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EMERGENCY KIT

SURVIVAL GUIDE TO ABUNDANCE

A thin, oddly theistic self-empowerment workbook.

Debut author Wallace encourages readers to listen to their conscious mind while quieting their subconscious in this self-help workbook.

We often know what we want (or think we do), and yet we are somehow unable to realize our goals. The problem, according to Wallace, is that our subconscious isn’t always on the same page as our conscious mind. The author demonstrates this in a fictional dialogue: “SELF: Yes, I can! I love and approve of myself. All is well in my world. I am in a loving space. SUBCONSCIOUS: I do not love and approve of myself—screw the world! SELF: I am now a size four and looking good. SUBCONSCIOUS: Who are you trying to kid? You are a large size fourteen.” In the dialogue, the subconscious starts to beat out the self until God himself swoops in to set things right. Wallace offers an explanation of why it’s important to understand what both halves want in order to make sure we are listening to our true selves and not becoming derailed by our subconscious. The bulk of the book is a series of near-identical work sheets where readers can fill out lists of their wants in an assortment of categories (relationships, health, careers) as well as blank spaces to construct small vision boards. The writing here is light and sometimes infused with humor, though it replicates the jargon of the motivation genre: “This condition of emergency can cause you to send out negative frequencies that will attract more unwanted, negative thoughts, creating a vicious cycle. Recognize this pattern of dialogue.” The inclusion of God (also referred to as the Higher Power or the Universe) is a somewhat incongruous choice. Wallace claims that by listening to ourselves we are really listening to God—which calls into question the ultimate agency of the self. The text sections of the book are brief and somewhat muddled, while the workbook section is rather repetitive and simplistic. Readers will be able to find the same ideas presented more clearly and comprehensively in numerous other works.

A thin, oddly theistic self-empowerment workbook.

Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2015

ISBN: 978-1-5043-3496-9

Page Count: 70

Publisher: BalboaPress

Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2018

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THE LAWS OF HUMAN NATURE

The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.

A follow-on to the author’s garbled but popular 48 Laws of Power, promising that readers will learn how to win friends and influence people, to say nothing of outfoxing all those “toxic types” out in the world.

Greene (Mastery, 2012, etc.) begins with a big sell, averring that his book “is designed to immerse you in all aspects of human behavior and illuminate its root causes.” To gauge by this fat compendium, human behavior is mostly rotten, a presumption that fits with the author’s neo-Machiavellian program of self-validation and eventual strategic supremacy. The author works to formula: First, state a “law,” such as “confront your dark side” or “know your limits,” the latter of which seems pale compared to the Delphic oracle’s “nothing in excess.” Next, elaborate on that law with what might seem to be as plain as day: “Losing contact with reality, we make irrational decisions. That is why our success often does not last.” One imagines there might be other reasons for the evanescence of glory, but there you go. Finally, spin out a long tutelary yarn, seemingly the longer the better, to shore up the truism—in this case, the cometary rise and fall of one-time Disney CEO Michael Eisner, with the warning, “his fate could easily be yours, albeit most likely on a smaller scale,” which ranks right up there with the fortuneteller’s “I sense that someone you know has died" in orders of probability. It’s enough to inspire a new law: Beware of those who spend too much time telling you what you already know, even when it’s dressed up in fresh-sounding terms. “Continually mix the visceral with the analytic” is the language of a consultant’s report, more important-sounding than “go with your gut but use your head, too.”

The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.

Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-525-42814-5

Page Count: 580

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018

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UNTAMED

Doyle offers another lucid, inspiring chronicle of female empowerment and the rewards of self-awareness and renewal.

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More life reflections from the bestselling author on themes of societal captivity and the catharsis of personal freedom.

In her third book, Doyle (Love Warrior, 2016, etc.) begins with a life-changing event. “Four years ago,” she writes, “married to the father of my three children, I fell in love with a woman.” That woman, Abby Wambach, would become her wife. Emblematically arranged into three sections—“Caged,” “Keys,” “Freedom”—the narrative offers, among other elements, vignettes about the soulful author’s girlhood, when she was bulimic and felt like a zoo animal, a “caged girl made for wide-open skies.” She followed the path that seemed right and appropriate based on her Catholic upbringing and adolescent conditioning. After a downward spiral into “drinking, drugging, and purging,” Doyle found sobriety and the authentic self she’d been suppressing. Still, there was trouble: Straining an already troubled marriage was her husband’s infidelity, which eventually led to life-altering choices and the discovery of a love she’d never experienced before. Throughout the book, Doyle remains open and candid, whether she’s admitting to rigging a high school homecoming court election or denouncing the doting perfectionism of “cream cheese parenting,” which is about “giving your children the best of everything.” The author’s fears and concerns are often mirrored by real-world issues: gender roles and bias, white privilege, racism, and religion-fueled homophobia and hypocrisy. Some stories merely skim the surface of larger issues, but Doyle revisits them in later sections and digs deeper, using friends and familial references to personify their impact on her life, both past and present. Shorter pieces, some only a page in length, manage to effectively translate an emotional gut punch, as when Doyle’s therapist called her blooming extramarital lesbian love a “dangerous distraction.” Ultimately, the narrative is an in-depth look at a courageous woman eager to share the wealth of her experiences by embracing vulnerability and reclaiming her inner strength and resiliency.

Doyle offers another lucid, inspiring chronicle of female empowerment and the rewards of self-awareness and renewal.

Pub Date: March 10, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-9848-0125-8

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Dial Books

Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2019

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020

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