Anne Marie Miller

Category: Lean on Me

  • Shake the Dust :: Letting Go

    Sometimes things don’t go as planned.

    Things fail.

    Health.

    Friends.

    Love.

    School.

    Work.

    Expectations rise and fall.

    Rise.

    And fall. And fall.

    (and rise?)

    Someone says or does something (or perhaps nothing?) and it opens up scars from the past

    Scars that say you’re not good enough

    Or that you’re dumb

    Or not worth it

    Or too much…

    I’ll never forget the first time I heard Anis Mojgani perform Shake the Dust

    years and years and years ago.

    Recently, my fingers found a scar not quite healed

    and those voices

    those LIES

    came pouring down like gasoline on my open wound.

    Stop it.

    Stop it.

    Stop it.

    I said.

    Let it be.

    Let it go.

    Shake the Dust

    I heard it rattle in my mind.

    And I hope that no matter what voices you may hear,

    No matter who you are,

    What you do,

    What you look like,

    Or how broken you are,

    Shake the Dust. [watch the video below or if you don’t see one, click here…]

    ****

     

  • Why All The “Modesty Conversations” Miss The Point

    Last summer, the feeds in my various social media channels blew up with articles on modesty.

    How low is too low when it comes to necklines? One piece or two piece swimsuits (or, the generally-church-camp-approved tankini?) Spaghetti straps, tanks, or sleeveless? AND THE PLIGHT OF THE YOGA PANTS (oh, but it’s okay if your butt is covered!)

    And then articles followed on what Paul meant when he spoke of modesty (more of a financial context), how men (and women) are responsible for their thoughts and actions (pluck out your eye, sinner! it’s not my fault you can’t look at me without seeing me as an object!) and how culture plays into what we consider “modest” even means.

    The summer heat is upon us once again, as are all these conversations on modesty. In a mindless and brief skimming down my Facebook feed Sunday night, I’m fairly certain I saw more posts on modesty (and satirical ones at that) than I did the World Cup.

    (What has this country come to? Come on, y’all. It’s the World Cup!)

    The arguments were all the same, men and women pitted against the other team, one side crying “FREEDOM” and the other crying “RESPONSIBILITY!”

    …as if these two are mutually exclusive?

    This is not a post on whether or not your bikini will make Jesus mad or cause a man to lust after you. This is not a cultural dissection of contextual modesty. I’ve been to almost every continent and have seen completely covered and completely bare, depending on the culture. I understand how it works.

    This is a post on why most of the conversations I’ve read on modesty – regardless of the point someone is trying to make – are, in fact, well…missing the point.

    There is something more at stake than your clothing choices. 

    And that thing is community.

    It is another person, another flesh-on-spirit, imago dei.

    It is your family, your brother or sister given with a Holy being, intertwined with your own.

    ***

    BUT FREEDOM!

    Paul talks about freedom in Christ. A death on a cross gives us freedom to live. I hear cries of “I am not responsible if someone sins because of the way I am dressed!” And you are not. To a point. You do have freedom. And I think the greatest freedom is to choose to say no to your freedom for the sake of another person.

    We hear “Don’t dress to make a man like you. Don’t dress to make a woman like you. Dress to make you like you.”

    That, my friend, is not freedom.

    Let’s call it for what it is: entitlement. Many of us feel entitled to do what we want, to wear what we want, and to behave how we want to behave. Loving another is not about how we feel or even embracing our freedom.

    True freedom is laying down your life for another.

    There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. (John 15:3)

    ***

     

    BUT REALLY, PEOPLE ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR OWN THOUGHTS! I COULD WEAR A MUMU AND BE A “STUMBLING BLOCK!”

    Yes. People are accountable for their own actions. You could wear a mumu and someone may undress that mumu right off you. I am not minimizing the responsibility we all have for our decisions to act against what we know is true and right and lovely.

    “Well, if I walked into a McDonald’s and ate 70 Big Macs, I’m responsible for that, not McDonald’s.”

    You’re right. But McDonald’s was not created in the image of God.

    You were. And so is your neighbor.

    We say someone else should take responsibility to not sin & we have freedom to do as we please. True. But let’s take this a step further. 

    Maybe we should take responsibility for another so they can have freedom instead of struggle.

    The truth is we are responsible for one another. We are not to judge or criticize people for thinking or acting differently than we do where there is freedom, but we are also to encourage others to be holy, not condemn them to it.

