PODCAST reviews

MINDSET MASTERY

Episode: “How Mindfulness and Self Reflection Can Change the World with Saundra Davis”

Money is seldom the meaningful aspect of financial goals, says podcast guest Saundra Davis, a financial coach and mindfulness teacher. It’s about what the money can buy, and for many it adds up to peace of mind, freedom, or legacy. Her refreshing perspective takes into account the deeply emotional nature of financial planning, and therefore, the responsibility of financial coaches like herself—and not only for people who are wealthy. She offers a candid account of her personal experience with poverty and her journey into the world of finance. “Just because you’re broke doesn’t mean you’re broken,” Davis says. – AWC

WILD WITH SARAH WILSON

Episode: “Johann Hari: THIS is why you’re finding the world too much”

How To Break Up With Your Friends

Finding Meaning, Connection, and Boundaries in Modern Friendships

Erin Falconer • Sounds True

If you haven’t yet delved into Johann Hari’s Stolen Focus, let yourself be convinced by this highly engaging episode. Host Sarah Wilson probes some of the book’s salient topics, including why it matters that we read differently on a page versus on a screen; the real productivity cost of believing our brains can multitask; and the combo of It may be an understatement to say that mindfulness is a hot topic—but with all the information out there, it might actually feel more difficult to learn the basics. Enter Jon Kabat-Zinn, the founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), who helps us cut through all the noise and explains mindfulness in a way that’s

Life Kit

Episode: “Mindfulness 101 with Jon Kabat-Zinn” personal and systemic shifts needed in order to truly attend to what Hari describes as the “unprecedented tripwires and trapdoors” we now face as a species. From climate chaos to political upheavals, he says, “If we lose our greatest superpower, our attention, at the moment of our greatest crisis, that’s going to be a real problem.” – AT approachable and backed by science. In this engaging 20-minute conversation with host Shereen Marisol Meraji, Kabat-Zinn highlights the importance of awareness in a mindfulness practice, dispels some of the common misconceptions about mindfulness, and shares a breathbased meditation practice for beginners. – OL

“The truth is, I chose this title to get your attention,” Erin Falconer admits in the first lines of the introduction to How to Break Up With Your Friends. Compassionately cutting friends loose is only a part of Falconer’s deep dive into the meaning, importance, practice, and ritual of nourishing friendships. Don’t worry, you’ll get what you initially chose the book for (in Chapter 9), but first Falconer outlines how to be a good friend (to yourself, too). By the time you turn the last page, you’ll understand that “so much of friendship really is about you: who you are, what you need, and what you can give.” Through a refreshing mix of anecdotes from Falconer’s life and the lives of other women she interviewed, and expert advice, you’ll learn how to evaluate whether a friendship is serving you in its current form and how you can take the steps to strengthen a relationship–or ultimately break up with your friend. Falconer is honest in her thoughts on friendship and how you can “bring the fullest human being possible into relationships.” Taking a look inward to assess what you expect from your friendships doesn’t necessarily come easy but simple “homework” assignments at the end of chapters make the workload lighter. The work you put into one friendship may not match the work you put into another. It’s the circumstances that can make dynamics tricky, but Falconer acknowledges that and offers her voice to remind you that you’re not alone. – KR

LIFE, PART TWO Seven Keys to Awakening With Purpose and Joy As You Age

David Chernikoff • Shambhala

Chernikoff—a longtime meditation teacher and counselor, and a former director of conscious aging program Sage-ing International— shares this insightful vision of what it means to become a wise elder. Dispelling the notion that aging inevitably saps us of meaning and joy, he deems our later years our spiritual prime: “The challenges inherent in the aging process,” writes Chernikoff, “can become a direct pathway to the actualization of our best human qualities—wisdom, joy, compassion, generosity, loving-kindness, and equanimity.” He then maps that path, drawing from many wisdom traditions as he illuminates seven core principles for growing older: Embracing the Mystery, Choosing a Vision, Awakening Intuition, Committing to Inner Work, Suffering Effectively, Serving from the Heart, and Celebrating the Journey. It all adds up to a compassionate, harmonious work, lighting the way to connection and purpose as hallmarks of this part of life. – AT

