What's Holding You Back? Eight Critical Choices for Women's Success
Author: Linda S. Austin
List Price: $14.00
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ISBN: 046503263X
Publisher: Basic Books (19 February, 2001)
Sales Rank: 159,818
Average Customer Rating: 4.07 out of 5
Customer Reviews
Rating: 5 out of 5
If you could be doing more with your life, read this book!
"What's Holding You Back" is the most interesting and motivating book I've read since attending college 20 years ago. Dr. Austin provides strategies for women to achieve their dreams, without undermining motherhood. As a former marketing professional and current at-home mom (the last eight years) it's given me the motivation I've needed to stop worrying about all the barriers and rather focus on taking the steps now to achieving my goals.Dr. Austin explores the differences between men's and women's roles in the family and society and how this shapes women's self-esteem and expectations for achievement. She then offers a practical step-by-step plan for accomplishing your goals. The book is filled with inspiring and amusing stories of famous and not-so-famous women who achieved their goals despite overwhelming obstacles. Whatever your background or age, you'll know "if they can do it, I can do it!".
Regarding her appearance on "Oprah" last week, Dr. Austin was the most intelligent and charismatic psychiatrist Oprah has had. It was fascinating to see how Dr. Austin "zeroed-in" on the conflicts of each guest and provided an insightful and meaningful solution that each woman could use to improve her life. Unfortunately, in one hour they only touched the surface of her book. I hope Dr. Austin will return for a more comprehensive interview.
Rating: 1 out of 5
Didn't deliver the answers it promissed
I bought this book because I saw it reviewed on Oprah. They touched on all pertinent questions regarding why women feel 'stuck' and can't seem to move forward in their goals. Topics such as fear of success and taking risks, years of 'feminine'conditioning, lack of motivation and anxiety to name a few were some of the reasons. The way the book presents itself is that it will cover these topics and offer constructive advice as to how to overcome these issues and move forward. It never did. I found the book to be very informative if you want statistics and thorough research on the effects of years of feminism and how women are trying to overcome the need to nest-build and sacrifice their careers for family life. The book touched on a lot of eye-opening facts. Linda Austin wrote excessively about her research and included a lot of case studies of the professionals she interviewed, but with no practical advice or solutions. I read the book twice...maybe I missed something the first time. At the end of it I just felt worried for the future of working women...very daunting. I was not impressed at all. I was really hoping for some answers.
Rating: 5 out of 5
A Self-Defeating Collaboration
According to Austin, "Making correct choices will enable women to overcome the obstacles to professional and personal success which they now face." These choices are heavily influenced by "a powerful motivation driven by a sense of meaning" and involve "the capacity for risk-taking; the ability to focus intelligence; the ability to find and define great problems to work on; a willingness to compete in hierarchies as well as individually; the ability to tolerate and learn from failure; significant skill with difficult people; and the development of autonomy and power." Frankly, I continue to wonder why so many (most?) women still have to put up with all the illegal or at least unethical obstacles. Of course, they do. For Austin, there is one force which united all eight issues for variopus women cited, and powerfully shaped their careers: "That force was the feminine drive to affiliate with others, a drive scholars have described as the most gender-specific aspect of women's psychology." When addressing the eight critical choices for women's success, Austin organizes a wealth of information and insight within eight highly informative chapters.Austin concludes her final chapter with this observation: "Our commonality of values and ambitions may well make it easier to build lives of accomplishment as well as loving relationships, with deeper appreciation of our shared humanity." I agree. One final point: Although Austin's perspectives are gender-specific, just about all of her advice would be of substantial value to males as well as to females. I am convinced that most human limitations are self-imposed. We hold ourselves back, perhaps convinced by others that we must do so. But obviously there are other limits such as those which result from gender discrimination. They are an obscene violation of our "shared humanity" and must be eliminated immediately.
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