Not long ago I received a free review copy of The Life Ready Woman by Shaunti Feldhahn and Robert Lewis. I had previously appreciated Feldhahn’s book For Parents Only, and though I wasn’t sure if her new book would pertain to my current life circumstances, I was curious enough about it to accept it for review.

(There’s also a giveaway at the end of this post so one of you can win a copy of The Life Ready Woman!)

What the publisher says:

Whether a stay at home or an airplane-hopping executive, an empty-nester caring for multiple generations or a single juggling high demands of career and personal life, today’s fast-paced modern world leaves women gasping for balance. We as modern Christian women want to look to the Bible for guidance on how to manage our lives — but because the world of women looks so different today than it did when the Bible was written, it is hard to find chapter and verse that seems to apply to our situation today.

Thankfully, God has given us exactly that timeless, unchanging guidance for how to find peace, clarity, and God’s best for our lives once we know where to look! The Life Ready Woman: Thriving in a Do-It-All World, reveals a profound biblical roadmap for how each of us can find the abundant life we are longing for, rather than the stressful, torn, how-do-I-balance-it-all life we often feel like we are trying to keep up with today. Actually being a LifeReady Woman means that you are clear about your life, bold in your faith, and able to find God’s best for you, and the end result will be that you not only survive but thrive in our do-it-all world.

God has given every wonderfully unique woman different skills and abilities, different desires, and different temperaments — and every woman around the planet and through the ages is certainly living in different circumstances. But no matter what a woman’s life looks like, the Bible says that God has an individual mission and plan that He’s carefully designed for each of us. And He wants us to find it. Starting January 2011, The Life Ready Woman and the Life Ready Woman Video Series will help every wonderfully unique woman to thrive as she identifies and courageously pursues God’s unique design and callings for her. LifeReady Woman puts you on a roadmap to make decisions that will lead to relief, delight, and fulfillment instead of regret.

What I thought:

I recently exchanged emails with a high school friend. Both of us are now moms of young kids, but we went to a high school where everyone was encouraged to go out and “conquer the world.” We certainly got a good education, but we had to admit to ourselves that occasionally we now feel like being “just a mom” might not be enough. There’s a certain amount of lingering internal pressure we feel to do “more,” be “more,” conquer “more.” Even if we don’t know what that “more” is.

I know our struggle isn’t unique. In The Life Ready Woman, the authors talk about the many choices that are presented to women today. Work in the home or out of the home; have kids or don’t have kids; start a business or be “just a mom” — the options are endless! But with all those choices comes the necessity for discernment and wisdom. How can we know if we’re making the right choices, the God-honoring choices?

Feldhahn and Lewis provide a roadmap for Christian women, helping them to first grasp the big picture — answering questions like “Why are we humans here anyway?” — and then moving toward a personalized idea of what it looks like to live out God’s best for us. Along the way, they visit concepts such as:

• Understanding our core callings. Who are we as human beings? As women? As individuals? What does the Bible tell us about these various roles?
• Living from the inside out. Making decisions based on our core callings and beliefs, rather than pressures from our culture.
• Recognizing that our current season of life is just that — a season — and learning how to structure our priorities and life to please God in that season while preparing for upcoming seasons.
• Exercising wisdom in our interactions with men. Yes, we are women, but our relationships with men — boyfriends and husbands in particular — will deeply affect every area of our lives and it is crucial that we apply godly wisdom to these relationships.
• Using our individual gifts and passions to serve God and live life in a way that is truly fulfilling.

One thing I greatly appreciated in The Life Ready Woman is the authors’ reminder that “a choice for something is a choice against something else.” We simply can’t have it all, all at the same time. We make trade-offs when we make huge decisions like pursuing a high-power career or having a baby. But we also make those trade-offs every day, when we choose whether we’ll spend time with our kids or plop them in front of the TV while we chat for another hour on the phone.

The wise woman will carefully consider her season of life, examine what the Bible has to say about it, and make decisions based on following Scriptural principles that lead to an ultimately fulfilling life. It’s not necessarily easy, and it’s not going to look exactly the same in every woman’s life. But’s important to put in the time and energy and hard work to thinking through these life-altering concepts.

As for me, even though I’m not struggling with whether or not I should be pursuing a career, the book encouraged me to fully embrace my current season of life. I don’t have to conquer the world. It’s enough to work on being a good mom, and to watch for ways to use whatever gifts and passions I have to impact those around me in a positive way. And that’s “more” than enough.