Useful for midlife woman
4 steloj
I felt drawn to read A Midlife Voyage to Transformation by Donna Roe Daniell because I am about in the middle of the age group of women for whom this book is intended - late thirties to mid sixties - and I hoped Donna's expertise and experiences would contain lessons that I could transfer into my own life. While her lifestyle is, understandably, very different to my own, I found myself identifying strongly with a lot of what Donna has to say especially in her ideas about how important it is to get out into the natural world and to meet each day with a sense of mindfulness and curiosity. I loved the concept of a 'sacred space' within one's home, an idea inspired by Virginia Woolf's A Room Of One's Own, and even though we don't have the space for me to commandeer a whole room, I can certainly …
I felt drawn to read A Midlife Voyage to Transformation by Donna Roe Daniell because I am about in the middle of the age group of women for whom this book is intended - late thirties to mid sixties - and I hoped Donna's expertise and experiences would contain lessons that I could transfer into my own life. While her lifestyle is, understandably, very different to my own, I found myself identifying strongly with a lot of what Donna has to say especially in her ideas about how important it is to get out into the natural world and to meet each day with a sense of mindfulness and curiosity. I loved the concept of a 'sacred space' within one's home, an idea inspired by Virginia Woolf's A Room Of One's Own, and even though we don't have the space for me to commandeer a whole room, I can certainly create a small shelf space for myself and am already trying to envisage how this could work.
Much of Donna's memoir is very personal to her own family and professional situation, yet I felt that the events she goes through would be shared by many Western women. Certainly the techniques she learns in order to understand how internalised childhood behaviours can subconsciously be repeated throughout adulthood would be useful to many of us who strive, often unsuccessfully, to avoid them! A Midlife Voyage to Transformation begins and ends with Donna's attempt to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, an epic expedition which recalled to me Susan Scott's similar essay in In Praise Of Lilith, the two books presenting themselves to me as strong companion volumes.
I took several days to read A Midlife Voyage to Transformation, quite a slow read in comparison to my usual pace, as I frequently felt the need to really think over an absorb Donna's words. Reading about her life journey resembled a mindfulness exercise in itself for me which was interesting because I had not expected that. I recommend this book for midlife and older women, those who feel themselves to be in a period of transformation obviously, but also for those of us who feel stable right now, but want to have a flexible and beneficial toolset ready to help us to cope when the next life change comes.