Rachel Hollis

Bestselling author of Girl, Wash Your Face and founder of TheChicSite.com Rachel Hollis urges women to stop apologizing for their desires, hopes, and dreams and instead to go after them with passion and confidence.

A Shame-Free Plan for Embracing and Achieving Your Goals

Girl, Stop Apologizing

Ivy X

I think there are definitely a lot of good messages for girls to recognize how our parents and how our society teaches us to be lesser than men & how we can embrace ourselves, come to terms with our shames/guilts, and even improve and understand our constructed ideals of love and boundaries. I definitely felt motivated to be productive after hearing her tips and behaviors that allowed her to reach her full career potential. I also admire the amount of dedication, work, and enthusiasm toward her goals and how she uses her platform to share her tips and experiences w the general public. 

However, there were many times where I raised my eyebrow while reading this book because I started to recognize her book was geared toward women who are already fairly well off/independent. I found it hard to connect with some areas such as talking about how her E-sized boobs after childbirth made her feel like an elephant and needing to change it to feel good about herself. I am all for body positivity and for cosmetic surgeries (if that is what you want)...but it just seemed to throw women who are shaped in those sizes under the bus. It would have been better if she said what many mothers have said before, such as: not feeling comfortable in her new body anymore, struggling with body image issues since her body has changed, etc. 
I also find some of her work to be also geared toward privileged people as well. If your main sacrifice is giving up TIME to do unpaid work in order to get your portfolio going, you are privileged in your main source of income. Likewise, I feel like she also fails to encompass how women who are more dependent/codependent are not acting like that purely because of society ideals but rather also because of necessity. For instance, women in abusive relationships may not be able to be fully independent with just a mind-change--they would need help and sometimes they may also have to pull themselves away from financial security to find safety. There are also women in immigrant families who may not be earning as much and who may also struggle with barriers that other women (such as Rachel Hollis) will not. 

There are more thoughts but I found that this other review (by Goodreads user: Johanna) encompasses some of the flaws and problematic aspects of this book much better & is also done in an extremely well-written and well-rounded way. 

2-2.5/5 stars

Yesenia Vargas

SO GOOD. I underlined so many helpful and inspiring things in here. Next step is to go back and list out some action steps. Highly recommend this book!

Sarah Ryan

I really enjoyed this. Rachel discusses the challenges faced by women in today's society, especially women who have chosen to build careers and businesses. Some great stories and advice. Very inspiring.

Neisha Gabrysiak

Rachel Hollis knows how to light a fire in people's hearts. I read Girl, Wash Your Face earlier last year and finally got my hands on Girl, Stop Apologizing. She is so relatable and honest and in your face about what you need to do for you to live your best life. Since reading her books, I've started listening to her podcasts that she does with her husband Dave, I've participated in their Last 90 Days challenge, and I'm working on a better version of me.

Caroline Lewicki

I wanted to hate this book so badly. I don't know if it's because I hate the busy body who recommended it to me or because I generally don't find self-help books to be very helpful, but I went into reading this begrudgingly. 

 I. Loved. It. 

I seriously felt like I got so much out of this book. Rachel Hollis sets out actionable things you can do to achieve your goals, and it's not "save more money", "quit your shitty job." It's all about mindset and empowering yourself to feel like you have it within you to accomplish the things you want to. 

Like I said, I normally hate self-help books and don't find an epiphany in them. I won't say this book changed my life but it definitely set me up to make changes.

Courtney ✿ @librarycutie

I didn’t enjoy this book as I expected, I really loved Girl, Wash Your Face and was motivated and inspired, but this book felt like she was speaking to women who had body image issues or ate a lot, because she mentioned eating snacks you’re not supposed to and I didn’t enjoy that, it didn’t uplift me or motivate me but really did the opposite. I also feel like she was yelling at me during the audiobook and it startled me.... very often!

Vera Sokolyanskaya

I didn't know who Rachell Hollis was before I read this book. I never followed her on social media, I don't remember any of my friends reposting her content.

I've seen the book in the book stores and I saw people reading it on a bus and I've heard two of my colleagues rave about its greatness. So I wanted to check out what the hype is all about.

Rachel wrote this book for the right reasons, let's give her a star for this. She wanted to inspire women to achieve goals and tell them how to do it. This is just not my inspirational cup of tea and I knew it from the moment I've read on the cover that Rachel is "female Tony Robbins". Did I mention I hate Tony Robbins? 

This book is a giant pep talk told in the language of an Instagram post. It tells you to stop making excuses, acquire new behaviours and skills and achieve your dreams. The ideas are not new but Rachel doesn't bother giving your references which makes sense for an Instagram post.

My main problem with this book is that I couldn't relate to most Rachel's examples. I can't relate to a boob job as a way to boost confidence. I can't relate to her life style and her dreams. When I got to a chapter about "Planning" as a skill, I hoped I would relate to it, planning is like 50% of my job but it was an utter disappointment.

Imane

As a rule of thumb, I do not seek advice from privileged white women free of mental health issues and living in California (or elsewhere for that matter but ESPECIALLY from California). This book proved me that I should keep doing that!

Kayla 

I am happy to say that I did find a few passages that really helped brighten my mood and give me that boost I needed. 

I really enjoyed the first half of this book. I liked the excuses she laid out and the message she was trying to get across. While I did find this helpful for what I needed I also recognized the problematic elements. 

There are some things in here that I just didn’t think helped support the overall message, particularly in the latter half of the book where body shaming issues arose and a boob job story I just didn’t see as relevant to the theme of the book. This was definitely written for privileged women.

Renee Delcourt

Girl wash your face spoke to me in ways I can not explain and so on I went to girl stop apologizing. I enjoyed it. It wasn't quite as moving as the first but that's not what the point of this book was. It's like the blow horn to get you moving and make something of your life. I really loved this book and think it's a must read for and woman out there.

Danica Holdaway

So much better and more helpful than Girl Wash Your Face!! Perfect for goal setting. It’s much more driven and in your face, which I personally like.

Emily C Peterson

We are apparently not even pretending to be Christians anymore in this book.
Some of the advice about pursuing your goals and not letting other people's opinions color what you do was great. But overall the main message here was that we are in control of our lives and that we can choose our destiny and our happiness. Girl, that is so not the case. We aren't in control whatsoever, and I'd rather have joy than happiness

Chelsea Breher

Why did I decide to read this 😂 I didn't particularly like the first one so why did I read this 😂 I mean it wasn't horrible but it wasn't anything I'd ever read again.

Chelsea White

I really enjoyed Rachel Hollis' first self-help book, and found this one to be a good follow up, with good calls to action. Like the first one it definitely fired me up to make the changes I've been wanting to in my life! I listened to it and will probably also read the book so I can give more attention to what she says/the action items she goes over.

Dani C

4.5 stars. The perfect kick in the pants - equal parts encouraging and reality check. Hollis is the cheerleader you want on your side because she's going to push you to go for it while also calling you out on your BS if you give in to your excuses.

Girl, Stop Apologizing A Shame-Free Plan for Embracing and Achieving Your Goals

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