Here are 100 books that Rising Strong fans have personally recommended if you like
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I’m a writer, researcher, and lifelong learner. As the daughter of an Air Force pilot, I followed my father on his assignments around the world and went to 10 schools before graduating from high school. But my greatest education was learning how people from different cultures find joy, meaning, and peace of mind. I have a Ph.D. in English literature and a master’s degree in counseling. I’m now Professor Emeritus and Associate Director of the Applied Spirituality Institute at Santa Clara University, a professional certified coach, and lecturer in the Positive Psychology Guild in the UK. I love books that bring us greater peace of mind, inspiration, and hope.
Why? Because it reassures me that I’m not alone in searching for greater peace of mind. Jon Kabat-Zinn combines stories from Buddhism and his own practice with humor and words of encouragement to remind me that it is up to me to wake up from the mindless rush of compulsive planning, worry, regret, and resentment that too often cycles through my mind like the voices on a talk radio station.
He also reminds me to be kind to myself, not to fall into shame or self-accusations, because mindfulness is an ongoing practice to become more centered, aware, and balanced.
I smile when I catch myself drifting away from being mindfully present, take a deep breath, and return to the here and now. And this process continues in my formal meditation practice each morning and my ongoing attempts to be more mindfully aware…
Reduce stress, ease anxiety, and increase inner peace—one day at a time—with a year of easy-to-follow mindfulness meditation techniques.
Certified mindfulness teacher, bestselling author, ultramarathoner, wife, and dog-mom Nita Sweeney shares mindfulness meditation practices to help anyone break free from worry and self-judgment.
I’m a writer, researcher, and lifelong learner. As the daughter of an Air Force pilot, I followed my father on his assignments around the world and went to 10 schools before graduating from high school. But my greatest education was learning how people from different cultures find joy, meaning, and peace of mind. I have a Ph.D. in English literature and a master’s degree in counseling. I’m now Professor Emeritus and Associate Director of the Applied Spirituality Institute at Santa Clara University, a professional certified coach, and lecturer in the Positive Psychology Guild in the UK. I love books that bring us greater peace of mind, inspiration, and hope.
It reads like a novel, but it’s a true story, a story of a young boy raised in a dysfunctional family—his father was an alcoholic who couldn’t hold down a job, and his mother was suicidally depressed. Poverty, eviction, his mother’s repeated attempts at suicide—this was his life until one day, at age 12, he met a kind woman who taught him to meditate.
I won’t give away the details of the story, only to say that I felt personally connected to young Jim as he awakened to greater peace of mind, hope, and possibility. And in his quest, I saw my own quest to reach for something beyond what had been to what could be.
In this book, I found insight and inspiration, reminders to pursue my own mindfulness practice, to leave the past behind and open my heart to the miracles…
The award-winning New York Times bestseller that inspired BTS's K-pop song 'Magic Shop'.
The day that 12-year-old James Doty walked in to his local magic shop is the day that changed his life.
Once the neglected son of an alcoholic father and a mother with chronic depression, he has gone on to become a leading neurosurgeon, based at Stanford University. He credits Ruth for this incredible turnaround: the remarkable woman he met at the Cactus Rabbit Magic Shop, who devoted the summer to transforming his mind and opening his heart.
In this uplifting memoir, Jim explains the visualisation techniques Ruth…
I’m a writer, researcher, and lifelong learner. As the daughter of an Air Force pilot, I followed my father on his assignments around the world and went to 10 schools before graduating from high school. But my greatest education was learning how people from different cultures find joy, meaning, and peace of mind. I have a Ph.D. in English literature and a master’s degree in counseling. I’m now Professor Emeritus and Associate Director of the Applied Spirituality Institute at Santa Clara University, a professional certified coach, and lecturer in the Positive Psychology Guild in the UK. I love books that bring us greater peace of mind, inspiration, and hope.
I read Shauna Shapiro’s Good Morning, I Love You when I was going through some difficult times, dealing with old abusive family patterns and trying to give myself the love and acceptance I hadn’t received as a child.
Shauna tells how she discovered the approach to mindful kindness and loving self-acceptance when she was also going through difficult times, and her therapist told her to say, “Good morning, Shauna, I love you.”
It took her a while to do this, and it’s taken me a while to follow her example. But her book was like a kind, supportive friend, reminding me that I’m not alone, that I can give myself the loving acceptance that I need and heal my childhood pain, one day, one small act of kindness, at a time.
This book has made a positive difference in my life.
Learn how self-compassion can change everything about how you feel, how you relate, and how you live-for good
"Revolutionary findings in neuroscience have demonstrated that we can change our happiness setpoint. But it's not through changing our external world. It's through changing our internal landscape," writes Shauna Shapiro. In Good Morning, I Love You, Dr. Shapiro-one of the leading scientists studying the effects of mindfulness on well-being-shows us that acting with compassion toward ourselves is the key.
