I haven’t been reading as much as I’d like to be. When I have time in which I am not tending to the kids or the house, I jump at the chance to write. And when I’m reading, it’s usually writing-related material. But I miss the feel of a great paperback in my hands, that irreplaceable feeling of something delicious waiting for me at the end of the day – a little escape into another world, where I fall in love with characters and feel like they are actually part of my regular life.
I decided to end my reading drought with something from Hay House; although it’s non-fiction, inspirational writing makes my soul happy. So, when I had the opportunity to review Roz Savage’s Stop Drifting, Start Rowing I decided to dive right in (pun intended!) and join Roz’s journey solo across the Pacific Ocean in a rowboat.
It was the tagline of the book, One Woman’s Search for Happiness and Meaning Alone on the Pacific, that really grabbed me. Seriously? Alone? On the Pacific? I had to hear why someone would put themselves through that. What was her driving force? How did she even dream up such an endeavour? And obviously, she lived to tell about it. I needed to know what she had to say.
Savage’s messages encompass heavy issues such as our carbon footprint, the dreary state of the world’s oceans and the impact of Earth’s ailments on people we have never heard of but desperately need to know about. They were delivered with humour, hope, wisdom and this…light…for lack of a better word. A light that could very well be compared to a guiding buoy on the dark waters. I learned a lot about my own place in this giant web. It’s not about feeling guilty; Savage hands out facts that opened my eyes and made me say, “Ok, there is something needs to be done. Let’s just do it.” She didn’t make it sound simple – there’s nothing simple about plastic particles outnumbering plankton – she just said it like it is. And as a reader who devoured her book while ignoring her children (except the newborn – she cries the loudest…plus I could breastfeed her while reading) I am left believing that I can make a difference, not just on this lot of land I live on, but somewhere out in the deep blue where I likely will never physically be.
And what I was left with was this: If I can live my life so that every day I am showing up, doing something, changing something, creating something and, most importantly, being something (namely, myself!) then at the end of the day, when I climb up on top of my one-woman rowboat, weary from a great adventure, I can rest my oars, lean my head back on a cushy pillow and look around me at the gorgeous view of a panoramic sunset. Amen.
If you would like to stop drifting and start rowing, check out Roz Savage’s book through my affiliate link. Just click here and search for Stop Drifting, Start Rowing under Books. Thank you for supporting my work, and hers.
*Disclaimer: This book was given to me for free by Hay House Publishing in exchange for an honest review.
