A Tale of Two Reviews

A month apart, I received two reviews of my memoir/self-help book, Leaning into Curves:

“One of the best memoirs I have ever read [and, along with Knife by Salman Rushdie, one of the finest nonfiction books of 2024]”

And

“I have to say that it is probably one of the worst books I have ever read.”

After I got over the sting of reading the latter review, I fell to laughing!! If ever there was proof of what my spiritual teacher Sydney Banks called separate realities this had to be it!! Syd was referring to the inarguable fact that we all think in unique ways moment to moment and that our thoughts can turn on a dime so that what we once saw we can, in an instant, see differently!

As an example, I remember the very first moment I saw Steve Hardison, the Ultimate Coach, speak and thought to myself, “what an arrogant A-h***. I now see him as one of the most incredible human beings I have ever met, and I love him dearly! What and how he shares has changed my life!

All this begs the question – is there ANY objective reality?

For example, is there REALLY any best book? Or worst book? Or, as the old saying goes, is beauty in the eye of the beholder?

One of the BIGGEST and most CHAGRINING lessons I have learned in the past year is how judgmental I am. I have been asked to look repeatedly at how I create myself, the world and others. In the end, what I’ve seen is that my judgments always say so much more about ME than they do about anyone else. It took being on the “judged” end of the judgment stick, put in a box by people who said they loved me, to force me to look at how I do the same thing.

In the end, I arrived more rooted at THIS PLACE:

“Your own inner beauty will increase and grow as you recognize the beauty in others.” – Syd Banks, Dear Liza, page 73.

I’ve been fortunate to see beauty easily, but, these days, I’m looking deeper and wider. More often, I look to find the beautiful even in the most “frightening”, “dark” and “mundane.” Why? Because I feel better doing so…and it creates magic in my relationship to myself, others and the world.

As for the book reviews: as a middle schooler, my daughter Laura, won an first place in a short story competition and got invited to the West Virginia Writer’s Conference to receive an award. One of the keynote speakers was Phyllis Reynolds Naylor who has published 120 books and 2000 short stories!!

A middle-aged woman at the time, the author walked onto the stage holding a 2-inch sheaf of papers in one hand and her children’s book, Shiloh in the other. She held up the sheaf and said, “This is the stack of rejection letters I got for Shiloh from publishers.” She read the top one, which called Shiloh a terrible book with no future! Then she held up the book, and said, “Shiloh just won the Newberry Medal!” That award is like the Nobel Prize in Children’s Literature!!

I stood up and clapped for Phyllis with every ounce of energy I had, unstoppable tears streaming down my face. Her faith in her creation, her perseverance to share what she knew was a beautiful, touching story, pierced me to the core.

As for me, I will stand for beauty, my book, and for creating the world as a special place to be, with beauty available in every. single. corner.

Oh, and there IS beauty in the latter reviewer’s remarks…I saw some steps I can take to be a better writer!

**********

Copyright 2024: Linda Sandel Pettit, Ed.D.
Photo courtesy of istockphoto.com

Dr. Linda Sandel Pettit is an author, speaker, personal consultant and champion for the Wild Intuitive Way of Love which guides us to breakthrough insights for living at optimal levels of well-being, self-expression and creativity. Read more about Dr. Linda and order her acclaimed memoir/self-help book, Leaning Into Curves: Trusting the Wild Intuitive Way of Love at https:lindasandelpettit.com.

Check out this blog: https://drlindapettit.com/elegy-8/