This past year I finished reading MAYBE 2 books. How incredibly disappointing is that? In high school I read ALL THE TIME, and I have a whole wall covered in books, yet I have barely read! I’m really going to force myself to read more this next year. I know for a FACT that my semester next year will hinder my goal, but I’m hoping to follow this plan as closely as I can (although I am darn positive that I probably won’t be able to finish all of these). Most of these books I have selected relate to other personal goals I hope to achieve. The boldened titles are the books I feel are most important in my personal growth (and thus the books I will read first). I’m also hoping my love for reading can be reignited. I know a lot of us can lose the habit of reading, especially with busy college schedules, so I’ve added the descriptions of the books (from the back or from the amazon descriptions) I hope to read in case any of you would also like to read more!
Productivity Books
1. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
In The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People People, author Stephen R. Covey presents a holistic, integrated, principal-centered approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, honesty, and human dignity- principles that give us the security to adapt to change, and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.
2. Getting Things Done by David Allen
In today’s world, yesterday’s methods just don’t work. Veteran coach and management consultant David Allen shares his his breakthrough methods for stress-free performance that he has introcued to tens of thousands of people across the country. Aleen’s premis is simple: our productivity is directly proportional to our ability to relax. Only when our minds are clear and our thoughts are organized can we achieve effective results and unleash our creative potential. From core principles to proven tricks, Getting Things Dones can transform the way you work an live, showing you how to pick up the pace without wearing yourself down.
Meditation and Buddhist Books (from Wisdom Publications mostly)
3. Zen Vows for Daily Life by Robert Aitken
Zen Vows for Daily Life is a collection of gathas, vows in verse form for daily practice, similar to prayers or affirmations for use at home, at work, and in the meditation hall itself. Reciting these poetic vows can help us be fully present in each moment and each activity of our lives. These gathas serve as gentle reminders to return again and again to our highest aspirations, with acceptance, joy, and compassion—for ourselves and all beings. Zen Vows for Daily Life will be a steadfast companion in keeping the reader inspired and committed on their spiritual path.
4. A Heart Full of Peace by Joseph Goldstein
Love, compassion, and peace—these words are at the heart of all spiritual endeavors. Although we intuitively resonate with their meaning and value, for most of us, the challenge is how to embody what we know: how to transform these words into a vibrant, living practice. In these times of conflict and uncertainty, this transformation is far more than an abstract ideal; it is an urgent necessity. Peace in the world begins with us. This wonderfully appealing offering from one the most trusted elders of Buddhism in the West is a warm and engaging exploration of the ways we can cultivate and manifest peace as wise and skillful action in the world.
This charming book is illuminated throughout with lively, joyous, and sometimes even funny citations from a host of contemporary and ancient sources—from the poetry of W.S. Merwin and Galway Kinnell to the haiku of Issa and the great poet-monk Ryokan, from the luminous aspirations of Saint Francis of Assisi to the sage advice of Thich Nhat Hanh and the Dalai Lama.
5. Open Mind by B. Allan Wallace
Lerab Lingpa (1856–1926), also known as Tertön Sogyal, was one of the great Dzogchen (Great Perfection) masters of the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries and a close confidant and guru of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama. This volume contains translations by B. Alan Wallace of two works that are representative of the lineage of this great “treasure revealer,” or tertön. This volume will be of great interest for all those interested in the theory and practice of the Great Perfection and the way it relates to the wisdom teachings of Tsongkhapa and others in the new translation schools of Tibetan Buddhism.
6. Interconnected by Ogyen Tinley Dorje
Plucked from a humble nomad family to become the leader of one of Tibet’s oldest Buddhist lineages, the young Seventeenth Karmapa draws on timeless values to create an urgent ethic for today’s global community. The Karmapa shows us how gaining emotional awareness of our connectedness can fundamentally reshape the human race. He then guides us to action, showing step by step how we can change the way we use the earth’s resources and can continue to better our society. In clear language, the Karmapa draws connections between such seemingly far-flung issues as consumer culture, loneliness, animal protection, and self-reliance. In the process, he helps us move beyond theory to practical and positive social and ethical change.
7. I Wanna Be Well by Miguel Chen
A punk rocker’s guide to grow, learn, and appreciate the present moment—in short, to live a life that doesn’t totally suck.
8. Discovering Your Soul Signature by Panache Desai
Your soul signature is your spiritual DNA - it is who you are at your core, the most authentic part of you, and your singular contribution to this world. And yet, we reject our authentic selvs. We allow our soul sigature to become blocked by any number of emotional obstacles that life throws in ou path: anger, fear, guilt, shame, sadness, despair. Any or all of these feelings overtake us and create a density, a heaviness that doesn’t permit us to embrace who we truly are, deep inside. We are energetic beings, Panache Desai reminds us, and emotions are energy in motion. When we are blocked we feel unworthy, less than, unloved, incomplete.
