Book Club: Rising Strong, Chapter 10

Welcome to the comments and discussion of Chapter 10: You Got To Dance With Them That Brung You of the book, Rising Strong by Brené Brown!  Catch up on Chapter 1: The Physics of Vulnerability,  Chapter 2: Civilization Stops at the Waterline, Chapter 3: Owning Our Stories, Chapter 4: The Reckoning, Chapter 5: The Rumble, Chapter 6: Sewer Rats And Scofflaws, Chapter 7: The Brave And Brokenhearted, Chapter 8: Easy Mark, and Chapter 9: Composting Failure.

Let’s get started!  Chapter 10!

Mallory:

Every chapter of this book is filled with oodles (yes, that is a technical word) of insight.  Sometimes I come to these chapters, already feeling slightly broken in my day to day of being a cancer survivor and sometimes I come to them rushed and stressed at everything on my to-do list.  Every time, I leave each chapter feeling more sorted, more settled.  Each chapter is like a little therapy session…leaving me to wonder whether it is time that I get back to having a regular therapy session as I have in the past.  Anyway…  🙂

Since so many quotations and thoughts came to my mind as really important during this chapter, I decided to focus on one:

“From Long Island to Silicon Valley, a fear of being perceived as weak forces men into pretending they are never afraid, lonely, confused, vulnerable, or wrong; and an extreme fear of being perceived as cold-hearted, imperfect, high maintenance, or hostile forces women to pretend they’re never exhausted, ambitious, pissed off, or even hungry.”

While I don’t always face the same gender ‘shoulds’ as I see others dealing with, this idea of trying to be someone or act a certain way because of how we believe we are perceived is powerful.  In my career shift from engineering to nonprofit, from flashy to grounded, from high-pay to no-pay, I have faced over and over again this idea of what my life *should* look like right now.  Where I *should* be in my career or whether where I am is *adult enough.*  These thoughts keep me up at night.  They make me swing from feelings of pride at what I’ve made of my own two hands and feelings of desperation at providing financially for my family.  They unground me and unsettle my core stability.

Should Should Should.  Enough Enough Enough.  It’s fatiguing, to say the least.  Some days I am fortunate enough to peak my head above the doubt and know that I am on a path that I have, at least somewhat, chosen.

Where do you find shame in your own life?  Where have you found nostalgia playing a role in prescribing *shoulds?*

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Thanks for joining us for our Chapter 10: You Got To Dance With Them That Brung You of Rising Strong!  Join in next Monday for Chapter 10: You Got To Dance With Them That Brung You and in the meantime, learn more about the book club commentators!

If you’re just joining us, here are some logistics:

We will talk about a chapter each Monday until the book is done.  Then, we’ll use one more Monday to talk about general feelings from the book and anything else you’d like to discuss.  Join in, in the comments every week!  At the end, we’ll have a book club discussion via video chat!  Also, there will probably be spoilers.  Read along with us!

How are you enjoying our young adult cancer book club?