THE EXTRAORDINARY GIFT OF BEING ORDINARY Finding Happiness

Right Where You Are

Dr. Ronald D. Siegel • Guilford

Am I doing this right? Will people like it? …like me? Questions like this plague most of us every day. If they don’t, we may be a narcissist, sure we are the greatest! How do we break free and discover a middle way between withering self-examination and unjustified over-confidence?

Siegel, a longtime meditator and clinical psychologist, explores “how we humans evolved to be so preoccupied with evaluating ourselves, why we can’t win at this game, and what we each might do about it.” Findings: Our brains are preoccupied with assessing social rank and likability (primal survival concerns); as circumstances change, we keep moving the yardsticks out of our reach; and the good news is that we can give up the game, with a mindfulness toolkit that can interrupt our endless search for greater self-esteem. His diagnoses and prescriptions are delivered with humor, care, and lots of stories. It’s a helpful message that goes down easy. – BB

Practical advice and tools to help parents of kids ages 18 months to 4 years respond skillfully and with mindful intention, especially in difficult moments, from the popular author of Sitting Still Like a Frog.

Let the planets be your guide to reestablish trust in your own body and inner wisdom. Nutritionist, certified strength and conditioning specialist, and astrologer Claire Gallagher guides you in the healing powers of each planet and how to use food, movement, and lifestyle to realign and empower.

Stay calm, steady, and composed through the ups and downs of life with yoga poses, relaxation techniques, meditations, and lessons on how to manage stress, grief, anxiety, and life’s transitions.

From the bestselling author of How to Be an Adult in Relationships, the definitive guide to finding your perfect timing for life’s biggest decisions. Filled with relatable stories and helpful practices, Ready helps us understand our own perfect timing in everything that matters most.

The first-of-its-kind workbook that uses three easy steps to repair your relationship with money, from financial therapist Bari Tessler.

We tend to show more compassion to others than to ourselves. While it can be easier for us to lend a shoulder or a kind word to a friend, it can be a lot harder to open ourselves up to receiving the same. In this guided meditation, Sharon Salzberg invites us to open our hearts to giving and receiving love and reminds us that there’s nothing special we must do to deserve love—the fact that we simply exist is more than enough.

As much as the good moments are a part of life, so too are the difficult ones—and self-compassion can allow us to soften our approach to difficult events and emotions. While this may seem obvious, it’s so easy to forget. This guided practice from Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer can be a pleasant reminder to apply the three core components of self-compassion—mindfulness, common humanity, and kindness—when life gets rough.

WHO IS WELLNESS FOR? An Examination of Wellness Culture and Who It Leaves Behind Fariha Róisín • Harper Wave

In her third book, Fariha Róisín considers that uncomfortable question, who gets to be well? Her answer, conveying the breadth of true wellness and the depth of interconnectedness, is visionary: Either wellness must be for everyone, or it is for no one. “It deeply concerns me that whiteness and capitalism have co-opted wellness, relegating caring for oneself as a privilege when wellness should be for all,” she writes. “How can we be individually well if we aren’t well collectively?”

Róisín brings the perspectives of a queer Muslim woman who is part of the Bangladeshi diaspora, now living in New York. In courageous and richly insightful prose, and weaving in quotations from dozens of experts and teachers, she explores how “wellness” is constructed by unjust social and economic systems. She also reflects frankly on her own traumas: abuse by her mother, white supremacy, chronic illness. Her own healing, she says, was a catalyst for the book’s themes: “Starting with an inquiry into my own wellness inevitably meant that I had to expand to think of other people’s, too.”

