Untamed... book #14

I haven't been blogging about every book this year... but I really want to blog about the ones that truly impact me in the deepest way.  Untamed by Glennon Doyle is one of them.  I knew that I would love it as soon as I started it.  I didn't really know that it would be just what I needed at this moment in my life.  Words they are like such a comforter to me.  It has always been that way.  I few written words after an awful day and I feel just so much better.  Words are definitely my love language.  So as I read this book, I just let it wrap me up.. kind of like those big burrito shaped blankets that you see.  I let myself be a burrito.  I allowed myself to feel all the things... and because of that I am one giant heap of sobbing tears and red-faced crazy.  But you know what?  I would rather be crazy emotional, then be able to just push someone away like they didn't mean anything to me at all.  So I take in all my feelings as I grieve a friendship that I thought would never change this drastically or come to what seems like an end.  I grieved as I read.. and I learned.  I learned about who I am, who I want to be, and my next steps that I need to take in order to heal from rejection.

Some of my favorite things that were in untamed weren't necessarily the quotes, but more the stories.  The stories of life, love, and understanding more of who she is.  We get put in boxes so early on, and we think that just because we have believed in one thing our entire lives that wee have to continue in that path.  But it isn't true, is it?  We can forge down a new path.  We can make a life that is different from the one we thought we would be on.  We can start over in a new place....

We can also unbelieve some of the things that we were taught to believe and it will be okay.

But here are some of my favorite quotes...

"I wanted to be a good girl, so I tried to control myself.  I chose a personality, a body, a faith, and a sexuality so tiny I had to hold my breath to fit myself inside.  Then I promptly became very sick."  page 5

"I was wild until I was tamed by shame.  Until I started hiding and numbing my feelings for fear of being too much."  page 46

"Feeling all your feelings is hard, but that's what they're for.  Feelings are for feeling.  All of them.  Even the hard ones.  The secret is that you're doing it right , and that doing it right hurts sometimes."  page 50

"Pain is not tragic.  Pain is magic.  Suffering is tragic.  Suffering is what happens when we avoid pain and consequently miss our becoming.  This is what I can and must avoid:  missing my own evolution because I am too afraid to surrender to the process."  page 52

"I have learned that if I want to rise, I have to sink first.  I have to search for and depend upon the voice of inner wisdom instead of voices of outer approval."  page 60

"Discontent is evidence that your imagination has not given up on you."  page 67

"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."  page 70

"What we need right now is more women who have detoxed themselves so completely from the world's expectations that they are full of nothing but themselves."  page 75

"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."  page 93

"Brave means living from the inside out.  Brave means, in every uncertain moment, turning inward, feeling for the Knowing, and speaking it out loud."  page 105

"She trusted her own voice more than she trusted the voices of others.  Brave is not asking the crowd what is brave.  Brave is deciding for oneself."  page 106

"She offered a new friendship memo:  that for us there would be no arbitrary rules, obligations, or expectations.  We would not owe each other anything other than admiration, respect, love- and that was all done already.  We became friends."  page 110

"What if love is not the process of disappearing for the beloved but of emerging for the beloved?  page 128

"The moment after we don't know what to do with ourselves is the moment we find ourselves.  Right after itchy boredom is self-discovery.  But we have to hang in there long enough without bailing."  page 158

"What if we decided that it is strength- not weakness- to let other people's pain pierce us?"  -page 182

"The miracle of grace is that you can give what you have never gotten."  -page 17

"Judgment is just another cage we live in so we don't have to feel, know, and imagine.  Judgment is self-abandonment.  You are not here to waste your time deciding whether my life is true and beautiful enough for you."  page 201

"I want us to all grow so comfortable in our own feelings, our own Knowing, our own imaginations that we become more committed to our own joy, freedom, and integrity than we are to manipulating what others think of us.  page 202

"Luckily, I am a woman who has learned repeatedly that while rock bottom feels like the end- it's always the beginning of something."  page 213

"Blessed are those brave enough to make things awkward, for they wake us up and move us forward."  page 222

This life is full of doubts and fears.  We learn at an early age that we are too much, that we need to calm ourselves or people won't like us.  We learn early on especially in spiritual households to be this way or that.  It is too much sometimes.  As I read through these quotes, they help me heal from some things.. and help me realize others.  My emotions they are a part of me... being brave means understanding those emotions.  Being brave means not being afraid to be exactly who I am... with all my faults.  My imperfections, my passions... everything that I feel is okay.  I don't have to hide or belittle myself for the sake of other's feelings.  That's what this book did for me....  

So thankful for these words.... read this book!