    There is not love in telling a man or woman to suck it up and deal with their lust problem so we can dress how we please.

    ***

    There is a picture here larger than the conversation of modesty. We are believers warring against each other under the name of freedom and waving the flags of entitlement. This idea can be copied and pasted over so many areas – alcohol, food, fill-in-the-blank.

    My fear is we get so wrapped up in our freedom that we can’t show love – true, sacrificial love – for each other.

    And when the world reads our passionate war words, they don’t see the love of Christ we are to love each other with, which is what our ultimate charge is.

    “Owe nothing to anyone—except for your obligation to love one another. If you love your neighbor, you will fulfill the requirements of God’s law” (Romans 13:8)

  • Surrender and Self-Sufficiency in the Church

    When I was nineteen years old, my grandfather was in his final hours of life after a long fight with cancer. He called each of his grandchildren into his room one at a time. I leaned over his fragile frame in order to hear the last words he would ever speak to me. He didn’t have the strength to open his eyes and could barely whisper the six words he spoke.

    “Never give up on church.”

    I told him I wouldn’t. But in order to keep my promise, I’d need to start making some significant changes in my life…like, actually going to church again. I had been out for a good three years, since my father left the ministry in a bloody battle of a business meeting.

    Over time and with conviction, I slowly let my walls down and tried to make good on my pledge to my grandfather. My actions stemmed more from wanting to keep my promise than actually being obedient to what God wanted, but eventually my change of behavior caused a change in my heart and I fell in love with the church in all of her magnificence and her flaws.

    I surrendered, slowly and timidly, to the call of unity God has placed on all His children. Surrender doesn’t come easily, especially when we’ve been hurt in the past. When we think about giving into something we used to push away from us, we’re met with an internal resistance. It’s easy to justify our actions that keep us walking the line between self-sufficiency and surrender.

    photo credit: Môsieur J. [version 9.1] via photopin cc

    As I’ve spent time talking to other Christians, and some who have even—in their own words—“left the faith,” or “left the church,” I’ve noticed a pattern so common it’s become perfectly acceptable without question. Someone enters into a relationship with a community of faith, and the programs or the legalism or the perceived lack of authenticity turns them away. It’s either too structured to have “organic” community (which is not a Biblical concept, by the way) or it’s so “organic” that relationships never grow because we don’t know how to grow them.  So we bail.

    I have a friend who’s an atheist but who stays in tune to what’s happening in different faiths. As he looked at the western Christian culture, it was easy for him to see the things that divide us. He bluntly asked me, “How can everyone in your faith be so divided yet claim to follow the same God?”

    Good question.

    I truly believe this break in our unity is a strategic plan of the enemy.

    Many Christians today have fallen into a culture that tells us we have the right to believe whatever we want to believe and are entitled to be right in our beliefs. And because of the surplus of platforms from which we can speak, never before our generation has a group of people been able to voice their beliefs so loud and clear.

    Some see this as progress. I see it as subtle (and at times, not so subtle) expressions of selfishness. Where in our proclamations and defenses of our personal beliefs do we find humility? Where do we find surrender?

    We don’t.

    In order to have healthy relationships with God and others, we must surrender. To God, we surrender our desire to live our lives for ourselves. Only by dying to ourselves—our human nature—can we truly live in the identity of who God created us to be. In order to embrace the person we are meant to be, we must let go of the person, the ego, we created.

    With others, we surrender our need to be right. We surrender our need to be heard. We trust in the paradox of finding peace in serving instead of demanding to be served and complaining about it when we aren’t.

    Surrender goes against our very nature to be independent. Surrender indicates we willingly choose to rely on others. We must rewire our thinking to recognize that needing another person (and being the person someone else needs) is not a weakness; it only strengthens us.

    ***

    (Most of this post was excerpted from my new book “Lean on Me: Finding Intentional, Vulnerable and Consistent Community.” It comes out this fall, but you can get a few free sample chapters here or preorder the book here.)

     

     

  • Get Free Sample Chapters from My New Book Lean on Me!

    They say timing is everything, right? Well, today was the day I hoped to have some free sample chapters of my new book Lean on Me (it comes out in October) for you.

    I’m speaking over at the (in)RL conference this weekend (Saturday, specifically) and sharing a bit of the story behind Lean on Me.

