Anneli Rufus

UNWORTHY, a book about self-loathing, was recommended to me by two of the smartest, funniest, kindest, most gifted people I know. Isn’t that both sad and hilarious? I feel unworthy to share their perceptions of unworthiness.
Anneli Rufus’ hysteria-tinged prose captures the delirium of self-hate, the sodden yearning to un-be the self you are. The “unworthy” are legion. From page 49:
“According to one biographer, Franz Kafka’s lifelong struggle with low self-esteem was due to his show more ‘highly developed capacity for seeing himself in the eyes of others.’ ….
“The painter Paul Cezanne reacted so strongly to criticism that while still young he earned the nickname l’Ecorche, meaning ‘the flayed one.’ It was the name of a sculpture of which he owned a cast, and which he drew again and again - fascinated by the metaphor of a skinless man….”

https://maryoverton.wikispaces.com/Self-Loathing
http://www.artcyclopedia.com/feature-2003-06-Houdon-Ecorche.html show less

I wanted to like this book way more than I did. I had no problem with her writing or her adding people's individual stories in between. I had a problem with how she thinks, also a big problem I had when I read her book on saints. She can come across as very snarky, self-righteous and rude.

As a person with a 34 year relentless eating disorder, I will NOT allow her to label me as someone with 'bad habits '. I have had and continue to have a team of mental health workers who have not made any show more progress with it, and I graduated from a 5 month eating disorder program here in NY only to leave heavier than when I entered. I also have OCD and chronic insomnia. These are illnesses/disorders/afflictions and not bad habits. So if that is her stance, we have to part ways.

Also she is a self acknowledged cheapskate, something I am not and abhor. I gravitate generosity.

She is against living with your parents beyond the age of 20 or so, yet, how many college graduates out there find the only job waiting for them is pushing a broom ?? I have a Master's degree and it never mattered on bit. I am on SS disability now, but on my last job for the gov't in 2007 I only made $ 44,000. NY rents start at about $ 1,500 a month, then with the light bill, gas bill, phone bill, laundry, food and carfare, how can you manage ??? So she blames young people for wasting money, but if you make $ 35,000 on your first job out of school, the only place you can live for that kind of money is someone's closet for $ 100 a week.

I no longer like this author - I have read 3 of her books, I think I will toss ' Party of One ', I don't think I can deal with her anymore. show less

An essential defense of the people the world loves to revile--the loners--yet without whom it would be lostThe Buddha. Rene Descartes. Emily Dickinson. Greta Garbo. Bobby Fischer. J. D. Salinger: Loners, all--along with as many as 25 percent of the world's population. Loners keep to themselves, and like it that way. Yet in the press, in films, in folklore, and nearly everywhere one looks, loners are tagged as losers and psychopaths, perverts and pity cases, ogres and mad bombers, elitists show more and wicked witches. Too often, loners buy into those messages and strive to change, making themselves miserable in the process by hiding their true nature--and hiding from it. Loners as a group deserve to be reassessed--to claim their rightful place, rather than be perceived as damaged goods that need to be "fixed." In Party of One Anneli Rufus--a prize-winning, critically acclaimed writer with talent to burn--has crafted a morally urgent, historically compelling tour de force--a long-overdue argument in defense of the loner, then and now. Marshalling a polymath's easy erudition to make her case, assembling evidence from every conceivable arena of culture as well as interviews with experts and loners worldwide and her own acutely calibrated analysis, Rufus rebuts the prevailing notion that aloneness is indistinguishable from loneliness, the fallacy that all of those who are alone don't want to be, and wouldn't be, if only they knew how. show less

Rufus, who has clawed her own way out of low self-esteem, reaches a hand back to her fellow sufferers. While she acknowledges that self-hatred can come from many sources, we do hear an uncomfortable amount about her difficult relationship with her mother. Inspired, perhaps, by Buddhist philosophy, Rufus encourages her readers to aim for a middle path between self-hatred and narcissism.

I found a few useful ideas and strategies in this book. My best takeaway relates to negative self-talk. The show more author recommends acknowledging that the negative voice is trying to protect you, and then gently redirecting. I’m going to try to do this in future. However, I listened to the audiobook, and did not think that the narrator was a good fit, vocally. Her phrasing was awkward in spots. She also mispronounced a few words and names, which a good producer should have caught and corrected. I feel badly for criticizing the narrator of a work about self-esteem, but there you have it. Read the print version if you think this book might be useful to you. show less