'Dancing With The Mask'
by Sue Plumtree
About the Book: Synopsis
This book is a journey of personal discovery shared at a deeply intimate level. It explores the huge change I make in my core beliefs and the effects this has on my decisions and life choices. All choices have consequences and, as my journey unfolds, I begin to recognise the consequences of choices made long ago. I realise that, when I am clear about what really matters to me, the right choices are obvious and easier to make. Through my story I show how to create the life we long for.
This book will encourage you, the reader, to examine the role you play in the creation of your life and shows you how to transform your reality.
Book Reviews
Reviewed by John Mandry, 'The Friend'
Sue's autobiography is a two tales side-by-side, one external; one internal, amix the geographical and psychological.
The first part deals with her early life in the Argentine and the second with her life in the UK/USA/UK to date.
Her parents fled Central Europe in 1938 and spent 6 years in Bolivia where her parents wandered across the Chacos. In 1944 they moved to the Argentine where Sue was born in 1945.
Sue's parents had an overwhelming fear of getting too closely identified with either the children of Jews or the children of the Nazis who fled to the Argentine when the writing was on the wall. He continually impressed upon Sue of the need for an anodyne personality. Not only was she forbidden to identify with classmates or neighbours; she was also, albeit inadvertently, prevented from identifying with herself. Neutrality par excellence, deferring to others and reflecting what she thought they expected to see.
The second part of Sue's story starts in 1965 at the age of 20 when she came to the UK having left school at 14 and taken courses in typing and English. Shortly after arriving she met and married Jim, her husband of 37 years. She supported him in his technical studies by doing various office jobs. On graduation he was "brain drained" to the USA.
Jim was made redundant and they moved back to the UK, variously in Hertfordshire and Gloucester with Sue doing secretarial work. In the 1970's both her parents moved to Gloucester and Sue remained in close contact with them and gives a moving account of her father's death.
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Her parents objected when she began a Further Education course in Human Resources. Jim, however, supported her in her studies. She went on to become an HR Manager and a Senior Sales person yet nothing she did produced the love she so longed for. Only when she met and started to work with Alan, her life coach, did she begin to unpick the bits of the Masks she wore and this work helped her to become her own woman.
Her day-by-day account of the mental/physical parting from her husband should make anybody who thinks that the break-up of a childless marriage is just inconvenient, think again. The physical pain of moving into a separate room in the marital home bursts through the printed page. With the aid of Alan and many friends she came through the other side of the black hole of life.
She has had the courage to write about what most of us only think. She has finally removed the Masks she showed to others and, perhaps more importantly, the ones she showed to herself and become the woman she is today.
What they say
Reader's letter
"Thank you for writing "Dancing with the Mask". The impression it has left is deep and strong. You write with honesty and love, and trace with understanding the path you have travelled to reach your present strength. People will be helped through your book. Your example shows both courage and humility." Alathea B
"I was moved and enthralled by the book. I felt empowered to look at certain aspects of my own behaviour and relationships. I cried and I laughed, and I found myself thinking about what I had read for days afterwards."
Dinah L
"There was so much of myself I recognised. It was as if someone had switched the light on and sighed "Finally, you see what you have been doing and it's now time to stop."
Yvonne B
"This book is extremely generous - open, honest and filled with treasures, signposts and delight. It touched my heart and inspired me. It shows what is possible and it shows how change can come about even in the most difficult situations."
Jane L
"I identified with a lot of the emotions and fears expressed."
Annette S
