Review of “Doubt Your Doubts” by Rachell Kitchen

Score: 93/100 (9.3 out of 10)

“Doubt Your Doubts” by Rachell Kitchen was a joy and a pleasure to read! In the realm of self-help books for women, this one definitely stands out as interesting and unique. It's a much-needed kick in the butt to all us self-defeatists!

Author Rachell (“Rah-shell”) Kitchen symbolically takes on “Rachel,” her “gremlin” or inner self-doubter, as an example to women everywhere about their own little self-doubt monsters. There may have been a better explanation for Rachel somewhere in this text, but the one we remember and found most amusing is that the mispronunciation came to being from the author's uncle believing that his sister couldn't spell. This profoundly affected the author because she had gotten the message early in life that even a loved one wouldn't make the effort to pronounce her name correctly. By extension, this also affected her sense of self-worth and her overall self-impression along with insistence from her society that prettier, taller, skinnier, fairer-skinned, straighter-haired, wealthier women (and men) had an advantage over her. These ideas continue to be perpetuated by society and play in the minds of women—young and old—throughout America and the world.

There are also parts of this book that are either intentionally or unintentionally funny like when someone internalizes their neighbor continually saying, “Don't ride your boney, ugly ass past my house” like a Melissa McCarthy movie. What's amazing is that we can actually relate to things like this, look at our own situation/experiences, and laugh at them, realizing how ridiculous it is that we take things like this personally (and internalize them) on a daily basis. We develop a self-impression (ex. “I'm an athletic person” or “I'm a smart person”) based on the things people said or something that happened 20+ years age (ex. failing a math test) even though we have an opportunity to improve ourselves and realize a higher potential now. What a kick in the butt!

We'll just add that this negativity is not exclusive to women, as we saw in our review of “The 21st Century Man” by Dr. Judson Brandeis, but that women may be more vulnerable and susceptible to it. We also wanted to add that men can take away just as much from this book as women can, meaning that men can read this and not only be better able to understand/help a wife, sister, or mother, but even help themselves!

The truth is, we all have our little self-doubt monsters playing in our heads—some louder and more persistent than others. The key is acknowledging it and dealing with it. This book is a master class in just that from a masterful coach with years of personal experience as well as experience with clients.

Just about all of the stories here (some from the author and others from contributors) just tug on your heartstrings. So many of us can relate to the feeling of being overwhelmed, being broke, being talked down to, being forgotten, being insulted, or even feeling like giving up entirely. But these stories aren't told as just a point of interest, they are case studies from which we can learn and/or draw inspiration from. Without a doubt is a story that involves a person who'd considered taking their own life when they were jobless, foodless, and apparently hopeless. However, they received a kick in the butt from the voice in their head that said, “What is the matter with you? You’re better than this! Get your ass up NOW!”

For everyone who needs to motivational kick in the butt:
Get this book today!