Becoming a Peacock: Strut Your Way Into Self-Love

By Michal Bardavid

Loving yourself isn’t selfish, it’s your superpower.

We’re taught math, science, and grammar, but rarely how to love ourselves. In Becoming a Peacock, Michal Bardavid cracks open that silence with wit, warmth, and the kind of honesty that feels like a conversation with your bravest friend. (Amazon, 2025)

Release Date: December 2 — available now for pre-order.

Through intimate stories of heartbreak, healing, and rediscovery, Bardavid invites you to embrace your inner peacock: the bold, unapologetic, self-loving version of you that refuses to shrink to fit someone else’s cage.

What You’ll Learn

Each chapter blends real-life stories with empowering reflections and exercises designed to help you:

• Reclaim your worth (no external validation required)
• Set boundaries without guilt
• Rewrite your inner voice from critical to kind
• Let go of relationships and habits that dim your colors
• Celebrate your authenticity, flaws, feathers, and all

Part memoir, part manifesto, and all heart, Becoming a Peacock is a guide for anyone ready to stop playing small and start strutting through life in full color.

What’s Inside the Book

• Why the Majestic “Peacock”
• A Peacock Knows It’s Worthy
• A Peacock Can Take Rejection
• A Peacock Dares To Fail
• A Peacock Doesn’t Judge
• A Peacock Is Authentic
• A Peacock Is Grateful

Review

Becoming a Peacock is a heartfelt and spirited invitation to reclaim the parts of ourselves we’ve subdued for far too long. Bardavid writes with a disarming blend of humor, vulnerability, and gentle provocation, cracking open the silence so many people carry around their deepest hurts.

From the first chapter, her voice feels like that of a brave, loyal friend, the kind who tells you the truth with tenderness and refuses to let you abandon yourself again. The language is laid back and conversational while the tone is warm and nonjudgmental. With short chapters and clean structure, it’s a quick, easy read and easy to revisit favorite sections.

Through stories of heartbreak, healing, rejection, and the slow rebuilding of self-worth, Bardavid shows what it means to return home to yourself. She doesn’t preach or claim to have all the answers. Instead, she offers lived wisdom through intimate snapshots of losing her way and the surprising places she found it again.

Highlights

A Peacock Builds Resilience

A reminder that words matter. Kindness is crucial, but resilience is just as important. Bullying should never be tolerated, yet learning to rise above harsh moments is equally vital.

A Peacock Can Be in the Moment

Mindfulness means living with awareness and intention, even in painful moments. Distraction denies our feelings; presence helps us work through them.

“Let’s dare to put the phone down, be present for ourselves and our loved ones, and rediscover the beauty of being in the moment.”

Her “inner peacock” metaphor is playful and powerful, a reminder that boldness, beauty, and self-love are not traits we acquire but truths we unveil. Bardavid doesn’t shy away from messy emotions or difficult lessons, and that authenticity helps readers feel seen rather than lectured.

Becoming a Peacock is an encouraging guide to standing tall, spreading your feathers, and choosing yourself without apology. Ideal for readers who enjoy motivational, reflective books on the journey to self-improvement.

“I built this metaphor of a peacock to make self-love clearer, to remind my students—and now, any reader who wants to share the ride—that they are beautiful, worthy, and capable of living life fully.”

About the Author

Michal Bardavid is a psychological counselor, dance movement therapist, and international journalist. Over the past 15 years, she has reported from more than a dozen countries, taught movement therapy at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, and led creative workshops for Syrian refugee children. In Becoming a Peacock, she combines two decades of storytelling and healing into a candid, story-driven path toward self-worth.

*Thank you to the author for the gifted Advance Reader Copy for review consideration. I haven’t been compensated for this review and all views and opinions expressed are my own.