Debbie Travis, the serial TV host and entrepreneur, has a new book out, sharing her insights and experience in personal transformation, as well as several other people’s amazing stories.
When I spoke to her during the week before Christmas, she was delighted to note the book was the Number 1 seller in Canada, ahead of Michelle Obama’s, “Becoming”.
“Please, use this book to scribble in”
Design Your Next Chapter: How to Realize Your Dreams and Reinvent Your Life, is the latest from the woman who’s been helping Canadians, and many others around the world, design and reinvent their dwellings for thirty years now.
When Travis met her husband and partner in everything, at a TV convention in Europe, it meant emigrating to Canada, from her native England.
They built their lives and businesses around their base in Montreal.
In 2015 another goal was realized when they completed the extensive renovation of a 13th century home in Tuscany, that allows them to welcome women, and sometimes couples, for retreats 10 times a year.
The idea for this book came out of Debbie’s own turning point, and encounters with several of the guests in Tuscany, who’d made extraordinary transformations in their lives.
So this year, along with a new line of soft and cozy linens, Travis has provided the bed-time reading.
She says the book is really for anyone who wants to make a change in their life, from millennials not sure of the next step, to empty-nesters confronting the “now-what” stage.
Debbie Travis and team worked for 5 years restoring this 13th century home in Tuscany with the golden glow that shows what the Tuscan sun can do. (www.tuscangetaway.com)
The book is well-timed for the new year, and all the resolutions that come with it, in that it is also a workbook.
“Please use this book to scribble in, we’ve got lot’s of quizzes you can mark, where you are at this stage in your life, notes that you want to make.” Debbie encourages.
And some very high profile people are strong in their praise.
“Just ask”
Jan Arden, Canada’s much-loved singer songwriter recommends it heartily, as does the woman you might say, started it all.
Frances Mayes, the author of Under the Tuscan Sun, the 1996 best-selling novel that led to the 2003 Hollywood movie, watched over and over, lived the renewal and shared her story.
Debbie Travis, who loved the book when it came out, and like many of us, watches the movie often, practised what she preaches when she called Mayes, out of the blue, for a little advice.
Mayes responded with an invitation and the two have become fast friends since.
“Just ask” Debbie Travis often counsels women. It is surprising how rarely people say no.
Design Your Next Chapter: How to Realize Your Dreams and Reinvent Your Life is published by Random House in Canada.
(With files from CBC and CP)
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