You know, I don't exactly know why/how I ended up reading this whole book to be fair but I'm not mad that I did, just kind of baffled. I've intended to read works about or by St. Teresa of Avila just to see what all the fuss was about and it does genuinely have very moving and beautiful metaphors. Reading it definitely required a kind of suspension of disbelief or disagreement because obviously we practice religion very differently but I found some of the imagery of God living in the soul and of prayer and internal life and love manifest through works resonated. And even the kinds of structural beliefs I disagree with like fear of hell or deference to church authority felt like I could understand and identify with where some of the peace and value of those ideas were coming from.

Also sometimes it felt like she was emphasizing the beliefs about the weakness of and idiocy of women in a nearly sarcastic or way. Like, when she said things that might have been controversial she had this way of framing any mistakes as potentially inevitable for the weaker sex while also calling on God's authority and right to speak through whoever God chooses (woman or no). So that was pretty cool.

And I listened to the whole thing on audiobook I guess. So that's that.