Self-help book titles often entice but fail to deliver. Erica Mather’s book, however, pulls you in and wraps you in a big bear hug, while gently leading you to a place of self-acceptance and empowerment. While reading this book, I often felt a sadness for my body and what it has endured throughout my life, starving it of nutrition and love and empathy, blaming my flesh for all that was wrong in my world – why I wasn’t as happy as other women, why I wasn’t worthy of love, why my life was on hold until I took up less space and fit into smaller clothing. As Mather writes, “I discovered for the very first time how thoroughly bereft my body had been of my time, care and attention. No one had done this to me. I had done it to myself.”

It’s so clear reading this book that Mather is in her element writing about this topic and being able to share her wisdom of self-love with her readers. She is generous with her own story of acceptance; the reader quickly learns that she too has struggled and that she's writing from experience. You feel as if you're in safe hands embarking on this self-discovery with her.
Mather holds your hand, giving the reader tools and exercises - stepping stones throughout the book’s journey. She acknowledges that the “topic is heavy” but that facing our fears and learning to trust and accept this body that we are in right now is the only way we will truly be free of self-objectification. “It’s an act of violence against the self,” she says, and “when we do it to others, it’s an act of violence against them.” I feel ashamed that I have not only judged myself my whole life, but also other women, who are in turn dealing with their own demons of self-image.

This book doesn’t shy away from the importance of living as healthily as you can, through good nutrition, meditation and exercise (the author is a yoga teacher) as a way to honour our bodies, not as a means to achieve the unobtainable notion of perfection. Mather also demonstrates that by investing your energy into all the other attributes that make you you, it “creates a more beautiful being, body included”.

Just as we like to create an environment to live in that makes us feel at home and expresses who we truly are, Mather believes we can equally reclaim our bodies “as a safe home where all [our] wisdom lives” which once achieved, she says, “you will become more and more beautiful.