Customer Reviews

The Cinderella Complex: Women's Hidden Fear of Independence

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I am dissapointed at the previous reviewers who seem to have missed the subtle poignancy of this book. Above all else, this is a book about carving out a wholehearted, authentic existence. I am 23 years old and was not even born when these ideas were taking shape in Collette Dowling's head. However, they resonate with me in a way that no other book on "women's issues" has. I reread it often to vividly remind myself to hold nothing back--to throw myself into a rich and challenging life without insecurity, without fear, and without the need for anyone else, be it a parent, a lover, or an authority, to validate and lend importance to the things that drive me. Collette Dowling has articulated this idea in such an honest, poignant way, and I think that it's an important message for young women today, just as it was for the "baby boomers" of Dowling's own generation. Yeah, some of the slang is a bit outdated. But to focus on that is to overlook a truly unique and vitally important observation about how women can REALLY come into their own.

This is a book that will reveal to many women some fundamental and probably painful truths about themselves. The central theme is that some women, often the brightest, "best" at school, and from the more affluent homes, suffer from a "Cinderella complex". This is, as the name implies, the desire to be rescued by a "prince": to be whisked away from the frightening realities of living as an authentic adult. This phenomenon is the reason why so many seemingly independent women "lapse" into stereotypical roles as homemakers given the opportunity. This is not necessarily caused by sexist repression but rather women's basic fear of challenge. The childhood causes of this effect are discussed, but the emphasis of explanation is upon the conflicts this causes in adult women.

It is clear this book has been thoroughly researched, but to mention a slight criticism, this to an extent that I kept feeling many interesting threads of thought had been abandoned too quickly, to keep the length (and difficulty?) of the book down. A more serious criticism is that I, at least, was by the end of the book hankering for far more concrete positive suggestions as to what to do if we recognised this in ourselves. Perhaps it would have been bad faith on the writer's part to suggest easy solutions. What is provided is not only an exhaustive bibliography but readable end notes that point the way to a lot of interesting further reading.

In summary I'd say this book is a well-written discussion of a psychological complex whose importance for female psychology is hard to exaggerate. In its own way it confronts realities that the great works of feminist writing did not, namely the collusion of women in their own dependency. And, as the book says, there can be no progress if you don't actually confront the truth.

I have always considered myself a feminist. I have always struggled for independence, fighting a long history of abuse, PTSD, and a dual-diagnosis BPD/BP roller coaster. I've done a lot of self-exploration work, whether through seminars, books, independent study, reflection, or psychotherapy. This book opened up an entirely new thought process to me -- that of women's facade of independence. As I read this book, I saw more of myself than I would perhaps ever admit to anyone, friend or foe.

I've always been absolutely fascinated with the study of humanity and universal truths. This book confronted me head-on with yet another aspect of my "everything's fine" brand of denial. I'm still reeling.

I would recommend this book to anyone, male or female. I lent it to my ex-boyfriend as soon as I finished it. He, also, was enthralled. Mom is next on the library list for this book. Get yourself a copy. Or four.

The Dionysian political/spiritual/sexual liberation theology of the Woodstock/Vietnam/Civil Rights 1960's in America led to the full flowering of the political cynicism of the Nixon/Watergate 70's. The moralistic materialism of the Ronald Reagan/Wall Street 80's led to the Silicon Valley-influenced psychological spiritualism of the Clinton/Oprah 90's. Collete Dowling, the non-feminist feminist writer and intellectual pioneer, coming of age in the center of this four decade cultural transformation period of Post-World War II American culture (with its pendulum swinging of consciousness between political astuteness and spiritual awareness) wrote this book in 1981.

THE CINDERELLA COMPLEX is written from the central and centering vantage point of straight-ahead psychology; not politics or spirituality. It was designed for courageous women ready to reexamine their hearts and souls in the context of the true dynamics and hidden reasons for many of the dysfunctions and even existence of their most important interpersonal relationships. It is even more important now than when it was written.

Dowling in actuality was among the first to successfully teach the general public some of the basic ideas of psychology and their relevance to their world, in those changing times, in the context of what freedom and adulthood really means. As it turns out, her metaphor of the Cinderella Complex--the desire to search outside of oneself for the source of inner emotional malaise or turmoil, and to hold a "prince" of some kind accountable for both one's maturity and rescue from the secret pains of independence--is perfect for all people, men and women.

