Run Towards The Danger: Book Review

 Run Towards The Danger

Written by Sarah Polley

This Canadian authored book is amazing! Basically she unravels a lot of her anger and anxiety about life experiences during her youth as a child actor and later as an adult experiencing a mystery condition. 

Sarah Polley tells those of us who remember The Road to Avonlea as a most delightful family television show on CBC, that the stories were delightful; but, getting them to the release stage for all of us to enjoy, was HELL for her. She talks about some of the behind the scenes mismanagement, disorganization, and lack of communication, on top of the pressures of some parents pushing their own anticipated glory ahead of the thoughts, concerns and feelings of the children. 

From the tv screen, she went to the stage at Stratford where she experienced personal challenges with anxiety and a lack of self confidence leading to ultimate stage fright. She desperately tried to hide those challenges to the point of getting very sick. It, too, became HELL for her and she had to stop prematurely.

She later found joy and personal satisfaction in film making and discovered her comfort level was being behind the scenes.

Later in the book she talks about her direct experience with a guy named Gian Ghomeshi — a name in the news during a terrible time in the lives of other women who had a similar story to tell. It is a moving and very emotional account of ‘should I or shouldn’t I” and her decision to do what she did, when she did.

The other of her six essays I want to highlight is the last one entitled “Run Towards The Danger”.  It is about the horrors of getting a concussion.  Initially she thought nothing of it, until she became an almost completely different person. She felt mixed up and messed up at the same time. Went to various specialists, many contradicting the others, all giving her conflicting advice, until one day, she was in the right place at the right time, and someone with a similar experience, guided her to a potential solution. The results were life changing and life enhancing, bringing her to a point she never imagined to ever be. She finds her spirit and embraces her being.  The best way to explain it is by saying don’t live backwards, live forwards.

I really enjoyed this book. It took blunt honesty to pull her from dark waters and a gloomy attitude, to get her to her happy place.  We can all learn a lot from her journey from Avonlea to blissful glee!