Ten Must – Read Books –

These 10 Must-Read Books will Change
your Perspective on Life Complexities

Certain publications have been extraordinary signposts on my journey toward wellbeing and those of my clients.

Though we’re all aware of fundamental good health practices like diet, exercise, sleep, and handling pressure, putting them into action can be tough.

Here are 10 books that guide us on how we can create our best lives. The knowledge gained from them can help us tackle challenges and be amazing motivations to become the best version of ourselves.

This is the second recommendation list. To access the first recommendation list, click HERE.

A New Earth: Awakening to your Life’s Purpose

by Eckhart Tolle

A New Earth is a personal favorite for me. I have read it over 50 times and every time, the same lines acquire a new meaning according to where I am in my personal growth. I keep a copy next to my night stand. This is a book you need to read not to listen to.

Tolle teaches us how we  may be creating our own suffering without recognizing it. He shows how transcending our ego-based state of consciousness is not only essential to finding meaning and personal happiness, but also the key to ending conflict and suffering throughout the world.

Tolle describes how our attachment to the ego creates the dysfunction that leads to anger, jealousy, unhappiness, and violence, ,and shows readers how to awaken to a new state of consciousness and follow the path to a truly fulfilling existence.

When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times

by Pema Chodron.

How can we live our lives when everything seems to fall apart—when we are continually overcome
by fear, anxiety, and pain?

The answer, the beloved Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön suggests, might be just the opposite of what you expect.

Drawing from traditional Buddhist wisdom, she offers life-changing tools for transforming suffering and negative patterns into habitual ease and boundless sense  of contentment. A phenomenal read.

Already Free

by Bruce Tift

Dr. Bruce Tift is a psychotherapist, a deep thinker and a very clear writer. In his book he opens  a fresh dialogue between the practical tools and wisdom from the Eastern and Western traditions, and explores how each one provides us with essential keys to experiencing full presence and aliveness.

This is a fabulous book for anybody who wants to go deep into the world of integrating what is philosophy and psychotherapy practice. I  highly recommend it.  A book I go back to frequently.

The description on Amazon says: Buddhism gives us powerful tools for breaking free of our own identity drama and our fascination with day-to-day problems, yet it does not address how early childhood experience shapes our adult lives.

Western psychotherapy provides a wide range of proven techniques for understanding and untangling the development of our neurotic patterns, but it is only beginning to recognize the powerful impact of exploring awareness itself. “These two approaches sometimes contradict and sometimes support each other,” Tift explains. “When used together, they can help us open to all of life in all its richness, its disturbances, and its inherent completeness. “With a keen understanding of the wisdom of East and West, and a special focus on working with intimate relationships as a pathway to spiritual awakening, Bruce Tift presents seven immersive sessions of insights, wisdom, and practical instruction for realizing the fundamental freedom that is your birthright.

Lasting Transformation

by Abby Rosen, PhD.

This is a new edition of Dr. Rosen’s book and now available on Audible. The road map outlined in Lasting Transformation gives specific guidance for this journey. It offers important insights and effective strategies for developing a strong self, fulfilling relationships, and deep soul-wisdom.

Dr. Rosen shares the experience of her thirty-nine-year pilgrimage integrating psychotherapy and spirituality. Each chapter includes real client experiences that show the process of behavioral change and lasting transformation, and practical exercises that together provide a program to help you navigate the sacred journey of your life. A wonderful read.

Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life

by James Hollis, PhD.

Another amazing book by James Hollis who never disappoints. We invariable reach a moment in life when we have the need to reevaluate our priorities and update our perspectives. We assume that once we “get it together” with the right job, marry the right person, have children, and buy a home, all is settled and well.

But adulthood presents varying levels of growth, and is rarely the respite of stability we expected. Turbulent emotional shifts can take place anywhere between the age of thirty-five and eighty when we question the choices we’ve made, realize our limitations, and feel stuck—commonly known as the “midlife crisis.” Jungian psycho-analyst James Hollis believes it is only in the second half of life that we can truly come to know who we are and thus create a life that has meaning.

The Courage to Be Disliked

by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga

Using the theories of Dr. Alfred Adler, one of the three giants of 20th-century psychology,
The Courage to Be Disliked follows an illuminating conversation between a philosopher and a young man. The entire book is written in dialogue form. The philosopher explains to his pupil how each of us is able to determine our own life, free from the shackles of past experiences, doubts, and the expectations of others. It’s a way of thinking that is deeply liberating, allowing us to develop the courage to change and to ignore the limitations that we and other people have placed on us.

Dancing with Life

 by Phillip Moffitt

Life is a dance and Moffitt helps you find your own rhythm. His brilliant writing style makes complicated ideas easy to understand with creative examples and poignant questions. He addresses the Four Noble Truths with a  fresh perspective on ancient wisdom, showing how to move from suffering to new awareness and unanticipated joy.

One of the book reviewers commented:  Somehow I learn more and more about myself each time I read the book. I find something new in the pages year after year. I do not know why that is so, or how.
Give this book a read if you are at a low point in your life and wonder why God is making you suffer, why prayers don’t help, why your life’s work is coming undone and your family and friends are leaving you.
You will feel better once you have traveled through the pages of this book.

A Hunter-Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century:
Evolution and the Challenges of Modern Life

by Bret Weinstein & Heather Heying

We are living through the most prosperous age in all of human history, yet we are listless, divided, and miserable. Wealth and comfort are unparalleled, but our political landscape is unmoored, and rates of suicide, lone­liness, and chronic illness continue to skyrocket. How do we explain the gap between these truths? And how should we respond?

Evolutionary biologists Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein, draw on decades of their work teaching in college classrooms and explor­ing Earth’s most biodiverse ecosystems to confront today’s pressing social ills – from widespread sleep deprivation and dangerous diets to damaging parenting styles and back­ward education practices. Asking the questions many mod­ern people are afraid to ask, A Hunter-Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century outlines a science-based worldview that will empower you to live a better, wiser life.

The Brain that Changes Itself

by Norman Doidge.

This is a moving and inspiring book by psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Norman Doidge, MD, who invites us to an exploration of the astonishing new science called neuroplasticity which is overthrowing the centuries-old notion that the human brain is immutable.

Dr. Doidge traveled the country to meet both the brilliant scientists championing neuroplasticity and the people whose lives they’ve transformed – people whose mental limitations or brain damage were seen as unalterable.

We see a woman born with half a brain that rewired itself to work as a whole, blind people who learn to see, learning disorders cured, IQs raised, aging brains rejuvenated, stroke patients learning to speak, children with cerebral palsy learning to move with more grace, depression and anxiety disorders successfully treated, and lifelong character traits changed.

This book will permanently change the way you look at your brain, and it phenomenal potential.

The Body – A Guide for Occupants 

by Bill Bryson

A magnificent read. Be prepared to marvel at the miracles of the human body. This book will amaze and humble you. Bryson takes us on a head-to-toe tour of the marvel that is the human body. As he writes, “We pass our existence within this wobble of flesh and yet take it almost entirely for granted.” The Body will cure that indifference with generous doses of wondrous, compulsively readable facts and information.

Enjoy your reading!!
warmly,
Monica