7 Minutes to Freedom by Natalya Androsova

Natayla Androsova is a writing coach with a clear goal in her mind. Her goals come across very beautifully when I read this. No, you won’t be able to read this book in 7 minutes, but serves a good purpose. It’s clear that she wants her readers and pupils become courageously authentic. Most of all, she wants us to be kinder to herselves. It dosen’t surprise me that she hosts writing retreats and writing groups. After reading this book, I can imagine her writing groups will be a lot of fun to take part in.

7 Minues to Freedom is a self-help book written by a professional writing coach. It’s a compilation of writing excerises and chapters that are meant to boost your writing productivity, and help you overcome many writing woes such as self-doubt, the inner critic and the much dreaded monster - the writer’s block.

The book is split into 19 sections and does a good job on getting you hyped straight away. The book opens with big quotes praising the author and this book and they go into detail on how the book helped them and will be able to help you.

There are many self-help books out there. Some are more helpful than others. Some are only designed so that authors can boast about their success and there are some individuals like this who have sadly taken credit for work others have done or have been clearly ghost-written. Thankfully this is not The Art Of A Deal. Out of all the self-help books out there, if you pick this one, you’ve made a nice choice.

It also dosen’t alienate or discriminate. The author dosen’t tell you you’re wrong. The book opens up and acknowledges many writing worries like the feeling of not being good enough, not being accepted or finding a voice. This book can encourage you to cast those fears aside.

As a writer, I would find some of the content in this book useful. It has advice that I’ve seen scattered about on Instagram and Tumblr pictures, and in other writing advice books, but what makes this book different to other writing books is that it dosen’t just focus on exercises, it focuses on meditations and takes a holistic approach to writing.

The book aims to inject confidence and takes a lot of things into account. Because of the holistic approach of the book, I can see this book being useful not just to writers, but to anybody who considers themselves to be a content creator.

The book is very well formatted with chapters, quotes, headings and designs. Everything is easy to look for and the prose is clear and crisp. It’s feels like a kind and nurturing teacher coming is guiding you every step of the way.

One of my favourite parts of the book is chapter four which is discovering our relationship with nature. There’s a lot of nature metaphors and simulies. The one that stood out the most were the mountain ones. In a digital climate and in the midst of a pandemic, it’s refreshing to see people falling in love with nature again. I think this chapter was the most strongest and relevant of the whole book.

Whilst I’ve been lucky not to suffer from a serious case of writer’s block. I’ve had burnouts before and they are not fun. I am grateful I got this book for free in exchange for an honest review. Even if I paid for the book, my thoughts would have been the same. I think this book will come very handy if I’m ever in a dark space in my mind or if the day comes when I am infected with the writer’s block. I believe that this book will help me beleive in myself and mak me pluck the courage to write again.