    However, (wah-wah!) the samples won’t be ready for another couple weeks or so (I’m sorry!) but…

    I’d love to send them to you as a free PDF as soon as I get my grubby little hands on them.

    How do you get them? Easy, peasy. Put your email address in the little form below (if you don’t see a form and you’re reading this from an email, just click here!) and viola!

    Sign up here! Quick!


     

    You can find out more about the book (and pre-order it if you’re feeling sassy) here or you can read the little nugget below.

    Lean on Me by Anne Marie Miller

     

    Have you ever found yourself in what feels like your darkest hour desperately seeking a lifeline?

    Life has a way of throwing unexpected obstacles in our path, tripping us up, and bringing us to our knees. When these crises hit, who do you call? Who do you lean on? Anne Marie Miller found herself in one of these valleys on the floor of a hotel bathroom while on a business trip. Months of stress accumulated and took its toll. In a moment of desperation, she picked up the phone and called a friend for guidance. That simple phone call was the first step in a transforming journey of evaluating what community truly meant and looked like in her life.

    We live in a world and a generation where the word “community” is often discussed. But how genuine and authentic are your relationships really? Anne Marie noticed an important tension all of us must recognize in order to have life-giving friendships: “We desperately want to belong yet at the same time, we yearn for independence.”

    In Lean On Me, Anne Marie Miller takes us along as she sets out to dig below the superficial and explore what choices are necessary to find intentional, vulnerable, and consistent community. Jesus was passionate about truth-speaking relationships. And with Anne Marie’s narrative and practical insights interwoven together, you will feel more equipped in your quest for these types of relationships as you seek people to lean on and as you pour love into those around you.

    Have a great weekend!

    Anne Marie Miller

     

  • We Saw Them Become Orphans

    It was our fourth time to Africa, but our first time to go as a pair.

    Tim was hired by The Alliance for Children Everywhere to write some scripts, shoot some video, and edit it for a curriculum churches and schools will use back in the states that will help raise awareness and funds for their work in Zambia.

    What does ACE do? Rescue children who would otherwise die. That’s what their website says, point-blank. They do a lot more than that, but that’s a pretty big first step.

    About a week before the trip, I learned we’d be staying in The House of Moses, the rescue center for babies who’ve been orphaned or abandoned. I knew instantly I would fight the duality between loving that we got to stay there (because who doesn’t like to play with a room full of babies and toddlers?) and the reality that I would want to do so much more than stay there and play. I’d battle that instinct most of us have to want to make everything right, even things that are well beyond our grasp.

    House of Moses

    We were told it was likely we would see people dropping off abandoned babies. The house was small. We could be having dinner at the table (which is right next to the front door) and someone could come in with a baby that was found in a latrine. It wouldn’t be the first time that’s happened there.

    For the most part, our time there was pretty low-key. Some babies got dropped off, and one who was adopted went home. A mother who was in the process of adopting one of the children would come at dinner time most nights. It was clear these babies had hope and a future.

    Our last week, The House of Moses received 3 siblings. A toddler and newborn twins – a boy and a girl. The twins were only 3 weeks old and were only slightly larger than my hand. We learned their father died of HIV and their mother was in the hospital sick, likely because of HIV too. The twins stayed in the intake room, a quieter space with three cribs and 24/7 care.

    Once they were sure the twins were healthy, we were welcome to hold them any time we wanted. Now, I’m one of those people who have an irrational fear of dropping newborns, but after a day or two, I pushed through and picked up the little boy. His name? Gift.

    House of Moses

    Days went by and I found myself in the intake room with the twins more and more. If I was sitting in the front room reading and one started crying, I could look down at my watch and see it was time for them to be fed. Some kind of maternal instincts of mine were awakened. I was no longer afraid. I could comfort them if they cried or get a nurse if they needed milk…all while praying their mother survived.

    One morning, I went into the room and rubbed on their thin hands in just before we left. We returned from a full day of filming and we were told the mother passed away. In just a few short hours, these babies lost their mamma.

    I went in to the intake room fighting tears, and one of the caregivers was feeding the little girl.

    “The mother died,” she told me.

    I reached down to put my finger in Gift’s small hand. “I heard.”

    It was a raw and surreal moment, looking down at Gift and knowing he won’t remember his mother. I wondered what would happen to him, his twin sister, and their older sibling.  I started to cry.

