The book that changed me

I am late to the party with this book, however I recently read ‘Women don’t owe you pretty’ and in all honestly, I don’t think a book has ever hit me like this one did. I couldn’t put the book down and found it so inspiring and informative.

I’m sure many of you have read this book by now, but if you haven’t then I massively recommend giving it a try. The book touches on a variety of topics and even though I don’t necessarily relate to all of them, I still was engrossed in those chapters; that’s when you know it’s a good book! I bought the book of Amazon but I’m sure its probably on many different book websites etc etc – but please do grab this book if you can and give it a read!

I feel like for me, I started reading this book at a time when I needed some sort of pick me up. Not only is the text interesting to read, but the book also has many different images that are really great to look at and almost makes you want the image in a poster format to hang up in you room to constantly be reminded of the message.

I think with lockdown, everyone has had their struggles increased even more due to the loneliness, not being able to live our ‘normal’ life’s, and the reality of that we may not be loving ourselves as much as usual with some potential weight gain or not being dressed up (obviously there is nothing wrong with weight gain or staying in your joggers for a week). This lockdown (lockdown 3.0 for the UK) has been the toughest for me, especially before I read this book. I didn’t realise it was possible to cry as much as I did within the space of a few weeks…my eyes were puffy the majority of the time. I was going through some shit with not seeing my boyfriend along with other bits. My mindset wasn’t okay. My friends recommended this book to me and were speaking about it on facetime and I thought you know what I think it’s time I finally see what this book is all about, and I am so glad I did!

It was such an easy read. Some parts were so relatable or eye opening that I found myself sitting there nodding along while I was reading. I feel like, I knew there were issues in the way women are portrayed or for example, touching on the topic of women trying to figure out their safest way home, but I’ve never thought about it in much depth before. It’s so true what is said in this book and some parts made me feel shocked that I just considered this as ‘normal’, when in fact it isn’t normal the way I think or live my life; again, relating back to the getting home at night situation.

Even though I am in a healthy relationship and have been for almost 6 years, this book still spoke truths to me. The section about taking accountability and the way we may respond in arguments or when people tell you how you’ve hurt their feelings…it’s made me think about the way I talk and I’m starting to try to think more before I speak (which is something probably a lot of us need to do more often). If there is a case where I may have said something and the second it’s left my mouth, I regret it, I pull myself up on it and apologise and say you know what that wasn’t funny or a good ‘joke’ to make, it was just uncalled for and not needed. I want to change the way I respond to people and make sure I’m taking accountability for my actions instead of just ignoring that I may have upset someone.

I know it may sound dramatic when I call this book ‘the book that changed my life’ because I only finished reading it about 2 weeks ago, but I really do believe it’s going to continue to have an impact on my life and mind. I’ve always been someone who wants to become a better person and I want to learn how to handle situations better, or how to be there for people who may need different reassurance than what I do when I’m upset. Sometimes, I believe we go through our life so quickly that we don’t think about the words and actions we are making, and it may take a book you read or a TV series you watch to make you sit back and think about what you’re doing.

Before I read this book, I thought it would make me think about self-love in terms of my appearance and my body. But instead, it made me think more about my mindset and actions which isn’t something ‘self-love’ books normally do. Other books normally touch more on the look of your body. Even though I believe it helped me understand that I need to love myself more and ways I could do so, there’s been better benefits from this book.

A section that was really interesting in terms of self-love was the ‘refuse to find comfort in other women’s flaws’. It makes me almost feel ashamed to say it, but I 100% have done this throughout life. And, no offence, but I’m sure some of you have too. I’m not proud of it and now I’ve read about it, it hit me hard that this is actually something I have done in the past and something I need to stop doing. Even within the 2 weeks after reading this book, I’ve clocked onto other people who have messaged me things where I now think…you’re insecure about that, and so that is why you’re bitching about this person (I hope this makes some sort of sense, it’s hard to explain without literally writing down the chapter of the book). It’s sad the way our mindset works and that we feel like the only way sometimes to feel better about ourselves, is to make other feels bad. It’s a messed up way but with practise you can change this and overall just be kinder to yourself but also others around you.

I’ve touched on a few points that are spoken about in the book and for how passionate I feel about ‘women don’t owe you pretty’ I could probably go on for ages writing about it. Long story short, if you haven’t read this book then I encourage you so much to do so. Or, if you have but it was a while ago or feel like you need some inspiration, then read it again. I know that this book will stick with me for years and I’ll most likely read it a good few times in life.