September 26, 2006
who’s afraid of Arianna Huffington?
I am fascinated by Arianna Huffington, primarily because she is famous solely for being Arianna Huffington. I admire her for her outspokenness and her incredible ability to continuously recreate herself (she’s a Republican! no wait, she’s a Democrat!). She is the founder of the Huffington Post, and currently has a new book out, On Becoming Fearless. I wanted to like this book, I really did. Really.
Huffington’s claim–which I agree wholeheartedly with–is that we live in a culture of fear, and that women are particularly vulnerable to fearmongering. We are constantly barraged by reminders of all the ways we are failing–at home and at work and everywhere in between. Every choice we make is met with criticism and over time, we internalize that critical voice and allow it to control our decisions. We become fearful, and this fear infects our lives. We fear that we are failing our children and our spouses and our parents. We fear that we’re not working hard enough or making enough money. We fear that we are ugly. We fear that we will not succeed, and so we don’t.
“The most common response to this crisis of self is conformity,” Huffington writes in her Introduction. “So, ironically, the woman who appears to be well adapted may be the one who simply has become the most comfortable being governed by her fears, while the ‘neurotic’ one is still gamely struggling to reach her fearlessness.” As I read this, I thought instantly of the minivan driving soccer mom, and of my resistance to that stereotype. I think, in this moment, that Huffington is right; one way of allaying fear–or at least of creating the appearance of allaying fear–is to conform to the group. Once you are part of the group, there is nothing to fear. Except, of course, that the fears don’t vanish once you’re part of the group; they just eat away at you while you drive your minivan to soccer practice. Huffington identifies the places in our lives where we are most likely to be fearful–our relationship with our bodies, for example, or with work or money or love–and offers strategies for overcoming these fears. She looks at other literature in this area and quotes interviews with friends and Huffington Post readers and cites her own personal experiences. She is confident that women can, indeed, become fearless.
I like the idea of this book quite a lot. But the book itself left me puzzled and more than a little irritated. While this is not a Mommy Wars book, it employs that same us-against-them rhetoric. Huffington is critical of women who chose to approach the world in any way that differs dramatically from the one she is advocating here. She writes about an Oscar week party at which she found herself seated next to Hugh Hefner and his entourage, “the three pneumatically endowed platinum blondes on his arm.” She describes them as “horrifying . . . . At some point, they must have been lovely. And most likely, they still would be–but we’ll never know. That level of heavy construction and demolition can never be undone.” I am not a fan of plastic surgery, but I am even less a fan of this rhetoric. What divides women, what keeps us fearful and guilt ridden and angry about our inability to advance and succeed is, often, the criticism of other women, or at least our sense–our fear, if you will–that we won’t measure up in the eyes of other women. I think Huffington has a point about the Playboy bunnies and their desire to recreate themselves as Every Man’s Fantasy, but rather than attacking these young women (and they are young, very very young), I would have preferred she deconstruct the ideal they represent.
Too often, the book devolves into Practical Advice From Arianna, which is of little if any “practical” use in my real life. In the book’s first chapter, Fearless About the Body, Huffington asserts that “we can never really be fearless until we stop judging our looks and accept them.” Agreed; her argument is dead on. But her application falls short, particularly when she advocates solutions such as “Never get up from the table feeling stuffed or guilty, but never get up without feeling satisfied” and “Get enough sleep. . . . I try to get seven to eight hours of sleep a night as often as possible.” Quite honestly, I try to sit down at the dinner table whenever possible and I will take any sleep I can get. Reading about Huffington’s lunch hour hikes with her girlfriends or her yoga practice didn’t really give me any new insight into loving my body; instead, it left me feeling like I needed to get a whole new life, one that included a yoga instructor and a house in the California foothills.
