Urban Worrier: Adventures in the Lost Art of Letting Go
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Review
'His is a spiritual journey as much as anything else . . . assisted by some bouncy writing, a sharp eye for detail and a slight earnestness you can't help but warm to' --Daily Mail
'His is a spiritual journey as much as anything else . . . assisted by some bouncy writing, a sharp eye for detail and a slight earnestness you can't help but warm to' --Daily Mail
'With a pitch-perfect turn of phrase, and the ability to make you laugh out loud . . . Thorpe's epiphany is profound and affecting . . . utterly life-affirming' --Scotsman
'Chronicles a breathtaking year' --Independent
'His is a spiritual journey as much as anything else . . . assisted by some bouncy writing, a sharp eye for detail and a slight earnestness you can't help but warm to' --Daily Mail
'With a pitch-perfect turn of phrase, and the ability to make you laugh out loud . . . Thorpe's epiphany is profound and affecting . . . utterly life-affirming' --Scotsman
'Chronicles a breathtaking year' --Independent
Product Description
Hunched exhausted at his computer one ordinary Monday morning, world-class workaholic Nick Thorpe has reached the end of his tether. Fearing for his health and family life, he knows something has to change. But where to start when trying too hard is part of the problem? Nick makes a bold resolution: he will spend a year learning to let go. Beginning with a plunge off a Cornish cliff, he soon graduates to wing-walking on a bi-plane, city-centre clowning and a revealing weekend at a naturist convention. But the more he tries to relax, the bigger the questions: can you be happy if you're not in control? Is true contentment all in the mind? And what does his small, brown dog know that Nick doesn't? From a school where pupils make the rules, to meditation and rafting in Sweden; from the chaos of a Durban street shelter to a silent monastery in New Mexico, URBAN WORRIER charts a humorous and often moving quest for the ultimate modern grail: how to find balance and fulfilment in today's high-speed world.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I'd loved Nick Thorpe's last book, Adrift in Caledonia, so when I spotted he'd been busy scribing again, I stuck in an order pdq. It took a day to get here and then I basically didn't leave the house for 48 hours. I was completely absorbed, drawn in by Nick's candid (but never self-indulgent)and very personal story of learning to let go - and it's not as easy as you think.
Nick's got tired with being tired, weary of 'carrying so much, controlling and marshalling it ever upwards'.
And so begins a year-long quest to find out whether there just might be another way to live. His journey takes him to Cornwall where he hurls himself (literally) into something called 'coasteering' which involves leaping off cliffs and into the sea below; an event called the No Mind festival in Sweden where he encounters other people also looking for ways to relax in a world gone mad including a really moving encounter with an alcoholic; a couple of days at a naturist camp in Cornwall (revealing in more ways than one), mixing with street kids in Durban and winding up at a monastry in New Mexico.
And in the midst of these and other adventures, is the very intimate story of how Nick and his family prepare to adopt a small boy for the first time.
Aong the way Nick asks the questions I guess most of us of wonder about in the crazy, unpredictable times we live in. Can you relax if you're not in control? What will happen if we learn to be really honest with the people in our lives? And how can an anxious guy learn to loosen up a little and let his hair down?
Nick explores these and other predicaments but his writing is never intense and there is plenty of humility and lovely, gentle humour along the way.
Sometimes, you come across a book that leaves an impression which you just know will be there for a while. For me, this is one of those books. In learning to die to a few things, Nick Thorpe has written a book that is full of life.
Nick's got tired with being tired, weary of 'carrying so much, controlling and marshalling it ever upwards'.
And so begins a year-long quest to find out whether there just might be another way to live. His journey takes him to Cornwall where he hurls himself (literally) into something called 'coasteering' which involves leaping off cliffs and into the sea below; an event called the No Mind festival in Sweden where he encounters other people also looking for ways to relax in a world gone mad including a really moving encounter with an alcoholic; a couple of days at a naturist camp in Cornwall (revealing in more ways than one), mixing with street kids in Durban and winding up at a monastry in New Mexico.
And in the midst of these and other adventures, is the very intimate story of how Nick and his family prepare to adopt a small boy for the first time.
Aong the way Nick asks the questions I guess most of us of wonder about in the crazy, unpredictable times we live in. Can you relax if you're not in control? What will happen if we learn to be really honest with the people in our lives? And how can an anxious guy learn to loosen up a little and let his hair down?
Nick explores these and other predicaments but his writing is never intense and there is plenty of humility and lovely, gentle humour along the way.
Sometimes, you come across a book that leaves an impression which you just know will be there for a while. For me, this is one of those books. In learning to die to a few things, Nick Thorpe has written a book that is full of life.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I have just finished reading this beautiful book. Not an easy thing to do considering that my eyes were brimming with tears through the final chapter.
It is a wonderfully revealing, enlightening and inspiring story, written with great honesty and humility. A travellers tale where you accompany the writer each step of the way and feel grateful that he had the boldness to go through experiences you would instinctively avoid.
The scale both of the outer and inner journey is remarkable: don't be deceived into thinking this is just another exploration of new age navel-gazing carried out with the sole purpose of producing another book: it is a genuine pilgrimage, the conclusion of which left this reader quite broken.
One of those rare books that I laid aside with the feeling "Having read that I will never be the same again".
It is a wonderfully revealing, enlightening and inspiring story, written with great honesty and humility. A travellers tale where you accompany the writer each step of the way and feel grateful that he had the boldness to go through experiences you would instinctively avoid.
The scale both of the outer and inner journey is remarkable: don't be deceived into thinking this is just another exploration of new age navel-gazing carried out with the sole purpose of producing another book: it is a genuine pilgrimage, the conclusion of which left this reader quite broken.
One of those rare books that I laid aside with the feeling "Having read that I will never be the same again".
Format:Paperback
I found this book hard to put down. So much to like, such an easy read, the feeling of being in the company of a genuinely decent guy trying to find a way through life when the current way just doesn't seem to work any more. And then trying a new tack, and that doesn't quite work either, so on to the next thing. So recognisable it makes you groan as well as laugh, proves that the more personal a story is, the more universal it can become. (I even recognised a marital argument.) The humour is great (including some laugh out loud bits) and the refreshing bloke-ishness and groundedness of it. The book brought back a familiar longing for something indefinable, spirituality, balance, fulfilment, whatever you call it and made me start the search all over again.
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