    I moved down and knelt on the floor in front of the caregiver and gently rubbed the back of Gift’s sister’s leg. “How do you do it?” I asked the caregiver. “How do you work all the hours you work and see so many babies lose their parents. The parents die. Sometimes even the babies die. But you’re here and you have so much peace and hope in your eyes.”

    Without hesitation and without a single tone of harshness or pride, she simply said, “Obedience and sacrifice. That is what God has told me to do and so I do it.”

    I literally couldn’t say anything back; my throat swelled and closed like I was allergic to the emotion that was filling it. Instinctually, the caregiver knew and said, “They will have a good family one day. It’s hard now, but God promises to take care of them.”

    I know she’s right and ultimately God will take care of them. But what do I do? What do we do? Where is our sacrifice and obedience?

    IMG_2567

    I’m tempted to think big acts equal big sacrifice, but I’m beginning to believe that – except for the one big sacrifice that was truly the greatest – the opposite is true. What if it’s the everyday things that are hidden that are the greatest sacrifices of all? Making sure people have love, food, and that they know Jesus.

    Maybe it’s as simple – and as unglamorous – as that.

    And even though may be unglamorous, it doesn’t mean it’s not beautiful.

    In fact, I’d dare to say the things we don’t see are the most beautiful things of all.

     

  • When Joy is Hard to Come By

    I’m a little late in the game (no pun intended).

    My husband and I just started watching Friday Night Lights. For the longest time, I refused to lay eyes on the show. I grew up in West Texas, and the Odessa Permian Panthers (the Dillon Panthers in the show) were probably our biggest rival. My sophomore year, at a basketball game, as I was going up for a lay up, a very fast Panther power forward threw her arm into my back and slammed me into a cinderblock wall which messed my knee up badly enough I had to go to physical therapy for a year and couldn’t play basketball competitively anymore. Not watching Friday Night Lights was my boycott, my personal commitment to not give anything Panther related a second of my time.

    But then we started. And you guys, if you haven’t watched Friday Night Lights and you have Amazon Prime or Netflix, just go. Take a six-week leave of absence and dive in.

    Friday Night LIghts

    Enough of that.

    (But really, go watch it).

    Last night, one of the characters (the QB1, or starting quarter back), Matt, had a really bad day. I won’t go into it all, but everything that could possibly go wrong, did. I think we’ve all had days like that. You maybe don’t feel the best, you get the phone call that something bad has happened, you don’t get any sleep, you were so late for church you ended up staying home, you drop everything on the floor, you lose your keys, a friend isn’t responding to you, your dog is sick, you feel like you’re a fake at your work, you take it all out on your spouse with angry crossed arms and irrational accusations.

    If that isn’t you, I can assure you that the things I just described happened to me in the last three days.

    Please don’t hear that as a pity party. I had my pity party. I’m okay.

    But you are not alone when you’re so stressed, you want to change your name and move to Malaysia.

    My mini-crises ended up with my husband loving me so beyond what I deserved, that my façade of toughness and meanness broke. Tears spilled out with words of my perceived truth. And I use the phrase “my perceived truth” because once I actually spoke my fears, my hurts, and what the voices in my head were telling me, I started to see them as the lies they were. And if I didn’t see something as a lie, Tim was there to gently direct me back to find truth again.

    I was lucky. I haven’t had someone with me every time I’ve found myself so far away from joy, but in the last few years, I’ve learned something about when this happens.

    • Don’t ever drink more than a couple of glasses of wine
    • Talk to someone anyway

    The death of a brilliant actor looms over us all, a life cut too short by an addiction to something that brings a deep sense of peace. That’s why we escape. When we look in our faces and minds and spirits and hearts and we’re far away from the God who loves us and His truth, when the pain feels like a red-hot black hole inside our chest, we want to escape it. Some do it with needles, others run into the arms of a one-night stand. I’ve used alcohol and food and sleep to run away before.

    Photo by Vincepal

    In 2011, I was physically sick from my anxiety. I layed down on cool tiles of a hotel bathroom floor in Orlando at 3 am, finally finding the courage to reach out a couple hours later. A few weeks earlier, I asked a small group of people to be my friends. It sounds clunky and unsexy, but it’s one of the best decisions I made.

    Asking someone to be a friend is one thing. Telling them when you’re lost and hurting is another.

