The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off!: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Rebellion


Gloria Steinem - 2019
    From her early days as a journalist and feminist activist, Steinem's words have helped generations to empower themselves and work together.Covering topics from relationships ("Many are looking for the right person. Too few are trying to be the right person.") to the patriarchy ("Men are liked better when they win. Women are liked better when they lose. This is how the patriarchy is enforced every day.") and activism ("Revolutions, like trees, grow from the bottom up."), this is the definitive collection of Steinem's words on what matters most. Steinem sees quotes as "the poetry of everyday life," so she also has included a few favorites from friends, including bell hooks, Flo Kennedy, and Michelle Obama, in this book that will make you want to laugh, march, and create some quotes of your own. In fact, at the end of the book, there's a special space for readers to add their own quotes and others they've found inspiring. The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off! is both timeless and timely. It is a gift of hope from Steinem to readers, and a book to share with friends.

The Barbie Chronicles: A Living Doll Turns Forty


Yona Zeldis McDonough - 1999
    In The Barbie Chronicles, twenty-three writers join together to scrutinize Barbie's forty years of hateful, lovely disastrous, glorious influence on us all. No other tiny shoulders have ever, had to carry the weight of such affection and derision and no other book has ever paid this notorious little place of plastic her due. Whether you adore her or abhor her, The Barbie Chronicles will have you looking at her in ways you never imagined.

Man Enough: Undefining My Masculinity


Justin Baldoni - 2021
    In this engaging and provocative new book, beloved actor, director, and social activist Justin Baldoni reflects on his own struggles with masculinity. With insight and honesty, he explores a range of difficult, sometimes uncomfortable topics including strength and vulnerability, relationships and marriage, body image, sex and sexuality, racial justice, gender equality, and fatherhood. Writing from experience, Justin invites us to move beyond the scripts we’ve learned since childhood and the roles we are expected to play. He challenges men to be brave enough to be vulnerable, to be strong enough to be sensitive, to be confident enough to listen. Encouraging men to dig deep within themselves, Justin helps us reimagine what it means to be man enough and in the process what it means to be human.

I Thought It Was Just Me: Women Reclaiming Power and Courage in a Culture of Shame


Brené Brown - 2007
    Addiction, perfectionism, fear and blame are just a few of the outward signs that Dr. Brené Brown discovered in her 6-year study of shame’s effects on women. While shame is generally thought of as an emotion sequestered in the shadows of our psyches, I Thought It Was Just Me demonstrates the ways in which it is actually present in the most mundane and visible aspects of our lives—from our mental and physical health and body image to our relationships with our partners, our kids, our friends, our money, and our work. After talking to hundreds of women and therapists, Dr. Brown is able to illuminate the myriad shaming influences that dominate our culture and explain why we are all vulnerable to shame. We live in a culture that tells us we must reject our bodies, reject our authentic stories, and ultimately reject our true selves in order to fit in and be accepted.Outlining an empowering new approach that dispels judgment and awakens us to the genuine acceptance of ourselves and others, I Thought It Was Just Me begins a crucial new dialogue of hope. Through potent personal narratives and examples from real women, Brown identifies and explains four key elements that allow women to transform their shame into courage, compassion and connection. Shame is a dark and sad place in which to live a life, keeping us from connecting fully to our loved ones and being the women we were meant to be. But learning how to understand shame’s influence and move through it toward full acceptance of ourselves and others takes away much of shame’s power to harm.It’s not just you, you’re not alone, and if you fight the daily battle of feeling like you are—somehow—just not "enough," you owe it to yourself to read this book and discover your infinite possibilities as a human being.

From Shame to Sin: The Christian Transformation of Sexual Morality in Late Antiquity


Kyle Harper - 2013
    In this same society, the routine sexual exploitation of poor and enslaved women was abetted by public institutions. Four centuries later, a Roman emperor commanded the mutilation of men caught in same-sex affairs, even as he affirmed the moral dignity of women without any civic claim to honor. The gradual transformation of the Roman world from polytheistic to Christian marks one of the most sweeping ideological changes of premodern history. At the center of it all was sex. Exploring sources in literature, philosophy, and art, Kyle Harper examines the rise of Christianity as a turning point in the history of sexuality and helps us see how the roots of modern sexuality are grounded in an ancient religious revolution.While Roman sexual culture was frankly and freely erotic, it was not completely unmoored from constraint. Offending against sexual morality was cause for shame, experienced through social condemnation. The rise of Christianity fundamentally changed the ethics of sexual behavior. In matters of morality, divine judgment transcended that of mere mortals, and shame—a social concept—gave way to the theological notion of sin. This transformed understanding led to Christianity’s explicit prohibitions of homosexuality, extramarital love, and prostitution. Most profound, however, was the emergence of the idea of free will in Christian dogma, which made all human action, including sexual behavior, accountable to the spiritual, not the physical, world.

