read good stuff

best book of 2009: the unfolding now

What book - fiction or non - touched you? Where were you when you read it? Have you bought and given away multiple copies?

The Unfolding Now: Realizing Your True Nature Through the Practice of Presence
by A.H. Almaas

A.H. Almaas is the creator of The Diamond Approach work, which Ken Wilber calls "a superb combination of some of the best of modern Western psychology with ancient (and spiritual) wisdom...probably the most balanced of the widely available spiritual psychologies/therapies."

The Unfolding Now book is like chamomile tea for the soul, made with purified water, with honey from sacred bees, served in a hand made Zen bowl. So simple and nourishing. It is a book of rare transmission that sparks one's deeply innate desire to be real.

We want to learn how we can be here in as real a way as possible: How can I be completely here and completely myself, or as completely as possible? How can my atoms, which are scattered, vibrating, and oscillating in some kind of frenzy, slow down, collect, and settle here as what I am?
- A.H. Almaas

The most delicious mix of questions I drank in all year.

 

burning questions with the queen of uncluttering, erin doland

Erin Rooney Doland always impresses me. She's A+ organized, but not chilly 'n uptight about it. She's a ruthless time manager, but always has time to help. She hangs with Quakers and speaks to the high-powered women's groups. And she's smart, really smart.

She is: Editor-In-Chief of the uber popular Unclutterer.com, a Real Simple.com columnist, and a mama to a new baby and a new book: Unclutter Your Life in One Week: A 7-Day Plan to Organize Your Home, Your Office, and Your Life, with a foreword by David Allen and a glowing endorsement from my (other) favourite organizer, Peter Walsh.

Erin Doland's motto: simplicity is revolutionary. Clear the clutter so you can pursue what you love the most.

1. What do you know the most about? (more...)

 

the ridiculous pursuit of being well-rounded

Multi-disciplinary, general studies, political correctness, easy to get along with, in moderation, “nice”...these are all ways that we polish off our edges to be socially acceptable and useful - even though it's your edges that give you traction and make you interesting. Your “edge” - where the genuine You meets external reality, is where your strengths are, your genius, and it’s way more fun hanging out there than in the middle ground.

Being well-rounded is highly over-rated.

Employers who are trying to multiply the strengths of people are missing the point. Entrepreneurs trying to do it all are bound to go in circles. When you focus on building on your natural strengths, on doing what comes easiest to you, you get some serious momentum. It may be counter-intuitive, it’s certainly counter-culture because it’s been drilled into to us to work hard (all you Catholics and Ivy Leaguers say hey!) but truly, optimizing your second nature is the surest way to get a return on your investment.

Ever since I read Marcus Buckingham’s The Truth About You, I’ve been stopping strangers on the street. “Hey, get this. You know what a strength is? A strength is what you do that makes you feels strengthened, vital! And...wait, it gets better, you know what a weakness is? A weakness is stuff you do that makes you feel weakened!”

Deceptively simple. Revolutionary.

Why does this make me wanna do back-flips? Because this changes everything, people. And it goes back to my root theory in life, that it’s all about feelings. It means that all that crap that you don’t really like to do, but that you’re really good at ... you get to dump it! No more faking it to make it.

So what about good old-fashioned hard work? I’m all for it - when you’re moving towards the real you. No more trying to be a PR genius when what you do best is paint landscapes or make the widgets (hire a PR genius.) No more trying to come up with blue sky five year plans when you’re a short-term focused details guy (get a coach or a visionary friend to help you see the possibilities.) For me, that means I will never care about cooking the Thanksgiving turkey, being good at parties, or rocking Excel. Never gonna happen.

THE STRONG / WEAK EXERCISE
Buckingham has a powerful exercise that I loved. For one week I wrote down what made me feel strong and what made me feel weakened/drained. This showed up on my "weak" list: unqualified meetings make me feel like a loogan.

I was scheduled to have tea with an acquaintance of an acquaintance. I trusted the referral and so I made the date in haste, with a quick “sure, how about the café by so and so’s.”

