Rachel Hollis puts a fresh spin on the traditional “inspirational” book in her 2018 release, Girl, Wash Your Face. This book will kick your butt into gear and make you want to get up and DO SOMETHING about your life… without using a ton of cliches to get you there.

I’m going to be straightforward with you here: I’d never heard of Rachel Hollis until a month or two ago. I saw the trailer for her “Made For More” movie, and it certainly caught my eye. I looked into it, and her, and discovered she had a) an Instagram (so I followed) and b) a book. I had to request the book at the library and was on a waiting list, so it took me a bit to get it – but it was worth the wait!

 Instead of pushing cliches and typical inspirational mumbo-jumbo, Hollis takes a commonsense approach. We – especially women – tell ourselves lies all the time. So let’s take those lies, one by one, break them down and figure out how to STOP doing that.

I’m not going to give away the entire book, obviously. But I’ll share a few of the chapter titles, each of which is a lie that we tell ourselves: “I’ll start tomorrow” or “I’m not good enough” or “I’m bad at sex” or “I need to make myself smaller” or “I am defined by my weight.”

We tell ourselves these lies and it’s time to break that cycle. Hollis is open and personal and exposed and intimate in this book, which makes it feel more… real, more authentic. She isn’t afraid to talk about sex and her Christian background and how those two facets of her life overlap and conflict sometimes. She isn’t afraid to admit her flaws. She also isn’t afraid of empowering herself – and others.

I’m SO glad I dove into this book when I did. While some of it wasn’t specifically applicable to me – for instance, I don’t have any kids yet, so the chapters about feeling like a ‘not good enough mom’ didn’t exactly apply – it was ALL relevant and important.

PS – I didn’t end up seeing the Made for More movie in theatres, because other things came up and I decided I wanted to read Hollis’ book first… but I’m hoping (fingers crossed!) it will be out again or put on Netflix or something.

PPS – You got this. Whatever it is… you got this.