| December 2019 | ‘Talking to strangers: What we should know about the people we don’t know’ by Gladwell: Through a series of puzzles, encounters and misunderstandings, from little-known stories to infamous legal cases, Gladwell takes us on a journey through the unexpected. You will read about the spy who spent years undetected at the highest levels of the Pentagon, the man who saw through the fraudster Bernie Madoff, the suicide of the poet Sylvia Plath and the false conviction of Amanda Knox. You will discover that strangers are never simple. |
| February 2020 | ‘The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are’ by Brown is 138 pages long. An acclaimed professor of social work offers a powerful and inspiring book that explores how to cultivate courage, compassion, and connection by embracing your imperfections and recognizing that we are enough. |
| April 2020 | ‘Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living’ by Chödrön is 176 pages long. We all want to be fearless, joyful, and fully alive, but we are bombarded every day with false promises about how to do that. A Buddhist nun shows us that, until we get to the heart of who we are and really make friends with ourselves, everything we do will be a superficial fix. |
| June 2020 | ‘Ladder of Divine Ascent’ by Climacus is 129 pages long. In a spiritual classic, the 6th-centuray abbot of Sinaie compares the spiritual life to a ladder of thirty steps, explaining in detail the challenges presented by each. |
| August 2020 | ‘The Gnostic Gospels’ by Pagels is 218 pages long. In 1945, an Egyptian peasant unearthed what proved to be the Gnostic Gospels, 13 payrus volumes that expounded a radically different view of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ than that of the New Testament. This landmark study of the long-buried roots of Christianity is widely-recognized as one of the most brilliant and accessible histories of early Christian spirituality ever published. |
| October 2020 | ‘The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment’ by Tolle is 229 pages long. We’ve all heard that living in the now is the truest path to happiness and enlightenment. Tolle gives us an excellent manual of what that means. |
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