A few weeks later when I was walking to the meeting, I was feeling really resentful and pissy. WEAKENED. Because I hadn’t bothered to ask, I had no idea why the person actually wanted to meet. And I was feeling like I’d betrayed my time, my priorities. (And sure enough, the meeting could have happened in 15 minutes over the phone and I wouldn’t have had to find parking or rush to pick up my kid.) Conclusion: I feel strong when I ask, when I clarify, when I know The Point. I feel weak when don’t value my own time.

The masters focus on what they do best ... on their NATURAL CAPACITIES. They stay in their zone ... and the zone is what feels good, damn good.

So I what makes you feel strong?
Do more of it. And more still. Find ways to get even better at it, sharpen your saw as the old master of effectiveness, Stephen Covey puts it. Push your edge. Dare to be focused on your natural capacities. Say yes to what you love, what inspires you, what lights you up. It takes some kahunas, but it beats well-rounded mediocrity any day.

. . . . . . . .

FIND MARCUS BUCKINGHAM
His site
The Truth About You
Now, Discover Your Strengths
Twitter: @mwbuckingham

 

wisdom + creativity

{If you're viewing this via email, click on the title above to watch the video clip.}

A great friend gave me the coffee table book, Wisdom for Christmas. And I actually read it. It's packed with layers of experience. Humbling. Argumentative. Informed. From Clint Eastwood and Frank Gehry to Jane Goodall and Vanessa Redgrave.

This video clip is great for two reasons: one, it highlights the immense power of the players, but it also shows how Andrew Zuckerman, the book's author/coordinator, just did it. He had a values-based vision, and zero experience as an interviewer. He aimed high. He didn't settle. He made himself "a servant to the pursuit of wisdom," and he made it happen. Gotta love that.

 

i’d eat books for breakfast if i could

Announcing my Amazon a-store. Think of it as private tour through my neuroses and brilliance. Enjoy.

CLICK HERE TO HEAD ON OVER.

 

ignore everybody, by hugh macleod

Every pithy page brought from my new very favorite book by Hugh MacLeod brought on a yes!. McLeod is a foul-mouthed, illuminated advertising pro, who writes about marketing, meaningful living, and in his own way ... love. He is pulled forward by his thrill of "creative sovereignty." And he's one pragmatic, sweet curmudgeon. I'm in love.

Each one of his 39 Keys to Creativity is a sutra of street-wise insight. Here are my favorite gems:

: Question how much freedom your path affords you. Be utterly ruthless about it. It's your freedom that will get you where you want to go.

: So now corporations are awash with nonautonomous thinkers.
"I don't know. What do you think?"
"I don't know. What do you think?"
"I don't know. What do you think?"
"I don't know. What do you think?"

And so on.
Creating an economically viable entity where lack of original thought is handsomely rewarded creates a rich, fertile environment for parasites to breed. (more...)

 

Beauty: The Invisible Embrace, John O’Donohue

Beauty: The Invisible Embrace
Rediscovering the true stories of compassion, serenity, and hope
John O'Donohue

I sigh when I read this book. About every three paragraphs I close my eyes and shake my head in awe, as if to say to the gods of philosophy and poetry, Thank you for this man! This is a diamond blessing of a book that has become one of my favourite gifts to give. It will cause you to find and heed that naturally deep ache for beauty in your life. John O'Donohue will have you believing that beauty is a colossal force for transformation that is waiting in our personal and collective shadows. I believe. I believe.

7 reasons to buy yourself and your favourite friend a copy of John O'Donohue's Beauty, in the words of the master poet himself:

We live between the act of awakening of the act of surrender.

In a sense, all the contemporary crises can be reduced to a crisis about the nature of beauty. This perspective offers us new possibilities. Perhaps, for the first time. we gain a clear view of how much ugliness we endure and allow. The media generate relentless images of mediocrity and ugliness in talk-shows, tapestries of smothered language and frenetic gratification. The media are becoming the global mirror and these shows enshrine the ugly as the normal standard.

Could it be possible that a landscape could have a deep friendship with you? Perhaps your favourite place feels proud of you...it will miss your voice, your breath and the bright waves of your thought, how you walked through the light and brought news of other places.

Colour is the clothing of beauty.

