I WROTE A NEW BOOK!!!

The Florence Given Show

Florence Given announces her fourth book, 'Who Does She Think She Is?', a manifesto focused on reclaiming female ambition and overcoming the

Key takeaways

• The new book explores how women use labels like 'problematic' or 'too much' to police each's growth and maintain social hierarchies.
• Florence identifies 'The Sisterhood Wound' as the phenomenon where women suppress their power to avoid triggering other women's insecurities.

Main topics

• Book Announcement
• The Sisterhood Wound

Notable quotes

The most generous thing a woman can do with her life is to become so good that it pisses other women off.

Conclusion

An empowering call to action that serves as a permission slip for wome

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) Holy shit. I can finally tell you. Speaker 1 (0:07) you that I have been secretly writing my fourth book. Speaker 1 (0:14) for the last year and it's called Who does she think she is? Speaker 1 (0:28) Okay. Wait, I need to compose myself. Those six words have haunted women forever. Who does she think she is? Who does she think she is being all that, doing all of that, taking up all that space? It's so inconsiderate. She needs to be humbled. She's too fucking much. Who does she think she is? I have literally lingered at the edge of those words my entire life as though it was an actual line that I was forbidden from crossing. Speaker 1 (1:02) Never letting myself be too happy, too clever, too intelligent, too smart, too hungry, too ambitious, too alive, too fucking free, too anything. Speaker 1 (1:18) Women are taught to be humble. We're taught that the most generous thing we can do Speaker 1 (1:25) is protect other women's insecurities. By refusing to outshine them and stay obediently behind that line that doesn't piss anyone off. But I'm calling bullshit. I'm done pretending that the most generous, selfless thing a woman can do is make herself smaller so that she doesn't intimidate other women with her light. The most generous thing a woman can do with her life is to become so good that it pisses other women off. Who does she think she is? It's the words that we use to tame one another. It's the words that we use when a woman is so fucking close to becoming free, to finally breaking the character that she has played her whole life. And we use it to yank a woman back down to the level that we preferred her at, where she was small, shrinking, and when she didn't trigger our insecurities. And I've spent the last year writing an entire book about what happens when you stop fearing those six words. Who does she think she is? And what starts to happen when you can enjoy making people say them? Speaker 1 (2:49) Okay, let's get into it. Speaker 1 (3:32) God. Speaker 1 (3:34) Guys, I had to play it cool on that intro. I am freaking out about the fact that I finally get to share this with you. I have been cooking up this philosophy and this book for an entire decade. So about a year ago, I started sharing my who does she think she is philosophy all over social media. And what you won't know. is that this philosophy is something I have been cooking up for a decade, okay? This was the first book idea that I ever took to my book agent at 19 years old. I met her for coffee in Soho in London and she said to me, what do you want to write a book about? And I told her, oh God, I told her, I want to write a book. that talks about the ways women hurt one another. The book that no woman wants to write. The book that I am terrified of writing. And I want to be the woman to write the book on that because I'm an expert at it. I'm an expert at navigating this. I knew that this was the book I was born to write at 19 years old. And so that idea ended up becoming instead a chapter in my first book. I just wrote one chapter in Women Don't Know You Pretty as an essay about. internalized misogyny, okay? It was like me sort of testing the waters. And to this day, that is the single most quoted chapter in that entire book. Speaker 1 (5:18) And then when I published my novel, that was almost, who does she think she is? Women Living Deliciously was almost, who does she think she is? And so a year ago... I felt it was time for me to start sharing this philosophy on social media. So I started posting videos talking about what if you wanted to make people say, who does she think she is? What if you stopped fearing those words? What if you expanded deliberately? Speaker 1 (5:51) into those parts of yourself that you know will trigger other women's insecurities right I started sharing this on social media a year ago And I said to my book agent at the time, I was like, I think it might be time culturally for who does she think she is, okay? Because every book that I have ever written was almost this one. And I never felt like it was the right time. And I got this feeling last year. I was like, I feel like it's time. Let me start testing out the idea online. Thank you. And so I started sharing it on Instagram and I gained 600,000 followers in the space of a few months just from sharing this fucking idea. Speaker 1 (6:35) And it went viral to say the least. People were even creating like AI courses, taking my ideas and having people pay to do a course on who does she think she is. People were repeating it in their videos. People were just, people were begging for more of this from me. It went fucking nuts. It went beyond in a way that I could not. contain this idea and even have ownership over the idea. And so when I started seeing people taking Who Does She Think She Is, using