Work, Love, Pray: Practical Wisdom for Professional Christian Women and Those Who Want to Understand Them


Diane Paddison - 2011
    They yearn to learn from someone who has climbed the ladder of success without sacrificing family or faith--something author Diane Paddison has done with excellence and grace.The stories Paddison shares about her corporate, personal, and spiritual life, as well as the lives of other women like her, are both inspiring and instructive, providing on-target advice and concrete examples of how to succeed without feeling overwhelmed or compromised.This is a working book for working women. Full of practical, proven guidance that is both professionally viable and biblically sound, each chapter includes sidebars featuring pertinent facts from current research, resources relevant to the chapter's topic, action-oriented "to do" lists, and other interactive material. Chapters also include questions suitable for discussion, making it an excellent resource for use in small groups.Work, Love, Pray is a valuable resource for professional Christian women, but it's also a must-read for the husbands, sisters, daughters, and friends who share their lives.

More Than a Body: Your Body Is an Instrument, Not an Ornament


Lexie Kite - 2020
    With insights drawn from their extensive body image research, Lindsay and Lexie—PhDs and founders of the nonprofit Beauty Redefined (and also twin sisters!)—lay out an action plan that arms you with the skills you need to reconnect with your whole self and free yourself from the constraints of self-objectification.From media consumption to health and fitness to self-reflection and self-compassion, Lindsay and Lexie share powerful and practical advice that goes beyond “body positivity” to help readers develop body image resilience—all while cutting through the empty promises sold by media, advertisers, and the beauty and weight-loss industries. In the process, they show how facing your feelings of body shame or embarrassment can become a catalyst for personal growth.

Defending Identity


Natan Sharansky - 2008
    Better to have hostile identities framed by democracy than democrats indifferent to identity.In a vigorous, insightful challenge to the left and right alike, Natan Sharansky, as he has proved repeatedly, is at the leading edge of the issues that frame our times.

Feminism: A Beginner's Guide


Sally J. Scholz - 2010
    By highlighting the themes that form the three waves, taking powerful examples from feminist campaigns, and tackling timely issues such as genocide and war rape, Scholz invites us to join in with the lively debates and contemporary challenges of feminism.

Daily Rituals: Women at Work


Mason Currey - 2019
    We see how these brilliant minds get to work, the choices they have to make: rebuffing convention, stealing (or secreting away) time from the pull of husbands, wives, children, obligations, in order to create their creations.From those who are the masters of their craft (Eudora Welty, Lynn Fontanne, Penelope Fitzgerald, Marie Curie) to those who were recognized in a burst of acclaim (Lorraine Hansberry, Zadie Smith) . . . from Clara Schumann and Shirley Jackson, carving out small amounts of time from family life, to Isadora Duncan and Agnes Martin, rejecting the demands of domesticity, Currey shows us the large and small (and abiding) choices these women made--and continue to make--for their art: Isak Dinesen, "I promised the Devil my soul, and in return he promised me that everything I was going to experience would be turned into tales," Dinesen subsisting on oysters and Champagne but also amphetamines, which gave her the overdrive she required . . . And the rituals (daily and otherwise) that guide these artists: Isabel Allende starting a new book only on January 8th . . . Hilary Mantel taking a shower to combat writers' block ("I am the cleanest person I know") . . . Tallulah Bankhead coping with her three phobias (hating to go to bed, hating to get up, and hating to be alone), which, could she "mute them," would make her life "as slick as a sonnet, but as dull as ditch water" . . . Lillian Hellman chain-smoking three packs of cigarettes and drinking twenty cups of coffee a day--and, after milking the cow and cleaning the barn, writing out of "elation, depression, hope" ("That is the exact order. Hope sets in toward nightfall. That's when you tell yourself that you're going to be better the next time, so help you God.") . . . Diane Arbus, doing what "gnaws at" her . . . Colette, locked in her writing room by her first husband, Henry Gauthier-Villars (nom de plume: Willy) and not being "let out" until completing her daily quota (she wrote five pages a day and threw away the fifth). Colette later said, "A prison is one of the best workshops" . . . Jessye Norman disdaining routines or rituals of any kind, seeing them as "a crutch" . . . and Octavia Butler writing every day no matter what ("screw inspiration"). Germaine de Staël . . . Elizabeth Barrett Browning . . . George Eliot . . . Edith Wharton . . . Virginia Woolf . . . Edna Ferber . . . Doris Lessing . . . Pina Bausch . . . Frida Kahlo . . . Marguerite Duras . . . Helen Frankenthaler . . . Patti Smith, and 131 more--on their daily routines, superstitions, fears, eating (and drinking) habits, and other finely (and not so finely) calibrated rituals that help summon up willpower and self-discipline, keeping themselves afloat with optimism and fight, as they create (and avoid creating) their creations.

Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls: A Handbook for Unapologetic Living


Jes Baker - 2015
    Among the many Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls that you don't want to miss:1. It's Possible to Love Your Body (Today. Now.)2. You Can Train Your Brain to Play Nice3. Your Weight Is Not a Reflection Of Your Worth4. Changing Your Tumblr Feed Will Change Your Life5. Salad Will Not Get You to Heaven6. Cheesecake Will Not Send You to HellWith her trademark wit, honesty, and rallying spirit, veteran blogger and advocate Jes Baker makes the case for embracing a body-positive worldview, changing perceptions about weight, and making mental wellness a priority. Alongside notable guest essayists, Baker calls on all people to reject fat prejudice, fight body-shaming at the hands of marketing and media, and join the life-changing movement with one step: change the world by loving your body. If you're a person with a body, this book is for you.

Unfinished Business: Women, Men, Work, Family


Anne-Marie Slaughter - 2015
    State Department in 2009, she was confident she could juggle the demands of her position in Washington, D.C., with the responsibilities of her family life in suburban New Jersey. Her husband and two young sons encouraged her to pursue the job; she had a tremendously supportive boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton; and she had been moving up on a high-profile career track since law school. But then life intervened. Parenting needs caused her to make a decision to leave the State Department and return to an academic career that gave her more time for her family.The reactions to her choice to leave Washington because of her kids led her to question the feminist narrative she grew up with. Her subsequent article for The Atlantic, Why Women Still Can’t Have It All, created a firestorm, sparked intense national debate, and became one of the most-read pieces in the magazine’s history.Since that time, Anne-Marie Slaughter has pushed forward even further and broken free of her long-standing assumptions about work, life, and family. In the twenty-first century, the feminist movement has stalled, and though many solutions have been proposed for how women can continue to break the glass ceiling or rise above the “motherhood penalty,” so far no solution has been able to unite all women.Now, in her refreshing and forthright voice, Anne-Marie Slaughter returns with her vision of what true equality between men and women really means and how we can get there. Slaughter takes a hard look at our reflexive beliefs—the “half-truths” we tell ourselves that are holding women back. Then she reveals the missing piece of the puzzle, a new focus that can reunite the women’s movement and provide a common banner under which both men and women can advance and thrive.With moving personal stories, individual action plans, and a broad outline for change, Anne-Marie Slaughter presents a future in which all of us can finally finish the business of equality for women and men, work and family.

I Wish I Knew This 20 Years Ago: Understanding The Universal Laws That Govern All Things


Justin Perry - 2014
    Once we understand these laws, we will have a better understanding of how life works.Once we understand how life works, we can make life work for us, instead of against us. This book is an intended guidebook to offer knowledge that you can use throughout life. If I can sum up this entire book in one statement it would be: Your mind is literally shaping the world around you. The Author of this book owns the largest Self-Help YouTube Channel, "YouAreCreators".

Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype


Clarissa Pinkola Estés - 1992
    Her name is Wild Woman, but she is an endangered species. Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D., Jungian analyst and cantadora storyteller shows how women's vitality can be restored through what she calls "psychic archeological digs" into the ruins of the female unconsious. Using multicultural myths, fairy tales, folk tales, and stories, Dr. Estes helps women reconnect with the healthy, instinctual, visionary attributes of the Wild Woman archetype.Dr. Estes has created a new lexicon for describing the female psyche. Fertile and life-giving, it is a psychology of women in the truest sense, a knowing of the soul.

The Saffron Road: A Journey with Buddha's Daughters


Christine Toomey - 2015
    Author Christine Toomey, a veteran foreign correspondent, takes the reader from Kathmandu to the Cascades to meet these very diverse daughters of Buddha. Some left happy marriages, others dynamic careers, each looking for fulfillment through mindfulness and a deepened consciousness.