“Thursday morning. One hundred pounds overweight, no man in sight, and rounding the bend to 57 years old—a full-blown catastrophe.”

What happens when you realize you’ve had the career of your dreams, but you don’t have the life of your dreams?

This was the stark reality facing Sheri Salata when she left her twenty-year stint at The Oprah Winfrey Show, Harpo Studios and the OWN network. She had dedicated decades to her dream job, and loved (almost) every minute of it, but had left the rest of her life gathering dust on the shelf.

After years of telling other people’s makeover stories, Sheri decided to “produce” her own life transformation. And this meant revisiting her past, excavating its lessons, and boldly reimagining her future.

In the pages of The Beautiful No, she invites readers along for the ride—detoxing in the desert, braving humiliation at Hollywood’s favorite fitness studio, grappling with losses, reinventing friendships, baring her soul in sex therapy, and more. Part cautionary tale, part middle-of-life rallying cry, Sheri’s stories offer profound inspiration for personal renewal.

Sheri Salata is a writer/producer, cofounder of thepillarlife.com and cohost of the podcast The Sheri + Nancy Show. Her current ventures are the evolution of her 20-year career with Oprah Winfrey.