Life Storms: Finding Your Clear Sky
Practices to Overcome Negative Thinking, Build Connection, & Find Fulfillment
Life Storms is an inspirational self-help book that models moving through personal struggles.
Tracy Doyle’s uplifting self-help book Life Storms is about getting unstuck, finding one’s calm, and living with intention.
Introducing the Aurora Method of eight mindfulness practices to overcome fear and self-centeredness and become free of pain, resentment, and burnout, this book includes tips for strengthening one’s connections with others and finding inner peace. There’s advice for setting boundaries and surmounting negative thoughts too. Its tone is casual and conversational, with unadorned prose and short sentences.
Tough topics, including suicidal ideation, mental illness, and drug addiction are handled in a direct manner. Further, much is couched in terms of the central conceits of metaphorical storms versus clear skies. Even the chapters are titled accordingly, as with “Harnessing the Winds of Change” and “Living in Your Clear Sky.”
The foundations of the Aurora Method are personal, attributed to Doyle’s emergence from her childhood traumas. Thus, the first third of the book is devoted to her story and is paced in a manner designed to hold attention: One chapter ends with a head-on collision with a sports utility vehicle, generating interest in what’s to come. Dramatic pronouncements abound, as of Doyle not seeing the turbulent skies ahead or about her life unraveling.
But the nuances of the book’s personal anecdotes are often flattened in service of its didacticism. Indeed, Doyle’s stories are meant to convey lessons about standing up for oneself, steeling oneself for life’s vicissitudes, and grieving losses, and all is written with an eye toward supporting those takeaways. Still, the personal stories evince persuasive candor on topics including disappointment, failure, and relationship woes.
The book’s outward-facing guidance is less illuminating. Indeed, it fast falls into a repetitive pattern. Within it, bold text is used to highlight particular points, illustrative graphics arise, and bullet-point lists are used, but many of these elements are not fresh. For instance, space is devoted to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, which is covered in dutiful terms, evocative of a textbook. Elsewhere, the book defines the etymological provenance of the term “resentment.” Such moments do not often help to elucidate its own points. Indeed, as it continues, the book’s stacks of lists, exercises, and challenges become stultifying.
While some distinguishing insights about self-assessments, connections, and emotional healing are proffered, and while the related advice is applicable to everyday life, the book’s guidance is undermined by its overattentiveness to the audience, as with its regular interjections to take a break or not skip a step. Clichés about taking the long view in life round the book out—a hope-filled ending for those facing troubled times.
An affirming self-help book, Life Storms is about navigating tough times and seeking a calmer future.
Reviewed by
Joseph S. Pete
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