No-one wants to remain a prisoner of an unlived life.

The imagination has a deep sense of irony.

The who-ness of someone can never be finally named, known, claimed, controlled or predicted. The who is beyond all frames and frontiers and dwells in the mystery of its own reflexivity and infinity. Who has no map. ... Beauty is the inconceivable made so intimate that it illuminates our hearts.

 

the power of less to get more done

I’m obsessed with the essential. “We don’t need it,” “Get rid of it,” and “No thank you,” are guiding mantras ‘round my household. But I’m suspect of time management gurus, especially ones who espouse simplicity as a way of life and who are successful. Success breeds complexity. {Do you really think Tim Ferris, author of the bestseller, The 4 Hour Work Week works only 4 hours a week?} Simplicity and traditional success are a tricky combo. The masters of it are exceptions. They are also chilled, prosperous and rarely in a rush.

Leo Babauta is in no rush. Why hurry when you know what’s most important?

His new book, The Power Of Less, is an easy breezy read on “the fine art of limiting yourself to the essential...in business and in life.”

MY 4 FAVOURITE REMINDERS FROM THE POWER OF LESS:

1. Let your life be ruled by the moment. {Huh, is this a productivity book I’m reading?} Don’t schedule most appointments. If someone requests an appointment, tell them to call you a little before they’d like to meet and if you’re available, then meet.

2. If you aren’t finding yourself passionate about a certain tasks, allow yourself to move on to something you’re more passionate about. The more passionate you are about a task or project, the more energy you’ll put into it, and the better you’ll do with it.

3. Create a simple projects list ... just three projects, not ten, that will have your entire focus until you see them through to completion. The other projects on your list go on the “On The Deck List.”

Leo is a big proponent of email checking restraints. His suggestion, like that of Tim Ferris’, is to set email times ... check it once in the morning, and check it once in the afternoon. Leo admits that this is not as easy as it sounds. His answer is deceptively simple:

4. Every time you find yourself habitually switching to e-mail, stop yourself. Breathe. And then focus on your work instead. Your reward: you get a lot more done.

Got the itch to Twitter or check in on your Facebook friends in the middle of a looming deadline? Breathe. The itch will pass and your fans will love you all the more when you tweet. I breathe a lot.

Many productivity books have a drill sergeant running between the lines. Panic! So much to do to organize all that I have to do. The Power of Less is a sweet exception to that. Babauta’s energy is gentle and kind. No whistles. No drills. Just a zen-like understanding of what it takes to honour what's essential.

RESOURCES + RELATED
: Leo is the the man behind the wildly popular ZenHabits.net
: Entrepreneurial Time Management: How I Rock It

 

reality check: kawasaki helps entrepreneurs get real

Guy Kawasaki's new book, Reality Check: The Irreverent Guide to Outsmarting, Outmanaging, and Outmarketing Your Competition, is essential reading for entrepreneurs. Essential. If you're starting up, raising money, trying to make your living on-line, or stretching your marketing muscles, just get this book.

My 5 Favorite bits from REALITY CHECK, {with which I couldn't agree more:}

1. Innovation is a hard, messy process with no shortcuts. It starts with making something that you'd like to use that makes meaning, and it gets both easier and harder from there.
2. Ultimately, the underlying assumptions in your marketing model are the key to the fundability and viability of your start up. (more...)

 

start where you are: pema chodron

I've given away at least a dozen copies of this book. I've given away my last tattered treasured copy, saying, "You must have this, go now." And then gone out immediately to replace my copy because my book shelf feels anemic without it. Needless to say, Pema Chodron's Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living, would be one of my stranded-on-an-island book picks.

The heart of the book is Buddhist mind training "slogans."
Divine dictums like:

• Examine the nature of unborn awareness.
• Don't ponder others.
• Abandon any hope of fruition.
• All activities should be done with one intention.
• Don't expect applause.

As Chodron puts it, "The basic notion is that we can make friends with what we reject, what we see as 'bad' in ourselves and in other people. At the same time, we could learn to be generous with what we cherish, what we see as 'good'. If we begin to live this way, something in us that may have been buried for a long time begins to ripen."

Juicy cosmic fruit.