it in their own way, spreading like wildfire, I knew in that moment that I had to go quiet, that I had to stop sharing it online. Not because I was afraid or whatever. I don't like acting from scarcity, but I knew it was time for me to just fuck off and go write the book. I knew that it was time. for me to share this philosophy that has been marinating in me for a decade. This was the first book I ever wanted to write and I am so glad that I waited until I was 27 to write it. Because I did not have the medicine at 19 years old. All I had was this painful wound, this wound, this ache that I had with me for my entire life of wanting sisterhood and connection with other women, but feeling like it was always conditional on me remaining in my place, in me remaining small and in me remaining a version of myself that didn't surpass their insecurities. And that's the conversation that no one was having. Speaker 1 (8:17) But I'm fucking having it. And so you might have even started following me on social media because I started talking about this who does she think she is philosophy a year ago. And I just stopped talking about it. And maybe you even thought, why is she not talking about this anymore? I just literally dipped out of social media and got to fucking work on my manuscript. I just knew it was time to come away. And it's not because I stopped believing in the message. It's because I believed in it so much that I knew I had to go away and turn it. into this 13 chapter guide and manifesto to present it in its fullness to all of you. And you know what the funny thing is? This is the easiest book I have ever written in my life because it was already fully formed inside me. I have had this book marinating inside me through my lived experience and through a decade of writing now. And it literally fell out of me like soft butter. It just just came out. And that's what I've spent the last year secretly writing just to paint the picture. I submit all of my books normally at like 200,000 words. Okay. When Florence Given writes a book, it's a fucking Bible, right? The actual New Testament of the Bible. is like 160,000 words or something. The books that I submit are normally longer than the Bible. Okay. And so I'm so used to just blurting everything out and almost not trusting my voice when I write a book. And then my editor has to cut like half of that, kill all of my darlings, kill all of the things that I was so precious and attached to. And then I'm left with a book that's around a hundred thousand words long. And that's what I publish at. But with Who Does She Think She Is, my new book, I submitted this book at 50,000 words. And when I sent it to my editor, I spoke to my agent on the phone. I was like, babes, I submitted this book in at 50,000 words. Something's wrong. There must be something missing. And she was like, no, floss. I think you're just a better writer now. Speaker 1 (10:40) I submitted it at 50,000 words. And I think it's around, the finished book is around 70,000 words because then I went back and forth and edited it with her. But this book was already fully formed inside me. My only job in the creation of Who Does She Think She Is was sitting down every single day for the last year and writing it and pulling it out of me, pulling out all of it. And it was fucking hard because I've had to go to really. deep, painful parts of myself to write this book. Speaker 1 (11:14) But I just know that the universe needs this book because of how easy it was to write and because of all of the magic that has coincided with the release of this book. And because I tested it online a year ago, and I don't think that this messaging would have hit when I was 19. I'm not sure we were collectively ready for it. And I had this big intuition last year and I was fucking right. So I stopped talking about it. I went away. I got to work. And I have written the best book of my life. This is the book that I was born to write. Speaker 1 (11:51) Hands fucking down. This is the book I was born to write because this is my message. Speaker 1 (11:56) It's taken me a decade to really refine my voice. And this is it. Who does she think she is? This is mine. This is the best book I've ever written. And I can't believe it gets to be yours. Speaker 1 (12:13) Okay, so I'm going to tell you a bit about the book now. Do you understand how powerful I feel knowing that I have just written a book that is going to make women insufferably fucking confident? Speaker 1 (12:31) Insufferably fucking confident. Like this, anyone in your life that you think doesn't want the best for you, it's literally their worst nightmare that you pick up this book. Because this book is a permission slip for you to finally go full throttle and cross that line. You know the line, the line in your life that you don't allow yourself to cross. Because you know if you went all the way, it would piss people off. Speaker 1 (12:59) You're going to be unstoppable when you read this book, because even when you listen to me talk about this online, right, it's like that little temporary hit of motivation. But this book gets into the absolute cellular levels, like the tiny levels of what it actually looks like to take up space and hold it in your life, to become the kind of woman that other women say, who does she think she is about and fucking enjoy it. Because it's not a sign for you to stop. It's not a sign that you have done something wrong. It's a sign that you have finally shifted. Speaker 1 (13:38) If they're saying who does she think she is, it's because the changes that you are making