WE'VE GOT TO STOP MEETING LIKE THIS

A wife and mother with a career in finance recounts turning to yoga when her life began to fall apart in this debut memoir.

In the opening of her book, Ferris describes her husband, Jim, waking her to watch the sunrise with their children on New Year’s Day. The author, a successful financial saleswoman with a condo on the Jersey shore, had what appeared to many to be a perfect existence. Yet Ferris acknowledges that she had a “spiritual hole” in her life left by the death of her preacher father some 30 years ago. Her marriage also was strained, a result of “years of misconnection.” When a friend suggested a yoga retreat in the Berkshires, the author was skeptical, anxious that all the attendees would be “thinner and hipper” than she was and that reiki and crystal yoga classes were a little “woo woo” for her tastes. Yet during one yoga session, Ferris experienced an “in-and-out-of-body experience” that made her rethink her preconceptions. The author’s life was then thrown into turmoil when she discovered her husband had been cheating on her. The memoir charts Ferris’ facing divorce proceedings, coping with parenthood, reentering the dating world, and coming to terms with the verbal and physical abuse she had faced as a child at the hands of her mother. The book is also about finding new love, dealing with loss, and recognizing the many ways the universe reconnects people to those with whom they share a bond. Ferris recalls her spiritual journey, including entering yoga teacher training, in her quest for inner peace.

The author has a keen descriptive eye that allows her to vividly capture her heightening sense of awareness: “When she cued us to stand in mountain pose, my gaze drifted outside. The sun was rising. Large feathery flakes fell through treebranch veins. It was mesmerizing. Had snow always looked like this?” But her writing rarely lingers on the abstract and can be cutting when necessary: “Her spicy perfume gave me an instant headache.” The frank memoir adopts a thoughtful four-part structure––opening with Avidya, the Sanskrit word for Ignorance, and moving through Bhakti (Love), Duhkha (Pain), and, finally, Shanti (Peace) to represent Ferris’ odyssey. She cleverly opens and closes the book with a sunrise, encouraging readers to reflect on how the significance of the event changed through the passage of time and experience. The volume often includes flashbacks to the author’s childhood, such as observing her father at the pulpit as a 4-year-old girl. These passages are too short, and the shift between past and present can feel unnecessarily erratic and distracting. Yet this minor flaw does not largely detract from a well-crafted memoir that shares pithy wisdom about yoga that sticks in the mind: “If we want to make changes in our lives, the mat is the place to practice. It is where transformation begins.” Written from the perspective of a former reiki skeptic, Ferris’ journey is an enlightening one that may offer hope and inspiration to those facing similar challenges.

A sharp, stirring account with emotionally and spiritually informative writing.