It was simultaneously overly formulaic and completely unorganized. Each chapter starts with a simple anecdote, has an a-ha!/ light bulb moment, and then ends with a life lesson to tie it all together. That said, the chapters were in no coherent order--neither chronologically or by theme. I'm convinced you could randomize the order of the chapters had have a fairly similar reading experience. It was incredibly frustrating to guess where you were chronologically. Moreover, the author was constantly learning a lesson, just to jump back in the timeline and re-learning the same lesson. It made the a-ha moment feel forced and insincere. Lastly, the strange order made the book feel incredibly repetitive, as no topic was given enough space within a single chapter to reach any depth.
The author should have put all the stories in chronological order. This would have helped clearly describe who she used to be, provide us a chance to root for her in her non-linear journey, and then display a character arc. Alternatively, she could have given a brief overview of her story in the introduction, then organized all the chapters (in chronological order!!) into sections organized by large themes, such as inner self, love, parenting, god/ religious institutions, community/activism. I think the messages could have been so much more powerful if she started describing her internal journey, and then how it changed her relationships with those of various proximity to her.
Overall, I think the book was fine. Perhaps I'm just not the target audience... This book might be written for women who are white, christian, politically moderate, mothers (who she used to be). To be fair, if she can reach those kinds of women and engage them on issues related to race, gender, sexual misogyny, etc., then that's a win in my book. That said, I have the feeling she's mostly preaching to the choir.
To be fair, it wasn't all bad. The author has clearly lived many different lives as she's worked to find herself. She's turned her story into a series of easily digestible anecdotes and life lessons. There were a few powerful reminders about self-love, romantic love, and parenting. There were some empowering messages about trusting your intuition, defining happiness for yourself, and challenging oppressive systems.
That said, the actual book itself was a mess. It was simultaneously overly formulaic and completely unorganized. Each chapter starts with a simple anecdote, has an a-ha!/ light bulb moment, and then ends with a life lesson to tie it all together. That said, the chapters were in no coherent order--neither chronologically or by theme. I'm convinced you could randomize the order of the chapters had have a fairly similar reading experience. It was incredibly frustrating to guess where you were chronologically. Moreover, the author was constantly learning a lesson, just to jump back in the timeline and re-learning the same lesson. It made the a-ha moment feel forced and insincere. Lastly, the strange order made the book feel incredibly repetitive, as no topic was given enough space within a single chapter to reach any depth.
The author should have put all the stories in chronological order. This would have helped clearly describe who she used to be, provide us a chance to root for her in her non-linear journey, and then display a character arc. Alternatively, she could have given a brief overview of her story in the introduction, then organized all the chapters (in chronological order!!) into sections organized by large themes, such as inner self, love, parenting, god/ religious institutions, community/activism. I think the messages could have been so much more powerful if she started describing her internal journey, and then how it changed her relationships with those of various proximity to her.
Overall, I think the book was fine. Perhaps I'm just not the target audience... This book might be written for women who are white, christian, politically moderate, mothers (who she used to be). To be fair, if she can reach those kinds of women and engage them on issues related to race, gender, sexual misogyny, etc., then that's a win in my book. That said, I have the feeling she's mostly preaching to the choir.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Biphobia, Homophobia, and Religious bigotry
Minor: Addiction, Alcoholism, Biphobia, Chronic illness, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gun violence, Infidelity, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Grief, Religious bigotry, Abortion, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Classism
quirkko24's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Homophobia, and Toxic friendship
boba_nbooks's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
3.5
This was a really solid book. I enjoyed hearing about her life, especially the parts where she talks about protecting her family from outside forces. It was very empowering.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Alcoholism, Body shaming, and Eating disorder
kat_leona's review against another edition
challenging
dark
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
1.75
Not my favorite but I’m also not a non fiction girlie. I thought some parts had really good thoughts and others not enough. Good read if you don’t dissect each chapter but does that make it a bad read because you can’t dissect it too hard or you’ll start questioning the author credibility to properly narrate. I understand why people love it and if we didn’t break it down so much in book club than I may have also joined the collective that love it. But after reading it I honestly just think our girlie glennon needs therapy and this book starts a deeper discussion but does not do that conversation the justice it deserves. Like why do we as women question ourselves so much when our counterparts literally don’t bat an eye. Or why do we immediately think a confident woman is a bitch and hostile? There’s were ALOT of good points she brought up that stimulated conversation within our group. But once that conversation started you begin to realize that she couldve expanded or worded something different or whatever it was. We thought it had good ideas and foundations but it should’ve been edited and reviewed more
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Eating disorder, Misogyny, Alcohol, and Classism
savannahtrice's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
reflective
fast-paced
2.75
This was okay...her perspective felt so regurgitated and girl boss millennial vibes. She's inspiring but it just didn't work for me. I feel like I gained a lot from the first couple hours but after that I was just listening to finish.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction and Alcoholism