Ultimately, I found this book unsatisfying and frustrating. The myriad references to Huffington’s own life–intended, I imagine, to be enlightening and charming–were incredibly irritating. She writes about her dear friend Sherry Lansing’s gift of a session with the aesthetician Mila Moursi, and goes on to rhapsodize about how “my regular facials include microdermabrasion . . . But even the simplest home facial can cleanse and freshen up our skin and our spirits,” she adds, in what seems to be an afterthought intended to include readers who don’t have a standing appointment with a famous Hollywood aesthetician. Huffington talks about returning phone calls during a seaweed wrap and checking her Blackberry during yoga classes. I tried to imagine what the equivalent of these might be at my house, but all I could come up with was eating M&Ms in the laundry room while the kids watch Clifford. I couldn’t connect with Huffington, although I wanted to; I wanted to feel like there was some real practical take-away message, but it seemed that the message was that when you’re Arianna Huffington, you CAN stop being fearful.
I think Huffington is right: we live in a culture that barrages us with reminders of how we are failing and imbues us with fear. I think that her message–that women CAN overcome fear, that we CAN succeed, personally and professionally, that our lives will be more rewarding if we take risks and make decisions based on what we KNOW not what we fear–is crucial, particularly for young women. But I think there is not enough of that message and too much of Arianna Huffington in this book.
This review is part of BlogHer’s first virtual book tour. You can find more reviews–and get your own review copy of Arianna Huffington’s book–at BlogHer.
Posted by Susan @ 11:06 pm • Uncategorized
RSS feed for comments on this post.
TrackBack URI
September 27th, 2006 at 11:57 am, Plain Jane Mom Says:
Hell, I can’t even spell assthetician much less get myself over to one. Thanks for saving me money at amazon on this book.
Great review, and gutsy too as I see you’re part of one of those book-review blog-tour thingies. Admirable.
September 27th, 2006 at 12:17 pm, Candace Says:
Great review. I always hate those pithy little sayings, “Get eight hours of sleep!” “Don’t stuff yourself!” Yeah, if it were only that easy.
I like Arianna Huffington in general, so it’s disappointing to see that this book doesn’t seem to have any heft to it.
September 27th, 2006 at 12:31 pm, scribbit Says:
Even her name “Arianna Huffington” sounds like royalty to me and widens that gap between my life and hers. Hope that doesn’t sound too critical of her, I just don’t have much use for seaweed wraps and sessions with personal spiritual advisors. I agreed with the Kiwords post yesterday along the same subject:
http://kiwords.blogs.com/kiwords/2006/09/the_next_half_m.html
September 27th, 2006 at 12:52 pm, Chilihead2 Says:
Excellent review. Too bad the book wasn’t better. Thanks.
September 27th, 2006 at 12:54 pm, Kristen Says:
Hmm. I’m just not sure I associate fearlessness with a seaweed wrap anyway. Seems pretty cliche and upper class to me, and also contrary the idea of not trying to live up to something.
But did you see Stephen Colbert’s interview with her? Hilarious.
September 27th, 2006 at 1:30 pm, Susan Says:
Scribbit, Kira’s post is lovely; she gets right at what Huffington is trying to say. Thanks for pointing it out.
I really DID want to like this book because I really DO like Arianna Huffington. She was fantastic on The Colbert Report–smart and funny and RIGHT ON in her call for an “epidemic of fearlessness” but the book just felt . . . meh.
And dammit Steven Colber is so funny. SO FUNNY. I love him.
September 27th, 2006 at 3:09 pm, Jenorama Says:
I think I love Stephen Colbert even more than I love Jon Stewart, but don’t tell anyone.
Good review– but wow, it’s so obvious that Arianna Huffington is so out of touch with the audience she is trying to persuade. (Says Jen, who carries around her blackberry everywhere, LOL!). Didn’t her editor think that maybe these details should be edited out?
Who has regular facials? I mean, I suppose some people do, maybe even a lot of people, but I’m right there with you about the Cadillac and the California foothills.
And even the facial I apply in the bathroom– well, stating that even these can lift our spirits? How very Martha Stewart of you. So can spraying scents on my linens and ironing my pillowcases, I’m sure, but you know, if I had time for that level of spirit-raising, I wouldn’t have time to supervise homework, and work enough to pay for the damn linen spray.
I think we need an Everywoman to write that book and say those things. Like YOU.
September 27th, 2006 at 3:27 pm, Kara Says:
I remember buying a parenting magazine whose headline promised it would give me the secret to finding balance as a wife and mother and help me live in harmony with my spouse. It was about a young couple who were scratching their way to the top and who had lost themselves after they had a child. I read every word, nodding my head in agreement. Then it got to the part where they explained how they got their identities and sex life back: they hired a nanny.