In Discovering Your Soul Signature, Panache Desai invites us on a 33-day path of meditations-- shot passages to be read at morning, noon, and night that are designed to dismantle the emotional burden that holds us back and open us up to changing our lives. Through this distilled, poetic, practical, and inspiring course, he invites us to live a life of authenticity, to rediscover purpose and passion, and to believe from our soul in the possibility of all things.
9. As Man Thinketh by James Allen
This little volume (the result of meditation and experience) is not intended as an exhaustive treatise on the much-written upon subject of the power of thought. It is suggestive rather than explanatory, its object being to stimulate men and women to the discovery and perception of the truth that -
"They themselves are makers of themselves"
by virtue of the thoughts which they choose and encourage; that mind is the master weaver, both of the inner garment of character and the outer garment of circumstance, and that, as they may have hitherto woven in ignorance and pain they may now weave in enlightenment and happiness.
Religious Books
10. The Miracle of Forgiveness by Spencer W. Kimball
In The Miracle of Forgiveness, President Spencer W Kimball gives a penetrating explanation of repentance and forgiveness and clarifies their implications for Church members. His in-depth approach shows that the need for forgiveness is universal; portrays the various facets of repentance, and emphasizes some of the more serious errors, particularly sexual ones, which afflict both modern society and Church members. Most important, he illuminates his message with the brightness of hope that even those who have gone grievously astray may find the way back to peace and security. Never before has any book brought this vital and moving subject into so sharp a focus. This classic book is a major work of substance and power.
Science Books
11. God’s Equation by Amir D. Aczel
In God’s Equation, Amir Aczel tells the story of what lies between these events: the history of modern physics and the development of the sciene of cosmology, the study of the nature of the universe.
Other Books
12. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
In Anthony Burgess's nightmare vision of the future, where criminals take over after dark, the story is told by the central character, Alex, who talks in a brutal invented slang that brilliantly renders his and his friends' social pathology. A Clockwork Orange is a frightening fable about good and evil, and the meaning of human freedom. When the state undertakes to reform Alex—to "redeem" him—the novel asks, "At what cost?"
13. Walden and Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau
In 1845, Thoreau moved to a cabin that he built with his own hands along the shores of Walden Pond in Massachusetts. Shedding the trivial ties that he felt bound much of humanity, Thoreau reaped from the land both physically and mentally, and pursued truth in the quiet of nature. In Walden, he explains how separating oneself from the world of men can truly awaken the sleeping self. Thoreau holds fast to the notion that you have not truly existed until you adopt such a lifestyle—and only then can you reenter society, as an enlightened being.
These simple but profound musings—as well as “Civil Disobedience,” his protest against the government’s interference with civil liberty—have inspired many to embrace his philosophy of individualism and love of nature. More than a century and a half later, his message is more timely than ever.
14. The Art of Worldly Wisdom by Baltasar Gracian
In the Art of Worldly Wisdom Baltasar Gracian gives us pertinent and pithy advice on friendship, leadership, and success. Think of it as Machiavelli with a soul. This book is for those who wish to have an ambitious plan for success without compromising their integrity or losing their way. Audacious and captivating!
15. For One More Day by Mitch Albom
For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that lasts a lifetime and and beyond. It explores the question: What would you do if you could spend one more day with a lost loved one?
They who have no central purpose in their life fall an easy prey to petty worries, fears, troubles, and self-pityings, all of which are indications of weakness, which lead, just as surely as deliberately planned sins (though by a different route), to failure, unhappiness, and loss, for weakness cannot persist in a power evolving universe.
The weakest soul, knowing its own weakness, and believing this truth—that strength can only be developed by effort and practice, will, thus believing, at once begin to exert itself, and, adding effort to effort, patience to patience, and strength to strength, will never cease to develop, and will at last grow divinely strong.
As the physically weak man can make himself strong by careful and patient training, so the man of weak thoughts can make them strong by exercising himself in right thinking.
To put away aimlessness and weakness, and to begin to think with purpose, is to enter the ranks of those strong ones who only recognize failure as one of the pathways to attainment; who make all conditions serve them, and who think strongly, attempt fearlessly, and accomplish masterfully.
All that a man achieves and all that he fails to achieve is the direct result of his own thoughts. A man’s weakness and strength are his own, and not another man’s; they are brought about my himself, and not by another; and they can only be altered by himself, never by another.
In all human affairs there are efforts, and there are results, and the strength of the effort is the measure of the result. Chance is not. “Gifts,” powers, material, intellectual, and spiritual possessions are the fruits of effort; they are thoughts completed, objects accomplished, visions realized. The Vision that you glorify in your mind, the Ideal that you enthrone in your heart—this you will build your life by, this you will become.
