Submitted By: Anika Rahman
Profession/Background: Student And Overthinker
Book Title: Great Big Beautiful Life
Author: Emily Henry
Before Reading the Book:
I was stuck in a loop I didn’t know how to break.
From the outside, everything looked shiny—successful career, a Pinterest-worthy apartment, and a social media feed that could fool even my closest friends. But inside, I felt hollow. My days were a whirlwind of meetings, emails, and the constant pressure to “keep it all together.” Even joy felt like a performance.
I would often lie awake at night with a quiet ache in my chest. I couldn’t name it at the time, but I know now it was the weight of living a life that wasn’t entirely mine. I had created a version of myself to meet the expectations of others—and somewhere along the way, I had lost touch with the wild, soft-hearted girl who used to dream about living a life full of art, risk, and messy, uncurated beauty.
Then came this book.
Discovering the Book That Changed Everything:
I stumbled upon “Great Big Beautiful Life” in the most ordinary way—scrolling through a friend’s Instagram story. She’d posted a photo of a dog-eared page with a caption that simply read: “This book cracked me open.”
Curious, I looked it up. I had read Emily Henry before and loved her voice, but this title was different. The name alone tugged at something deep in me. “Great Big Beautiful Life“—I didn’t realize until then how much I had stopped believing in the possibility of beauty in the everyday.
I ordered the book immediately. When it arrived, I set it on my nightstand, intending to flip through a few pages before bed. I didn’t sleep that night.
After the Book:
This book didn’t just speak to me—it saw me.
Emily Henry writes with a disarming honesty that feels like a friend sitting beside you, telling you it’s okay to be tired, to be unsure, to be real. Her reflections on grief, joy, fear, and forgiveness were like mirrors. I found pieces of myself in every chapter. And for the first time in years, I felt like someone understood the contradictions that lived inside me.
It wasn’t a self-help book. It didn’t tell me how to fix my life. Instead, it invited me to feel it. To stop numbing and rushing and curating. To come back home to myself.
I laughed out loud. I cried. I underlined entire paragraphs. I started carrying the book around with me like a compass. It became a quiet companion on walks, during coffee breaks, and in those fragile early morning hours when doubt felt the loudest.
The Transformation:
After finishing “Great Big Beautiful Life“, something shifted. Not in a dramatic “quit my job and moved to Italy” kind of way (though I did consider it), but in a slower, deeper sense.
I began asking different questions. Instead of “How can I be more productive?” I started asking, “What do I actually need right now?”
Instead of “How will this look to others?” I asked, “Is this true for me?”
I let go of a few things—relationships that drained me, routines that no longer served me, and the constant striving for some imagined version of ‘enough.’
I picked up others—morning journaling, walking without a destination, letting myself paint again even though I wasn’t “good” at it.
Professionally, I started leading with vulnerability instead of always pretending to have the answers. It changed the way I showed up for my team. People responded. We started having more honest conversations, not just about work but about life—and how the two are never really separate.
This book helped me remember that life isn’t meant to be perfectly staged. It’s meant to be lived—in all its messiness, beauty, heartbreak, and hope.
My Favorite Line & How It Helps Me Every Day:
“Maybe the point isn’t to make sense of it all, but to be astonished that we’re here at all—and to stay awake to that miracle.”
I return to this line often—on days when everything feels too much, when deadlines loom, or when I forget why I started creating in the first place.
It reminds me to zoom out. To remember that we’re all just passing through this one wild, strange life. That even the hard moments are part of something bigger—and often, something beautiful.
It gives me permission to stop trying to control the narrative and instead feel it. To be present. To be amazed. To be alive.
To Anyone Considering This Book:
Read it slowly. Or all in one sitting. Read it when your heart feels heavy or when you’re standing at the edge of a new beginning. Read it when you’re questioning everything, or when you just need someone to tell you that it’s okay to be exactly where you are.
“Great Big Beautiful Life” isn’t a roadmap—it’s a lantern. It won’t tell you where to go, but it will light up the next few steps. And sometimes, that’s all we need.
So if you’ve been feeling lost, worn out, or simply longing for something more honest and tender in the way you live—this book might just change everything for you too.