The Cinderella Complex, Dowling shows us, is the siamese twin of irony in life. It is the perfect nickname of the dynamic within people that creates fateful circumstances and negative, self-fulfilling prophecies in a person's life and relationships until its existence is acknowledged. And after it is acknowledged, it asserts itself in a person as an inner war--a psychological jihad--such that it makes the only war you know how to fight and win (i.e. a material-world or male/female relationships war outside of your inner self) irrelevant. Her writing and ideas, as she is saying nothing new yet saying it in such an important new way, sympathetically vibrate with many of the most basic tenets of Western religion. However, her non-religious, psychological perspective allows for a new level of inner healing. Even, if not especially, for those who, unrealizingly, have made a false idol/"prince" out of Moses, Jesus or Mohammed themselves, along with the living men in their personal lives. Anyone reading this, man or woman, will not just find themselves in it, either as they live now (as I did) or how they once was. You will see much of today's post-Clinton, Bush/Enron 21st Century American culture be revealed in its pages. And, you'll understand why the pleasure principle doesn't make people nearly as happy as many who use the Constitution to defend it want to believe. (And that goes even moreso for the conservative minded than the liberal, as both we pleasure seekers and our "drugs"--physical/chemical, moral/religious or intellectual/emotional--come in all shapes and sizes.) Even after the coming of John Bradshaw (HOMECOMING [The 90's "Inner Child" man]), Alice Miller (PRISONERS OF CHILDHOOD: THE DRAMA OF THE GIFTED CHILD; FOR YOUR OWN GOOD), Nancy Friday (MY MOTHER MY SELF; OUR LOOKS OUR LIVES; JEALOUSY), Iyanla Vanzant, Melody Beattie (CODEPENDENT NO MORE) and the litany of other self-help authors still writing, Collette Dowling's ideas are as fresh today as when this book was written more than twenty years ago.

THE CINDERELLA COMPLEX in fact towers above even some of the best work of the authors mentioned.

It shocks me that this book is not still in print, despite the dozens of books that have come in the years after it riffing on her clearly laid out themes. I bought myself a used copy through one seller in perfect condition. And then, considering how much it would have cost new if available now, I bought three more hardcover copies for special people in my life. This book is still among the best of the bridges out there; bridging people into the real potential of the real world, and their real self. It is the perfect Mother's Day/Father's Day, Birthday and Christmas gift, for people close enough to YOU to appreciate it.

I highly recommend this.

Every teen-age girl should read the book THE CINDERELLA COMPLEX. Author Collette Dowling delivers a strong argument as to why women, in spite of gains made through feminism, are mistakenly willing to let a man take care of them.

While THE CINDERELLA COMPLEX was written about 25 years ago, today, half of all married women do not work outside the home, instead depending on their husbands. With a 50% divorce rate, that's asking for trouble. More than ever, women need to read THE CINDERELLA COMPLEX.

My father left my mother after 36 years of marriage. My mom spent her life living very far-outside of her authenticity and inner experience. She was a mess when he left and the therapist she started seeing recommened this book as a part of their work together. I remember seeing it on the coffee table and listening to my mother discuss it with her friends. And so began a journey of self-discovery which sadly ended a few years later with a very early alzheimer's disease diagnosis ( which lasted nearly 20 years)...I will be forever grateful to Colette Dowling for having the courage to write this book and for impacting my mother's life.

ature made male and female. Why/ We know why--for the procreation of the species

Nature made male and female. Why? We know why--for the procreation of the species and the enabling of love for one another. We also know that in order to bring up our children properly--ther has to be a certain amount of years that married couples will devote their time to raising their children. Mothers and fathers feel that it is in the best interests of the children that one of them stay home at least for the first four years of their lives--which sometimes extends to 8 or 10 years if they have two or more children. Traditionaly,the mother chooses to stay with her children while they are very young--rather than have someone else outside the family care for them. If amother is single that is a different story. When the children are older there is no reason that a woman cannot pursue further education or work inside or outside the home. As one woman just said the majority of people don't want to be alone. We need each other. I feel Collette Dowling is a very intelligent woman--but she is missing the basic ingredients of life on this earth. and in some ways she is putting women down.

This book infuriated me when it first came out and became a minor bestseller. Ms. Dowling's story may have intimated something important about how women feel about themselves, especially out in the world, but she parrotted all the usual myths about men, and she couldn't even see the point of her own experience.

At the heart of her argument is a tale of her marriage, of a time when her husband became so depressed and passive that he couldn't meet a job deadline, so Ms. Dowling did the job for him. Her conclusion from this? It wasn't "really" her, she was just acting under the protection -- beneath the mask -- of her husband's name and reputation!

The true lesson, however, was that she got the job done -- never mind how. It never seems to have occurred to her that males in fact have to do this all the time: bluff, employ tricks and masks, pretend to be "men" in order to get what they want or meet their obligations.

Simone de Beauvoir is famous for having said women are not born, they are made; catchy notion, but it's just possible that the same is true of men. The only difference is, our roles were once much better defined: society put its arm around our shoulder, told us what to do, and often made our way easier simply because we had the equipment between our legs.

It's a different world now, and I think women and men are much more like one another than they were ever allowed to be before. Ms. Dowling, certainly at the time she wrote this book, hadn't caught on to this.

I wouldn't recommend this for anyone who doesn't have a college degree. The author spends an inordinate amount of her time trying to figure out 100+ ways to say the same thing(and to impress us with her vocabulary). I would recommend other books before I picked this one up like "A Woman's Worth" by Marianne Williamson. Better read and enjoyable...sorry Dowling(s)?

I paid $3.99 for this book and it was suppose to be in good condition. I just received it today. It is not in good condition. Brand new the book is $3.95 and there is a $0.10 sticker on it. I believe I was totally ripped off. It will just cost me more to send back. I am very disappointed. So basically I paid more money for a used beat up book then it was brand new!