In short, lively chapters, Dr. Shapiro explains the basic brain science and offers numerous mindfulness and self-compassion practices. Stories from her life and…
The Animal in the Mirror is a wake-up call to your higher self. Why do we keep reacting, fearing, and repeating the same patterns—no matter how much we know better? Because beneath our thoughts and emotions still lives the animal within: the ancient survival instinct that once kept us alive…
I’m a writer, researcher, and lifelong learner. As the daughter of an Air Force pilot, I followed my father on his assignments around the world and went to 10 schools before graduating from high school. But my greatest education was learning how people from different cultures find joy, meaning, and peace of mind. I have a Ph.D. in English literature and a master’s degree in counseling. I’m now Professor Emeritus and Associate Director of the Applied Spirituality Institute at Santa Clara University, a professional certified coach, and lecturer in the Positive Psychology Guild in the UK. I love books that bring us greater peace of mind, inspiration, and hope.
I love this book because the gratitude practice has made me happier and brought me greater peace of mind.
Lately, I’ve been feeling stressed, dealing with an undercurrent of insecurity and anxiety, worrying about things that haven’t happened yet, wondering what to do about them. In his years of research, Robert Emmons has found that a simple gratitude practice can bring us happiness and make a major difference in our worldview. And I’ve experienced this for myself.
Pausing to think of three things I’m grateful for each day and pausing throughout the day to acknowledge what I’m grateful for is helping me shift from a stressed-out state to become more calm, more confident, more hopeful. I smile more often, realizing how gratitude helps me recognize life’s small miracles, shifting my attention from the shadows to the light.
A scientifically groundbreaking, eloquent look at how we benefit—psychologically, physically, and interpersonally—when we practice gratitude.
Did you know that there is a crucial component of happiness that is often overlooked?
Robert Emmons—editor-in-chief of the Journal of Positive Psychology—examines what it means to think and feel gratefully in Thanks! and invites readers to learn how to put this powerful emotion into practice.
Scientifically speaking, regular grateful thinking can increase happiness by as much as 25 percent, while keeping a gratitude journal for as little as three weeks results in better sleep and more energy. But there's more than science to embrace…
Raised when unsupervised kids roamed freely in the woods, my friends and I became adept at finding fun. My 20s were spent in New York in the 1980's zeitgeist of exploration and excess. A lifelong fan of comedy, I worked at the Comedy Cellar, where I booked and watched countless standup comics. Later, I left NYC’s glamor for Vermont’s nature. Since then, my Vermont newspaper column, "Upper Valley Girl," has amused and astonished (and possibly appalled) readers with humor and candor. Ever adventurous to the point of risk, making awful mistakes, and enduring impossible people, I learned limits the hard way. I advise young people not to do the same.
Advice by way of memoir, which I liked more as it went along. Maybe it was a slow start for me because she had seemingly lucky breaks, and I’ve had struggles. By the end, I was in LOVE.
She is frank, ballsy, unapologetic, kickass riotous, with an apparent ability to moonwalk, all of which is to say totally New York City in a way that I badly miss, having left 30 years ago.
I relived some of my youth. I learned things and laughed.
What does it take to grow up cool and popular, master adulthood, fast track your success, and always be your best? Laura Belgray wouldn't know.
Her wildly relatable coming-of-age stories include hate-following her 6th grade bully on social media decades later; moving home post-college to measure her self-worth in hookups with Upper West Side bartenders; dating a sociopathic man-baby; proving herself in the early '90s at New York's coolest magazine (as the world's worst intern); falling for get-rich-quick schemes on the Internet; and, most of all, saying "tough titties" to the supposed-to's in life: driving a car,…
I’m just an ordinary person who’s struggled with their own habits and compulsions. My fear and anxiety led me to read many self-help books over the last thirty-something years, and a lot of them helped me to firmly believe that if you start your day in the best way you can, then there’s no limit to the things that you can achieve!
Each of the books I’ve recommended has given me simple tools to help me do just that. Ultimately, I know they inspired me to create the Bad Habit Kicker system. I truly believe they can all help others optimize their lives and become the best versions of themselves!
If you’ve ever felt the pull of resistance, and the frustration of knowing that there’s something that you really want to do, but then that little voice in your head steps up and stops you, then this book will 100% help you. It explains a very easy way of short-circuiting that discussion.
It’s another simple idea, which is what makes it so powerful and helpful. And if you enjoy listening to podcasts, Mel now has an excellent one, "The Mel Robbins Podcast," which you can find on all platforms.
How to enrich your life and destroy doubt in 5 seconds.
Throughout your life, you've had parents, coaches, teachers, friends and mentors who have pushed you to be better than your excuses and bigger than your fears. What if the secret to having the confidence and courage to enrich your life and work is simply knowing how to push yourself?
Using the science of habits, riveting stories and surprising facts from some of the most famous moments in history, art and business, Mel Robbins will explain the power of a "push moment."…
My parents encouraged me to become a children’s author when I was very young. At first, I thought that was the silliest idea ever, but I found creating stories to be fun and inspiring. I’ve been an award-winning published author since 2009, when I had an intuition to try writing stories for children. I love being a role model for children; someone who can show them that they can achieve much more than they imagine if they persevere. My personal story, My Life at Sweetbrier; ALife Changed by Horses, is a testament that remarkable things can be accomplished through perseverance. I’m honored my work has earned many literary awards.
