Lift

How Women Can Reclaim Their Physical Power and Transform Their Lives

By: Anne Marie Chaker

Narrated by: Anne Marie Chaker

From a professional bodybuilder and longtime Wall Street Journal reporter, a manifesto on how women can radically change their lives by tapping into their innate physical power

When Wall Street Journal reporter Anne Marie Chaker discovered bodybuilding as a hobby in midlife, she was recovering from a series of traumas, including postpartum depression, the end of her marriage, and the sudden death of her father. By throwing herself into strength training and stretching her body beyond what she imagined to be its limits, she began to regain confidence. Slowly, she challenged the deeply entrenched body insecurities she realized she’d long held, and her life changed in ways she never could have imagined.

In Lift, Chaker explores the forces that have led generations of women to internalize the message that they should make themselves smaller and explains why, instead, building muscle not only creates long lasting health, but also empowers us. Along the way, she highlights research that dismantles the conventional story of women’s bodies. As Chaker argues, strength training can help women find true power and confidence that goes far beyond how we look: it can dramatically shift how we move through the world, reshape how we respond to setbacks, and transform how we see our value. And science shows that increasing muscle mass can help protect women’s bodies from the effects of aging. Most important, it rewrites the message we send the next generation once and for all and will help girls step into their power from a young age.

Bridging narrative storytelling with empowering and actionable takeaways, including advice on how to start a training program, Lift is a rallying cry and inspiring guide to help women to get stronger for life.

Excellent motivation for weight training for women!

I stumbled over this book and because I’d recently lost weight and know I need to build muscle because I’m …. <ahem>… “a woman over 40”, I decided to listen. I’m glad I did! Great motivation that has me seeking more information and planning a new fitness program for myself with the confidence that I had been missing. Not knowing where or how to start and not comfortable just going to a gym and asking for help, this has given me a roadmap to get started. I appreciate the information so much that I bought the hard copy book so I can easily refer to the diet and lifting instruction information included in the last few chapters! Great book for a beginner or, like me, someone returning to fitness after a long time who is doing something new.

great content, horrible reading

The author should have let someone else do the reading. The content is very good, but I can hardly understand what ahe is saying.

The information

I thought it was very informative I did like the food references she had. I have recommended it to my friends

Great book for women of any age, size, shape

TL:DR: Loved the book, HATED the narration.

LIFT was pretty fun to listen to, and as a middle-aged woman who has discovered her love for lifting and wished she had done so sooner, this was a pretty confirming listen. Informative, inspiring, positive. Wish women everywhere would listen and get inspired to be(come) strong and stand their ground.

Now the bad part: the narration. I believe the author herself narrated the audiobook, and I'm sorry to say this, but that wasn't a great idea. I wish someone along the way had told her to invest in a good narrator. There is hardly any emotion, inflection, emphasis in the narration and at some point I noticed how the narrator raises her tone OR keeps it flat towards every end of a sentence, which contributes greatly to the monotone reading style. Is everything a question? Is she too cool to add emotion? Set the book to 1.5x speed and try to focus on the content.

Great information and kept it simple

She gave details that we can relate to and use everyday. She kept it simple. Thanks for the information. I wish there was a PDF with the workouts and example meal plan she uses.