Our culture of happiness has strict social rules,’ reflects New York Times bestselling author Kate Bowler, ‘which makes expressing negative emotions unacceptable.’ On a practical level, this means when we feel sadness, frustration or despair we often do our best to hide, avoid, deny or bypass. This approach to work and life is becoming increasingly more common. Often referred to as ‘toxic positivity’ it’s the foundation of a multi-billion-dollar industry. (I’ve experienced workplace cultures like this and decided to step away quickly and quietly for my own sanity.)
While Joyful, Anyway has a focus on the American Dream, its lessons will likely resonate with Australian readers. Bowler hosts podcasts and has written several previous books exploring similar territory. In this book, she reflects on her own experiences with cancer diagnosis, treatment and recovery then discusses this with other common ailments, complaints and adversities from life and newspaper headlines (death, lost love, hurricanes, teenage anxiety, microplastics, stock market disasters).
The aim of the book is to acknowledge the aches of everyday existence, then guide and support readers to ask: ‘What is all this for?’ A big abstract question that’s made more palatable and approachable with Bowler’s light and bubbly language, sunny humour and unexpected anecdotes. Hope, delight and gratitude (combining to form joy) meet head on with grief, loneliness, stress and the deep expanse of cold space.
‘Because there are some truths we can only tell in a minor key.’
Reviewed by Mark Parry
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kate Bowler is the four-time New York Times bestselling author of Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved, No Cure for Being Human, Good Enough, The Lives We Actually Have, Blessed and The Preacher’s Wife, and hosts the popular podcast Everything Happens. She is a professor of history at Duke University and shuttles home to Winnipeg for the summer with her husband and son.
Visit Kate Bowler’s website here
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