    Pushing through awkward words and my greatest fear of rejection, I reached out. I got help. I was a weighty, heavy, burdened and hurt girl and I needed to be carried. My friends carried me. I could lean on them.

    If you’re in that place today where you can tangibly feel the pain of lost joy searing you, or perhaps you’re so far beyond hurting that you’ve numbed yourself into apathy, please reach out.

    We worry that we’re going to be a burden to someone. Here’s the catch. Not one of us is a burden.

    Are the things we’re going through burdens? Maybe. But you, a person, are not a burden. You are flesh and blood and skin and bone and pain and hurt and yes, even joy. There is joy for you and you may have to fight through ten thousand armies of evil to see it again.

    But you don’t have to fight alone.

     

    ***

    Share this:

    [Tweet “When the pain feels like a red-hot black hole inside our chest, we want to escape it.”]

    [Tweet “Asking someone to be a friend is one thing. Telling them when you’re lost and hurting is another.”]

    [Tweet “We worry that we’re going to be a burden to someone. Here’s the catch. Not one of us is a burden.”]

    [Tweet “There is joy for you. You may have to fight through armies to see it. You don’t have to fight alone.”]

  • When God Isn’t In Control

    Late last week, I had conversations with two of my unofficial spiritual/career mentors. They’re unofficial because I’ve never asked them, but when we meet, their advice to me always weighs heavy on my decision-making.

    One was over coffee at downtown Franklin’s famous Meridee’s. I voiced my current struggles of feeling disjointed in my work: too many voices to manage (“Church Anne” … “Porn Fighting Anne” … “Community Anne”) and my poor decisions to jump into too many things at once. Oh, and the ever-present fears of being self-employed and helping contribute financially to the dreams and plans Tim and I feel God giving us.

    [Tweet “I feel afraid even though God’s never failed us. Not once. He has always provided.”]

    My mentor honestly called out the truth behind my insecurities, gave me clear direction, and left me inspired and encouraged to move forward.

    Then I went to sleep.

    Then I woke up with a combination of anxiety and peace (which, of course, I tweeted to the world).

    I texted a friend of mine asking her for prayer. Her kind words back to me glowed with Christ and His providence.

    Yesterday, as I sat around in my pajamas, slightly fuzzy-headed from flu medication, I caught myself worrying. I was looking at the realities of releasing two book projects this year and an internet platform that looks entirely different than it did five years ago, when I first started writing. How can I expect to earn a living doing this anymore?

    I count the stats, the numbers, and I inject them into a vein of self-worth.  Does it boost my spirits? No. It begins atrophying.

    And maybe it was because of the flu meds that my inhibitions were down and the brave me wasn’t afraid to speak. She came to the front of my mind’s conversation and said,

    [Tweet “”Hey, wait. None of your circumstances matter. This is all in God’s hands. Leave it there.””]

    For some reason, I did. And this morning, it’s still there…even though I’m still a little afraid. That’s the part of me who thinks God isn’t in control.

    [Tweet “We must remember truth in its completeness: God is always in control. Always.”]

    Over coffee at Meridee’s, my unofficial mentor said two things to me that are sustaining my disbelief. Maybe they’ll help you, too.

    If you’re feeling ill-equipped to do something because of your experience, remember this: Jesus and Paul spoke a lot about marriage, but neither one of them were married. And if you’re afraid to take that next step, to invest your time or money into something that God’s leading you to, remember this: the only person who didn’t see a return on his investment was the one who buried his treasure.

    Continue moving forward in whatever God has placed in your path. Maybe you need to be brave and rest. Or maybe it’s time to say, “God, I’m all in.” Perhaps the next right step is just you trusting God – completely.

    Whatever it is, know you’re not alone. There’s a girl in Tennessee who’s fighting to hear truth through all the jumbled up voices in her head right alongside you.

  • Three Things to Help Control Freaks Let Go

    Control has control on me.

    It’s my thorn, my biggest enemy, my closest friend.

    I’ve been out of control a few times in my life…

    • The many times we moved when I was growing up
    • When a youth pastor sexually abused me
    • When a tornado hit my house
    • When a car I was driving had a bad tire and sent me spinning down a 150 foot embankment
    • When a person who said he’d love me forever changed his mind

    But really, aren’t we out of control all the time?

