Braving The Wilderness by Brene Brown
Star Rating: ★★★★★
Braving the Wilderness" is probably the hardest book I have read in my life. It showed me all the ugly parts of my own life, which is never easy to see.
Listening to this book reminded me of how I grew up in the wilderness when I just desperately wanted to blend in. And fitting in is not pretty, and this book reminded me of that. Now, as an adult, I spent 2018 and 2019 really breaking down walls I had built up, and, as it turns out, braving the wilderness. I just didn't have the coined phrase on hand. I read this while still going through that process, which was incredibly helpful but also hard.
What you may not see about "Braving the Wilderness" is that the wilderness is a lonely place. Not always, of course, as you can branch out and find people and places where you belong. But, in the age of FOMO and social media? Sure. Braving the wilderness means not fitting in, which means not being invited and involved in every social event. So, this book, while it provided some much-needed clarity, also meant coming to terms with some emotions from old work colleagues and old friends. Because fitting in and standing out can't be one and the same. I am in the wilderness, I probably never left it (but instead forced myself to "fit in"), and I am practicing every day becoming okay with that notion.
The more you try to become an "expert fitter-inner," the more of a stranger you become to yourself.
Format read: Audiobook
