REVIEW: Faith Elicia — Do You See What I See? (BOOK)
Faith Elicia brings genuine expertise, an empathetic touch, and a unique twist on the typical self-help focal point cruxes with the release of her new book, Do You See What I See? The latter trait mentioned is arguably the most important in Elicia’s presentational qualities. Rather than making the book mutually exclusive to territories relating to her informed experience, or letting the pendulum swing in the opposite direction — she opts for conversational. The entire structure of the read is an exercise in subjective empathy, by way of Elicia confronting a universal issue: eating disorders.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: https://www.faithelicia.com/
After this initial highlighting of the disease, she wisely proceeds to break the subsequent analyses into two distinctive camps: personalized examples of her methodologies and long-term habits in action, and then bullet points and challenges for you — the reader — to contrast them to. It’s this swinging between two very intensive, polar opposites that makes Elicia hit the jackpot on originality. It’s a pivotal wrinkle in the otherwise fairly uniform field of self-help as a whole, where often personalities occasionally boosted to marquee names take center stage on issues that should be geared towards the consumer. “…internal baggage manifests itself physically because the underlying feelings have to be dealt with and released,” Elicia writes. “The resulting anxiety makes (one) want to exercise to rid of it and restrict (one’s) eating. The worst part is nothing gets better after giving in to (ED)’s demands other than more self- criticism.” She goes on to elaborate, “It becomes a revolving door of thoughts/behaviors/self-punishment. The question remains: Who, other than myself, tells me I don’t deserve anything?
My therapist and I spoke about whether my feelings match my rational thoughts. They don’t. They actually conflict, which results in agitation. She suggested I journal since I have difficulty sharing with others. I end up stuffing all week until our next visit or my session with my nutritionist.”
What stands out in Elicia’s own, autobiographical examples of the disorder is they aren’t glamorized, nor are they in any way leaving something to be desired. Often books on the subject presently fairly uniform and pedestrian analogies leaving the reader feeling well-versed in the descriptors provided but emotionally slack. By making everything so detailed, almost at times it would seem to a fault, Elicia’s book can appeal to its audience not only by way of its preventative measures but because those measures are presented with a very three-dimensional and very real emotive speaker. Of course, the other shoe that easily could drop here is Elicia’s decided sentimentality on the matter threatening to overwhelm the pure data attached to combatting the mental and physical aspects of the disorder. But she has too much style, and frankly too much hard-earned wisdom, to let that happen.
AMAZON: https://www.amazon.com/Do-You-See-What-Black/dp/1948989204
“The reality is, at some point, it’s too late. Look what happened to Sleeping Beauty,” Elicia writes towards the end of the book. “I’m grateful it wasn’t too late for me, and I sought help, twice in treatment, and currently with a therapist and nutritionist. In an earlier entry, I said I never wanted to go back to treatment. Well, I did. I’m imperfect and allowed to make mistakes.” She continues, “Hell, I make them every day. And guess what? The world hasn’t ended. My journey has given me more than I could have ever asked for. It’s given me ME! I’m on the PhD road to self-discovery, and it feels fantastic.”
Colin Jordan
