Bona's Summer Reading List 2024 EP#109

 In this episode, I’m reminiscing about summer reading programs from my childhood. Whether you're traveling, relaxing by the lake, or diving into a good book, summer can be a time for fun and personal growth. Join me as I share  some fantastic book recommendations to inspire your summer reading list.

Book Recommendations:

• Take the Stairs by Rory Vaden:
• The Happiness Equation by Neil Pasricha:
• Happiness for Beginners by Katherine Center:
• Atlas of the Heart by Brené Brown:

Resources:

• Neil Pasricha's blog: 1000 Awesome Things
•  If you want even more reading ideas, you can check out my Summer Reading List from 2021

What's next:

• Share your summer reading lists and experiences with me!
• Start your own summer reading challenge and reward yourself.
• Come on over to The Happier You Facebook Group and join the conversation about your favourite books and summer reads.

Make time for the things you love this summer and capture those moments in your gratitude journal. Enjoy your reading adventures and choose happiness every day. Have a wonderful summer and go get your happy on!

Transcript

Did you have the summer reading program when you were a kid?  Where you signed up through the library and you got prizes for reading a bunch of books?  I LOVED the summer reading program so much.  In fact I heard on the radio that you can even sign up as an adult in my city.  I love reading. And I already have my list of books I want to read this summer.  Do you?

Well, if you don’t I have a few recommendations I’d love to share with you. Maybe you can create your own summer reading challenge and reward yourself when you reach your goal.  I always loved being rewarded with the final prize of a free book when I hit the big goal at the end of the summer.  

Today I’m going to give you an overview of a few of the books I have ready over the past year or so.  Maybe my take on them will spark some interest for you and inspire you add to your fun summer reads.

Take the stairs – Rory Vaden

In this book Rory talks about the “escalator mentality.”  Basically he clarifies that this mentality is that what we want shouldn’t require much work, and that there are always shortcuts in business and in life.

He says that  too often we allow each other to get away with debt, indulgence and procrastination.

Rory studied successful people and learned that there is one thing all have in common.  Successful people have done things they didn’t feel like doing in order to get where they are.  As he so succinctly puts it, success is not about taking the escalator – its about taking the stairs.

7 Strategies for self discipline.  None of these strategies are rocket science, but sometimes when you see something presented a certain way, you realize, OMG I’m doing this.  And when I do this, I’m sabotaging myself!  Yikes.

I don’t want to give the whole book away, but let me just give you an example of one of the concepts he talks about.  

Creative avoidance – This can happen when we get obsessed with minutiae while ignoring what’s truly important?  We tell ourselves we’re busy, but in fact, we’re spending hours surfing online, watching reruns, or creating “make work” for ourselves, while the real work goes ignored.

Okay my next book recommendation is

The Happiness Equation, by Neil Pasricha

This book feels like a really special find because I came across it at a used bookstore my son and I visited with my niece, nephew and sister.  I love discovering books about happiness that I haven’t heard of in the far back corner of a used book store.  Its like panning for gold…You wonder if its just shiny or does it have value for me?  

Well, I can tell you, I really enjoyed this book.  

In this book Neil shares 9 secrets to happiness.  He says that after years of successfully helping people lead teams, lead businesses and lead organizations, he realized that hardly anyone was happy!  Then he realized, he wasn’t happy.

The book starts with the author telling us to expect to disagree with some of what he says the first time you read it.  BUT he reminds us that we have the power to slowly let new ideas into our brain whenever we like.  I like that.  Sometimes we reject new ideas because they are new and unfamiliar to us…but if we let them percolate, we can start to change our opinion and get brave enough to try new things.

I had never heard of Neil Pasricha and because I hadn’t heard of him and no one suggested this book to me, I didn’t have any expectations.  I have to tell you, I LOVED this book.  Some of what he says in the book made me pause and think, what?  Hmmm not sure how I feel about that…but it did create some great discussions with my husband on many of our walks.  I enjoy ideas that stretch my brain…especially in a book where I can ponder them without anyone hounding me to have an opinion.  I can take my time and ask myself, how do I feel about this, does it apply to my life?  Then I enjoy taking them to someone else, often my husband or best friend, and sharing this new concept and asking what they think.  I hope some of you take me up on this recommendation because I would love to hear your thoughts on it.

