Books! Thankful for books!

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November Gratitude Shorts, Day 18

Yesterday I meant to post about books!  There are so many, how can we ever read them all?  Thank goodness for all these authors, who take the time and expend the energy to create and publish for the benefit of us all!

I keep a list of my favorites:

  1. The Art of Possibility, Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander
  2. Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting, Jon and Myla Kabat-Zinn
  3. Healing From the Heart, Mehmet Oz, MD
  4. Now, Discover Your Strengths, Buckingham and Clifton
  5. The Power of Mindful Learning, Ellen Langer
  6. A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink
  7. The Five Love Languages, Gary Chapman
  8. On Gratitude, Aaron Jensen
  9. Complications, Atul Gawande, MD
  10. Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, Malcolm Gladwell
  11. Made to Stick, Chip and Dan Heath
  12. Positive Psychology in a Nutshell, Ilona Boniwell
  13. Kitchen Table Wisdom and My Grandfather’s Blessings, Rachel Naomi Remen, MD
  14. The Inner Game of Tennis, W. Timothy Gallwey
  15. The Heart Speaks, Mimi Guarneri, MD, FACC
  16. Proof of Heaven, Eben Alexander, MD
  17. Peaceful Piggy Meditation, Kerry Lee Maclean
  18. The Timekeeper, Mitch Albom
  19. The Social Animal and The Road to Character, David Brooks
  20. Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engaging With Everyday Life, Mihalyi Csikszentmihaly
  21. The Mind’s Own Physician, ed. Jon Kabat-Zinn, Richard J. Davidson
  22. Daring Greatly and Rising Strong, Brené Brown
  23. Resonate, Nancy Duarte
  24. Start With Why and Leaders Eat Last, Simon Sinek
  25. Big Magic, Elizabeth Gilbert

During visits with patients, many of these titles routinely come up either in my mind or in conversation.  I found myself sharing them so often that I finally decided to keep them on a Word file to share electronically, and I add to it regularly.   Often, people have already read one or more, which is when I know I am connected with a like soul.  I love when that happens!

There are so many books I have yet to read, indeed that I am dying to read–I have bought most of them already!  My bookshelves are almost out of space, and the books are spilling out onto most other horizontal surfaces in the house.  Here are some titles I plan to read in the next year (the next few months, ideally!); please feel free to suggest others:

  1. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
  2. Being Mortal, Atul Gawande
  3. Drive, Daniel Pink
  4. The Book of Forgiving, Desmond Tutu & Mpho Tutu
  5. How the Body Knows Its Mind, Sian Beilock

I have yet to read most of the ones on this shelf, though I have dipped into many of them a few times.  I like to dig deep, mark them up, and take them down over and over again when I make connections between them.

bookshelf

The book post was meant to be lighthearted…  Books bring joy, wisdom, knowledge, connection, learning, laughter, pictures–it’s all good!

Today feels heavier, and my focus on reading and writing takes a serious turn…  More on that for Day 19…

12 thoughts on “Books! Thankful for books!”

  1. Books are a huge part of who I am and how I became me. And we have stacks and boxes full in almost every room of our home, as well as in the hall. Some of our book shelves are blocked by boxes and stacks of books.

    Yes, you could say I’m obsessed with books. So, your description of your book collection both resonates with me (ah, a fellow collector) and makes me smile (isn’t she cute with her “bookshelves are almost full”?).

    I have a few of the titles you mentioned but haven’t read any of them. Hope that won’t make you second-guess our friendship. 🙂

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    • Collector, yes!! That makes it feel more like a passionate cause, rather than an accumulation of uncompleted intentions…😉
      And though our friendship is new, it would take more than a few unread books to threaten this connection!

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      • Many of the books that I find inspiring also have a spiritual tone…such as Og Mandino’s “Greatest” series of books…Salesman, Secret, Miracle; anything John O’Donohue, but my favorite, “Anam Cara”; Paul Ferrini’s “Love Without Conditions”, Temple Grandin’s “Thinking in Pictures”, Hannah Hurnard’s “Hindsfeet in High Places”; Elizabeth Gilbert’s “Eat Pray Love”; Peter Jackson’s “The Lovely Bones”, Christopher Moore’s “Lamb – The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal” and my all-time classic favorite, Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights”. I’m currently making my way through Wm. Paul Young’s “The Shack” and a book you suggested to me, Debbie Fords, “Dark Side of the Light Chasers”…to name a few 🙂

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  4. Good ones, Cathy! I recently finished the Alchemist on Audible, as it was the favorite book of a blogger I admired who recently passed away due to a freak accident. (He was so much more than a blogger, but I don’t really know what else to call him. Either way, he was incredibly inspiring, and it surprised me that I was affected so deeply by his death. That prompted me to move the Alchemist up on the Audible list.) Here is one for your list: Everybody Matters by Bob Chapman. It’s on my shelf, and I hope to get it over the holidays. The byline is, “The Extraordinary Power of Caring for your People like Family.” Good stuff. 🙂

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    • Thanks, Lisa! Who was the blogger, is the blog still up? _Everybody Matters_ is indeed on my list, because Bob Chapman is one of the leaders that Simon Sinek holds up as walking the talk and succeeding in business while doing it! I will either listen to it on Audible or wait for the paperback–I don’t do hard cover books anymore, they are too heavy and take up too much space! ;P

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      • I believe that Simon Sinek’s FB page alerted me to Bob Chapman too. The blog is at liveyourlegend.net, and the author was Scott Dinsmore. It’s so much more than a blog, which is why I felt strange labeling him that way. I stumbled upon an interview between Scott Dinsmore and Simon Sinek earlier this year, not long after I discovered Start with Why, and was completely drawn into his work. I’m still so sad that he is gone, forever moved by his message. He was only 33.

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