Untamed Stop Pleasing, Start Living: THE NO.1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
Reviews
Some parts were powerful and insightful, but I found the overall structure of the book to just be a collection of “good thoughts”, which was not overly exciting to get through. I found the descriptions of her relationship with her wife to be a bit over the top and in-your-face in an annoying way too.
There’s plenty of interesting ideas and perspectives in here, and for me, as the father of young daughters, some very important things to think about as they get older.
Listened to audiobook. Underwhelming, maybe I am not the target audience for this book.
A beautiful memoir about finding love and dismissing the societal norm of identity.
This feels like a fuucking TED talk in a book form
I was hesitant to read this book because of the hype surrounding it. Was it was good or someone that reads their one annual book a year on Oprah or Reese’s book club good?
The reviews are also mixed, as someone else mentioned it being a “Pinterest inspiration quotes filled.” Or way to self help, not enough memoir. It can be that, but there is also some beautiful truth on relationships.
This book is filled with some wisdom that I would recommend to friends. Especially those who can not be unapologetically themselves. My highlighted quotes were my favorite chapters and if I had just read those as short stories/ internet articles I would be very impressed. As a whole, this is her story and I’m grateful to read someone’s unbeaten path to happiness. Memoirs are always hard to rate because it’s someone’s life. But also, as always ratings are stupid. Because depending on someone’s life experience, their enjoyment will vary.
There are some good nuggets in here, but I found the prose to be a little too curated. There are full quotes from decades ago that feel too edited to be authentic. Very inspiring story, just lacking some realness for me.
Glennon Doyle came unto my radar when it was announced that she and Abby Wambach are an item. Even tho her books from before are bestsellers the topics of those books aren't my thing. And also being nicknamed the Christian mommy blogger didn't make her books more appealing to me. But now that she was on my radar I learned more about her life since meeting Abby. Her friendship with Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love) and her stories about her new life. When Untamed was released I knew I had to read it. And I'm glad I did. “Being human is not hard because you're doing it wrong, it's hard because you're doing it right. You will never change the fact that being human is hard, so you must change your idea that it was ever supposed to be easy.” She writes about how girls (and boys) are indoctrinated early on how they should behave and conform to society's norm and how damaging that is. How it led her to addiction and an unhappy marriage. How she deals with raising her kids and trying to avoid the pitfalls. She also writes about how her life came full circle at 40 when she met Aby and fell in love for the first time. About when the honeymoon phase was over and how they dealt with that. She advocates for woman to live their truth, to stop conforming others and society. To keep their identities instead of becoming daughter of, wife of, mother of. How she finally feels more herself even tho it's a work in progress, dealing with her depression and anxiety and on a new life with Abby and their modern family. Another brave writer who dares to show her vulnerability to the world.
Hmmm so I'm torn on what to rate it - I wouldn't say it's a four but it's slightly higher than a 3/5. I didn't like the first half of the book. I found it to be too scattered and her 'voice' to be annoying. Truthfully, I'm also skeptical of Christian mommy bloggers and I know this book was all about the drastic change in her life and her becoming untamed, but I was still a bit reserved. I found her chapters on parenting and racism strong. The latter half felt more cohesive and meaningful. I would recommend it to folks to read since it's also easy.
DNF because no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t put myself through it. I like a good « risen from the ashes » memoir. This isn’t it. This is mostly ‘let me tell you what the world is really like’. Doesn’t offer any true insight, mostly spoken from entitlement & a dash of dry, hardly digestible humor.
Felt quite cheesy, over dramatised to make philosophical points and not really saying much that was new.
This is what a high schooler thinks an adult book sounds like
3.5
It was okay. I liked the sentiment and there were a couple of parts that really hit home for me, but overall I don't think it was groundbreaking. There are other books that came before this one with more powerful messaging.
Untamed came to me at a time I definitely needed it and maybe had I read it at a different time I wouldn’t have loved it so much. But thankfully Doyle doesn’t use that condescending self help writing voice or a hundred different fonts or have conversations with herself like other self help authors. this book was emotional and felt like a talk with my therapist more than a book. It ranges from things like religion to motherhood to mental health to sexuality. The range of topics was also such a bonus. I highly recommend untamed
I don’t think I am the audience for this book, although I did name my cat after Abby Wambach whom Glennon Doyle is married to. I can think of a few people I would recommend this to, though. And it certainly has its high points for me.
While I appreciated the anecdotes, I didn’t relate to much of the story. It also just felt disorganized and like the author was trying to cram in as many life lessons as possible. There was some good in here for sure, and I did highlight this book, but it didn’t resonate with me like I’d hoped.
This is one of those books where immediately upon finishing it you will buy a copy and mail it to your best friend. Unless of course that is how you got your copy. Glennon speaks the truths of our lives and our hearts that the rest of us don’t have the words for.
Truly life-changing. Never felt more seen by an author.
Loved it! Cover to cover in one day of flying across the country. Every parent, every human should read this.
Bold and inspiring, Doyle's unapologetic honesty and vulnerability (and humour) makes this a refreshing read with insights on family, relationships, women's health, mental health, and mental clarity. I really enjoyed listening to this as an audiobook.