Mindfulness invites us to appreciate the present moment instead of wishing things were different. This also applies to the way we look at ourselves, including some of the mistakes we’ve made and ways in which we wish we were different. In this meditation practice, Cheryl Jones leads us in a practice to foster self-acceptance and offers a way of learning to work with ourselves, and not on ourselves. – OL

Part 1, Journey to the Mind, looks at attitudes toward meditation and intuition. Róisín discusses epistemicide (the destruction of knowledge) as key to colonialism, with visible impacts on Western interpretations of meditation that often erase its original contexts. “If you meditate,” she wants us to ask ourselves, “why do you do it?” Part 2, Journey to the Body, explores the physiology of trauma, dysmorphia, white appropriation of yoga, and chronic illness. Part 3, On Self-Care (“a chance to choose myself again and again”), also investigates self-harm, esoteric traditions, and sexuality, referencing wisdom from bell hooks and Audre Lorde: “There is an inherent radicality to caring for yourself when you come from a lineage of oppressed people.” Lastly, in Introduction to Justice, she probes the need for economic degrowth, healing friendships, and a relationship of gratitude and reciprocity with the Earth. “There is sacredness here, there always was,” she says. “It’s about seeing it with fresh eyes and remembering everything can be a teaching.” – AT

Wonder Seeker

52 Ways to Wake Up Your Creativity and Find Your Joy

Andrea Scher • Harper Design

Author Andrea Scher seeks to remind us of magic—that source of wonder that is abundant in our surroundings, ourselves, and our connections with one another, if only we turn our attention to it. “Here’s what I know: our capacity for wonder and delight is also the gateway to our joy,” she writes.

This volume is a guidebook to levity, creativity, and delight in a time when it feels so needed. Scher skillfully navigates the reality that life is sometimes heavy, emotions are sometimes difficult, and we sometimes just don’t feel joyful, especially lately, and that’s OK. She offers space for reflection with prompts and offers personal stories in and around the main feature, which is a collection of ways to connect with ourselves, one another, and a sense of awe. If you could use a little help to fall back in love with the goodness that surrounds us despite everything else, this book is for you. – AWC

FREEDOM FROM HEALTH ANXIETY

Karen Lynn Cassiday • New Harbinger

The paradox of health anxiety is that we risk spending our healthiest moments worrying about losing physical health instead of enjoying it, writes author Karen Cassiday. We may unintentionally sacrifice our mental health in our worry and striving to get ahead of any possible threat. “Your real dilemma is not whether or not you have, or will get, a terrible illness,” she tells us. “It’s how you’ll live well in the life that you have been given.”

In this book, she helps the us face our fear and determine what “living well” looks like for us. This is the beginning of building new habits and neural pathways that help us shift focus to the positive and be present with what’s here now. Anecdotes, reminders, guided meditations, and therapeutic exercises add up to in a well-rounded and practical guide for people who struggle with a chronic fear of illness, death, and dying. – AWC

BRIAN

Cloud Meditation Bench Set

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It can be quite a sobering thought should you come to realize, as I have recently, that what you thought of as an aberration is actually a habit. The part of you that works hard to maintain self-esteem can sometimes get carried away: “I don’t do that very often. That’s not me. That’s not who I am.” When you begin to realize that, hey, maybe that is who I am, because I do that kind of a lot, the dastardly inner critic—the evil counterpart to rose-colored-glasses man—can run roughshod over you, reducing you to an inert lump with its withering words. Fortunately, there is a middle way, as proponents of self-compassion readily point out. For starters, you can laugh at yourself, heartily. Then, give yourself a break. Breathe. Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and see what’s there to be learned.

I learned that I regularly get into an intense rush when I’m doing something I don’t want to do. I clench my jaw, I tense my muscles, I breathe wrong, and I enslave my mind to an imagined ticking clock, as if I were the TV character Jack Bauer, from 24, who has to single-handedly save the entire world before the clock strikes midnight.

A few weeks ago I finally decided I could