    Tim and I are in Sioux Falls. Our flight leaves in three hours. We get back to Nashville (assuming there are no delays, which again, is out of our control) at 9:30 tonight.

    Sioux Falls, South Dakota

    The girl watching our new little puppy called and texted while we were at lunch. The puppy got sick – take her to the vet sick and I am a self-proclaimed puppychondriac. I want to get home. Now. But I can’t. It’s out of my control..And it’s making me anxious.

    Countess Jasmine Miller

    Canines aside, earlier this morning, I spoke at a university and gave students an opportunity to sponsor a child through Compassion. Will they? Will one? Will 20? If nobody does, did I just let a bunch of kids down who need help? If 20 students do, will I wonder why it wasn’t 40? Or 100? It’s out of my control…and it’s making me anxious.

    Anne Marie Miller Compassion

    And it just snowballs…what happens if I don’t sell another book? What if nobody wants Mad Church Disease when it comes out in February next year? Or when Lean on Me publishes in October, what if it flops? What if I never get asked to speak again, or what if we can’t have children or adopt or…or…or…

    (Take a breath, take a breath.)

    I realize I’m not the only control freak out there.

    And I think there may be two types of us: Internal and external.

    Internal control freaks allow the “what ifs” to avalanche inside our spirits and distract us from the present, from the hope and faith we have.

    External control freaks project the anxiety on to others. If I was an external control freak, I’d be at the airport forcing the airline to put me on the next plane to Nashville and throwing a fit about it (yes, so I can go home to a puppy; I get it). I would have manipulated those students with Western guilt and twisted and turned my words so they would sponsor children.

    How do we release the anxiety we have when our illusion of control is broken?

    This is what I’m choosing to do today.

    • Talk about it: Thankfully, Tim is on this trip with me so he’s sitting right next to me while I type this and reminding me that God loves me, he loves me, and with both situations, I’ve done the best I can do. I talked to the vet and our puppy is getting checked out. I did my best presenting Compassion, and we know that some children’s lives will be forever changed because they got sponsored.
    • Reflect and Repeat: I am a super fan of the one-sentence prayers that are said over and over again. For when I’m anxious, it’s “He keeps in perfect peace whose mind stays on Him” (my rendition of Isaiah 26:3) The rest of the verse says “Because he trusts him.” I trust God. Period. He has never failed.
    • What’s Possible Now? My friend Gail has a saying when something doesn’t go as planned: “What does this make possible?” So, what does being in snowy South Dakota make possible while experiencing my anxiety and facing my control issues? I know I’m not the only one feeling this way. So, I can write about them. I can share what I’m learning with you. I can ask for your prayers. You can ask for mine.

    Any life interruption is rarely a pleasant thing. Especially when it involves things we deeply care about (children in need and my little puppy – clearly I care about them in different ways; Hey, I’m just being honest with you!)

    Control freaks of the world, let’s all take a breath. Share your concern. Pray. Do what you can. God cares about you and what’s important to you. Let’s loosen our collective grips and be present, now, fully and with trusting hearts.

    (Update: As I was typing this blog post, our dog sitter called and said our puppy was sick and was given some antibiotics, but it was nothing serious enough to put her in the hospital…you know, just in case you wanted to know :)).

  • Lean on Me: The Book Cover!

    Even though it won’t be shipping until October 2014, that doesn’t mean my team at Thomas Nelson isn’t hard at work getting ready for the big day. Today, we finalized the cover for the new book, Lean on Me: Finding Intentional, Committed and Consistent Community.

    Lean on Me by Anne Marie Miller

    The first question out of some peoples’ mouths is, “Wait, is this a chick book?” Pink flowers, girly font…come on, Miller. What are you thinking?”

    That was the same question I had as well when we reviewed the first round of book cover designs. Is the book a “chick book?” Not at all. However, the way books – well, my books – have been purchased, shared, and talked about, as well as some other demographics we’ve considered, a vast majority of them have been carried by women.

    Generally speaking, a man is online or in a book store and is browsing books. He most likely purchases a book written by another man…especially in the faith-based market. Women, however, buy from both genders and increasingly more from female authors. And men generally buy more electronic books than women, so a cover doesn’t really apply.

    Regardless of if or how or when you buy this book (I’ll let you know when it’s available for pre-ordering), I am thrilled  with this cover. Knowing the content of the book, the metaphor really captures the message.