I appreciate the way this book aims to help you face your inner demons, the misconceptions. It provides frameworks to notice learned behaviors that could just be against your own believes but are so deeply wired into yourself that maybe you don’t even notice when they guide your decisions. Near the end of the book, there are a couple of chapters that focus too much in God and its impact on the author’s life, where I really had to skip a bunch of pages. Other than that, the book is a really nice read to challenge your inner psychology.
3.5 — rounding up
This is my new scripture.
Highlights
“I honor your Gods
I drink at your well
I bring an undefended heart to our meeting place
I have no cherished outcomes
I will not negotiate by withholding
I am not subject to disappointment.”
a friendship memo from Liz Gilbert
Girls and women sense this. We want to be liked. We want to be trusted. So we downplay our strengths to avoid threatening anyone and invoking disdain. We do not mention our accomplishments. We do not accept compliments. We temper, qualify, and discount our opinions. We walk without swagger, and we yield incessantly. We step out of the way. We say, “I feel like” instead of “I know.” We ask if our ideas make sense instead of assuming they do. We apologize for…everything. Conversations among brilliant women often devolve into competitions for who wins the trophy for hottest mess. We want to be respected, but we want to be loved and accepted even more.
"Can you imagine? The epitome of womanhood is to lose one's self completely. That is the end goal of every patriarchal culture. Because a very effective way to control women is to convince women to control themselves."
You don’t ask others what’s brave, you feel and know what’s brave. What you know to do might be the opposite of what others are telling you to do. It takes special bravery to honor yourself when the crowd is pressuring you not to. It’s easier just to give in. You didn’t give in to the crowd today. You stood strong in what you felt and knew. To me, that’s the greatest bravery. That’s true confidence, which means loyalty to self.
Your job, throughout your entire life, is to disappoint as many people as it takes to avoid disappointing yourself.
I unbecame a woman who believed that another would complete me when I decided that I was born complete.
When a woman finally learns that pleasing the world is impossible, she becomes free to learn how to please herself.
Then: “Glennon, have you tried just giving him blow jobs instead? Many women find blow jobs to be less intimate.”
i hope this woman is no longer practicing. what utter garbage.
How much of who I’ve become is inherent, and how much was inherited?
Good girls aren’t hungry, furious, or wild.
Your parent - your sister, your friend, the one who couldn't love you - her love was impeded. That love was there swirling, festering, vicious in its desperation for release. It was there, it is there, all for you. That love exists. It just couldn't get past the boulder.
The Ache paralyzes me with „You know how this ends. When she goes, you will not survive.“ I don't know if the Ache is trying to protect me or terrorize me. I don't know if it loves me or hates me, if it's bad or good I just know that its role is to constantly remind me of the most essential fact of life, which is: This ends. Don't get too attached to anything.
We're like snow globes: We spend all of our time, energy, words, and money creating a flurry, trying not to know, making sure that the snow doesn't settle so we never have to face the fiery truth inside us - solid and unmoving
And then we admire each others snow globes and masquerade.
When I became a good girl, I also became a bulimic. None of us can hold our breath all the time. Bulimia was where I exhaled. It was where I refused to comply, indulged my hunger, and expressed my fury.
If you can’t turn outside, you turn inside.
I learned how to be desirable very young. I learned how to match myself to the women on television. I learned how to highlight my hair, curl my eyelashes, wear jeans that made my ass look right, and stay thin by any means necessary. I knew how to become a billboard for myself, and after a boy had chosen me, I knew what to do next. I knew what kind of panties to be wearing and how to arch my back just so and how to make the right noises at the right time.
You learn to please other people in order to manipulate them to like you. But in fact they don’t like you. They just like how you pleased them.
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.
Ten is when the world sat me down, told me to be quiet, and pointed toward my cages: These are the feelings you are allowed to express. This is how a woman should act. This is the body you must strive for. These are the things you will believe. These are the people you can love. Those are the people you should fear. This is the kind of life you are supposed to want. Make yourself fit. You'll be uncomfortable at first, but don't worry- eventually you'll forget you're caged. Soon this will just feel like: life.
“The more often I do things I want to do, the less bitter I am at people for doing what they want to do.”
“Every time you're given a choice between disappointing someone else and disappointing yourself, your duty is to disappoint that someone else. Your job, throughout your entire life, is to disappoint as many people as it takes to avoid disappointing yourself.”
“Our terrible memo is also why we stay busy with the trivial while the world our children will inherit crumbles. We obsess over our children's snacks while they rehearse their own deaths in active-shooter drills at school. We agonize over their college prep while the earth melts around them. I cannot imagine that there has ever been a more overparented and underprotected generation.”
“Can you imagine? The epitome of womanhood is to lose one's self completely. That is the end goal of every patriarchal culture. Because a very effective way to control women is to convince women to control themselves.”
“Your business is to stay loyal to you. That way, you will always know that those who do like and love you are really your people. You'll never be forced to hide or act in order to keep people if you don't hide or act to get them.”
“Rebellion is as much of a cage as obedience is. They both mean living in reaction to someone else's way instead of forging your own. Freedom is not being for or against an ideal, but creating your own existence from scratch.”