Sticky Icky Vickyis an educational, entertaining, well-written book for children. The big, bright illustrations will help engage readers. They will want to know why Vicky is so terrified of water that she even hates bathing. What happened to make her fear water? How did Vicky overcome her fear? Readers will want to keep turning the pages to see how Vicky changes her thought process. What occurs in the story that helps Vicky make an important choice? Readers will cheer for Vicky as she tackles her fear.
Meet Sticky Icky Vicky, a girl who wants to get over her fear—once and for all In Sticky Icky Vicky: Courage over Fear, the first book in the Sticky Icky Vicky™ series, authors Alysia and Michael Ssentamu introduce readers to Vicky, a fun-loving girl who doesn't mind getting a little sticky and icky. She loves rolling down hills and playing in mud—but when it comes to water, Sticky Icky Vicky's fear prevents her from joining in the fun. Then Vicky gets an invitation for a waterpark party, and she decides that she really wants to go—even if it means ignoring…
There are so many good spiritual books out there that get little attention, especially books by women and women of color. I have been a meditation practitioner for three decades, running a mindfulness center at UCLA, and been teaching and sharing Buddhist and mindfulness teaching for 20+ years. I need my sources of inspiration too! Each of these books forced me to think—and brought new depth to my own meditation practice. I am interested in how the Buddhist and mindfulness teachings, which I love so deeply, can help us build resiliency and weather the challenges of the intersecting current ecological, political, and social crises. These books are a great start.
This book of short essays is a “jewel” in its simplicity and timeliness. Each essay tackles Buddhist teachings through teaching stories, but also with a clear heart and guidance for living in these challenging times. Kaira Jewel is a trustworthy guide with a big, loving heart, who can help us navigate loss, loneliness, anxiety, disempowerment, and change.
In ten concise chapters, you'll learn powerful ways to meet life's challenges with wisdom, resilience, and ease.
We all go through times when it feels like the ground is being pulled out from under us. What we relied on as steady and solid may change or even appear to vanish. In this era of global disruption, threats to our individual, social, and planetary safety abound, and at times life can feel overwhelming. Not only are loss and separation painful, but even positive changes can cause great stress.
Yet life is full of change: birth, death, marriage, divorce; a new relationship;…
I'm a Greek mom and entrepreneur at heart. Growing up, we cherished spirited conversations, ideas, and researching topics we loved. The whole goal was to really push each other to higher states of intellectual rigor that would improve the quality of life. Ideas and communication rival great food and Greek dancing fun. I share my passion for Philotimo (Greek imperative of love of honor and working for the greater good) through my books, brands, and marketing agency. I'm a fierce advocate for women and small businesses and have been featured in USA Today, Small Business Journal, Amazon Entrepreneurs, and enjoy being a weekly guest on national radio shows.
This book takes on the question that every successful woman is asked, “How do you balance it all?” Randi lives the concept that you can have it all, just not at the same time. Life is full of choices and this book breaks down a daily strategy to prioritize the most important areas of your life. She makes it so real, I could almost hear her voice, cadence, and smile. There is an honesty and vigor in the pages that really hit me hard to look in the mirror!
In this motivational handbook-both a business how-to and self-help guide-the New York Times bestselling author of Dot Complicated takes on the fallacy of the "well-balanced" life, arguing that the key to success is learning to be well-lopsided.
In an increasingly demanding world, we've been told that we can do everything-maintain friendships, devote ourselves to work, spend time with family, stay fit, and get enough sleep. We just need to learn to balance it all. Randi Zuckerberg doesn't believe in being well-balanced. We can't do it all every day,…
Are you tired of feeling tired? In a world that never stops, Drowning Lifeguards is a compassionate, down-to-earth guide for anyone struggling with exhaustion, burnout, or chronic fatigue.
Written by Ruth Hull, homoeopathic doctor, herbalist, counsellor, and author of five health-science textbooks, it offers a fresh, human approach to healing.…
I love to read. A life-changing event in 1997, started my journey into writing and eventually into my conversion to Judaism. Many years later, I’ve come to realize that there are grains of truth in every faith tradition and I search for those truths in my own life. Currently, I have four books in print, writing under the pen names of Brenda Ray (The Hebrew Midwives Trilogy) and B. K. Ricotta (Two of a Kind and A Love So Sweet). Two other novels (Book 1 and 2 of the Econfina Creek Series) are in the works.
This book was part of my women’s studies in nurse-midwifery school at the University of Florida. It affirmed what I already knew on a soul level about how women’s senses hold unique sub-strata. We “know” but have been unable to define the “why” over the centuries. As an empath, this book resonated with me and helped me understand how my gift brought to the bedside when caring for women at the most primal moments of their lives, was innate. It taught me how to trust my instincts.
Despite the progress of the women's movement, many women still feel silenced in their families and schools. This moving and insightful bestseller, based on in-depth interviews with 135 women, explains why they feel this way. Updated with a new preface exploring how the authors' collaboration and research developed, this tenth anniversary edition addresses many of the questions that the authors have been asked repeatedly in the years since Women's Ways of Knowing was originally published.