In 2008 Neil started a blog called 1000 awesome things.  Every weekday he posted something awesome he noticed and he talks about it bit in this book.  He also did a TED talk about it(I’ll put that link in the show notes if you  are interested in watching it).  I went to his website to see his list of 1000 awesome things! It’s a feel good list.  In the future, when I challenge people to notice even the smallest things they are grateful for, I am going to send them to Neil’s list of 1000 awesome things.  His list is funny and honest and reminds us that there are lots of little things in life that can bring us joy if we let them.  

Now I’m going to shake things up a bit and recommend

Happiness For Beginners – Katherine Center

You will not find this book in the self help or personal growth section of the bookstore.  I’m adding in this fiction book because it is a feel good read that has resilience and happiness lessons in it that warmed my heart and inspired me.

Does the name Katherine Center ring a bell?  Well, it might be because I quite often reference her quote about being brave.  Way back in the beginning of my journey I was reading a Brene Brown book and she shared this quote by someone named Katherine Center:

“You have to be brave with your life so others can be brave with theirs.”  Brene was talking about vulnerability and this quote really stuck with me.

This quote was one of the pushes that helped me to find my courage to be vulnerable and start this podcast.  I was afraid of putting myself out there.  I liked my safe little life and wasn’t sure I wanted to put my goofy imperfect self out there.  When I read that quote, and realized that if I got over myself and shared my journey, maybe I could help someone else who was feeling as lost as I was.  

So I loved that quote, and often when I want to reference a quote of someone I haven’t heard of before, I google the person who said it.  I am not sure if this is how I discovered this author…but I have thoroughly enjoyed many of her books.  And honestly, as I was prepping for this podcast, I found a few of her books I haven’t read yet!  Yay, more Katherine Center.

So even if this isn’t officially a happiness self help book, it really kind of is.  It’s fiction, and it made the list because I wanted to offer you a variety of options for your summer reading list…

If you are like me and you enjoy a good inspirational story combined with a romantic story…I may have just introduced you to your new favourite author.  You can pretty much pick up any of her books and she will show you a woman who learns from her life’s struggles and discovers she is stronger and more resilient that she ever thought possible.  You can’t help but love her characters.

You may have seen this title on Netflix.  BUT I have to tell you, as is almost always the case, the book is 100x better.  The movie doesn’t have all the emotion and depth of the journey of any of the characters, especially, Helen, the main character.

Let me know if you read this or any other of her books.  So far I have devoured everything I have read by her…so as a bonus recommendation you can also check out “how to walk away.”

The final book I am going to recommend today is Atlas of the Heart by Brene Brown. 

I saved this one for last because it is NOT a light read.  It has taken me months to get through this one.  I think its because there is so much in this book that I have had to consume it in bite sized pieces.  There is to absorb and process that I think I will still be learning from this book in my 90s.

In this book Brene clarifies and defines eighty-seven emotions.  87!  In the book she tells us that from over 7000 surveys they did over 5 years, they found that the average person can name only 3 main emotions.  Happy, Sad & Angry.

Are you asking yourself why you need to be able to identify 84 more emotions?  Well as Brene points out, 

naming the experience doesn’t give the experience more power, but what it does is gives us the power of understanding and meaning.  When we can put our finger on what exactly we were feeling, we can better figure out how to help ourselves through it or ask for what we need.

For example she shows us that behind our anger there may be more than 20 emotions that are presenting as anger.  Some of these are; grief, isolation, guilt, shame, helplessness, depression and overwhelming stress.  .  

In this book we are learning how to better understand and communicate what we are feeling as well as validate and try to understand what others might be feeling so we can create meaningful connections.

So like I said, not a light read, but there is so much goodness in this book I had to add it to my recommended reading.

I always love hearing from you if you want to share any other books you are reading this summer.  

If you love reading, I wish you many beautiful reading opportunities this summer.  Remember to carve out times to do things you love and then be sure to capture them in your gratitude journal.  That way you get to enjoy the experience in the doing and in the remembering.

All right happy people here is my reading themed quote to leave you with today:

“A book is a gift you can open again and again.”—Garrison Keillor

Remember, when you have a choice, choose happy.  Have a good one, and go get your happy on!