Thud.
Sounds like the authors of that article and Huffington have one thing in common: money I don’t have.
Great review, btw.
September 27th, 2006 at 4:27 pm, Lauren Says:
Sounds like dull, obvious advice. I’d rather read fiction. Now I must see the Colbert interview . . . .
September 27th, 2006 at 7:37 pm, Karyn Says:
I love this, Susan.
And it makes me feel about ten thousand times better about hurtling wildly along this wacked out path called Motherhood, resplendant in all my (many) neuroses.
But I must take exception to the minivan thing. I swore I’d never drive one; but I got one. I needed a new vehicle, this was affordable and it had airbags and a CUP HOLDER *AND*! it had volume toggles ON. THE. STEERING WHEEL. I love my van because it gives me OPTIONS. One kid in row 2; one kid in row 3. Both kids in row 3. Take other kids on field trip. Take friends home as designated driver. Move furniture. Buy many groceries. Buy many shoes. Buy many shoes AND groceries.
Anyway. I love your point, I love this post and I think I might just love you a little bit. (In a non scary, non stalker way.)
September 27th, 2006 at 9:22 pm, Susan Says:
Karyn, you know I can’t drive a minivan because then I would be compelled to VOLUNTEER for things and that goes against everything I believe in.
I can’t say it enough: Huffington absolutely has the right idea here. We SHOULD be fearless, we SHOULD stop worrying about things that don’t really matter. And yes, we should ALL have a facial.
Watch the Colbert clip. WATCH THE COLBERT CLIP. That’s all.
September 27th, 2006 at 9:36 pm, MJ Says:
First of all, isn’t there something wrong with using your Blackberry during a yoga class? Isn’t that anti-yoga or something? Won’t Buddha smite you? Or at least block your path to enlightenment?
The problem, as I see it, with these books that preach to Everywoman is that they tend to be written by upper class women and thus there is a huge disconnect between their lives and the lives of most of their readers. Without reading the book, my guess is that it could be a lot better if it was a sociological look at modern woman rather than a privileged woman’s journal. Good review, Susan.
September 28th, 2006 at 5:28 am, Jeana Says:
Yeah, this reminds me of…well, every time I have ever read O magazine. “Christmas Gift Ideas to Have On Hand As Backups, In Case You Forgot Someone or Someone Gives You A Gift and You Didn’t Shop for Them.” And any single one costs more than my entire Christmas budget.
Ooh,and I got an example! Arianna’s time management suggestions would translate beautifully in the post I just wrote about the kid in the car next to me, popping his pimples while he waited at the bank drive-thru.
You’re welcome.
September 28th, 2006 at 10:59 am, Undercover Mutha Says:
Sounds like she’s getting Oprah’s big money ego, too. I still love Oprah, don’t get me wrong. But the money part? She loses touch with the majority of her audience when she goes there.
September 28th, 2006 at 11:49 am, Laura Says:
Did she say something about drinking 8 glasses of water and making time for yourself, no matter what? Because I don’t have time to do either of those things, much less get a facial and spend money on a Blackberry (so I can text message my husband?).
Thanks for the review, and for your own fearlessness!
September 28th, 2006 at 3:27 pm, sarcastic journalist Says:
The problem with women like her are that they are full of “great advice” for women who are in the same situation as them.
The rest of us, the ones at home with small children, just trying to keep up with the amount of poo coming out of them, do not even have time for a “home facial.” We do not go on hikes, unless it is to the playground so we can get bit by mosquitoes.
I do not have a Blackberry and haven’t had a chance to talk on my cell phone without little people interrupting in forever. And, it doesn’t matter if they didn’t interrupt, I’m not made of cash like she seems to be.
So thanks for your “advice,” Arianna. Why don’t you come live a single mom’s life, or a widow’s life or a mom of many children’s life for a minute?
Then tell me what you call “fearless.”
September 28th, 2006 at 11:32 pm, The Daring One Says:
I didn’t read this post. I will get back to you once I’ve read the book and mine is up. I’m studiously avoiding reading reviews of it so mine can be authentic… whatever that means.