Category Archives: existentialism

The Way of Integrity by Martha Beck

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The Way of Integrity by Martha Beck was another “Oprah pick” that I listened to via audiobook. In it, Beck uses the framework of Dante’s Inferno to organize her own self help book. I have noticed this method with the other self help books, and, as a framework, my critique is…okay, fine, why not?

The book is full of examples from life coach clients and Inferno, but the strongest moments are when she writes about her own life and her own experiences. I have not read her other works, but it sounds like she’s written extensively about her personal life, so maybe that’s why it does not figure more prominently in this book. Even still, I would have loved to learn more about her own experiences, and how she continues to wrestle with, or overcome her own problems.

Interestingly, she writes about important issues in her own life, issues that sound incredibly difficult to navigate, but she writes about these issues with a calm, removed, even cool, understanding. Calmness is important and helpful and helps convey that she has resolved these difficult issues–she has processed them and moved on. However, sometimes her tone is even sort of droll and eye-rolly about her own painful experiences. I do not blame her for not writing about the stuff that is not entirely healed and processed. Not at all. Don’t do it. However, I would like to hear a bit more of navigating challenges during the process, while the thing is still “in process.” Just a thought. Maybe she’ll do that. Maybe someone else will.

Overall, Beck seems skills at quickly assessing and distilling people’s issues into manageable work that can be healed and overcome. That’s nice. That’s hopeful.

When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing by Daniel H. Pink

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(Yes, audiobooks have entered the chat.) I recently finished When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing by Daniel H. Pink. This was an interesting book that was full of tidbits all loosely connected to the idea of timing. Pink pulls from every imaginable study on timing and presents them in the book, adding lots of his own examples and anecdotes.

While some will call this a kind of pseudoscience and others may find the content to be too broad or too common, I think Pink balances enough really interesting information on timing throughout to engage readers. I have already found myself sharing anecdotes from the book in the days since I finished it.

I think I might also be feeling some “life-hacking” or “bio-hacking” fatigue lately and sometimes just want to “let the soft animal of my body love what it loves.” However, I have to admit that in the past, I’ve known and used some of the tactics he mentions in the book, and there has definitely been a benefit. I think it’s worth the read, especially if you’re on an uptick in life and feeling motivated to improve.

Anatomy of the Spirit by Caroline Myss

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Next up in my series in the self-help genre was Anatomy of the Spirit by Caroline Myss. I have read, or skimmed (or was supposed to read?) Myss in the past–I can’t quite remember–but either way, this book was familiar. In it, Myss compares the Eastern concept of the seven chakras to the Catholic concept of the seven sacraments.

Peronally, I am much more familiar with the chakras than I am with the seven sacratments. But, based on my limited understanding, I thought the comparison was often clunky, especially in regards to the first three chakras and first of the seven sacraments. Sure, both are seven, and sure, seven is considered a sacred number across many traditions, but beyond that, the comparisons often felt like a stretch.

Myss, like many of the gurus in The Wisdom of Sundays, has to hedged her integration of an Eastern tradition into her practice or theory. I find this kind of hedging to be kind of sad and frustrating. On one hand, it can dumb down the content, and on the other hand, I am just baffled and disappointed about what this says about society’s ability to hold on to complex and/or competing ideas. Still, I suppose these baby steps are necessary. Either way, while I was sometimes weary of Myss’s use of Christianity as a foundation for the philosophies in ways that did not feel productive, I still found a lot of wisdom in her words. There are many nuggets of truth to be had here.

The Wisdom of Sundays by Oprah Winfrey

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Next in the line up for self-help was more from Oprah: The Wisdom of Sundays. Similarly to The Path Made Clear, this book included excerpts and insights from Oprah’s interviewees.

As one might imagine from the title (Sundays), this book was heavy influenced by religion, mostly Christianity. However, I think other readers have something to gain from it because the interviewees (and Oprah) frequently refer to a sense of spirituality that will resonate with most audiences.

Interestingly, most of the interviewees shared a narrative of a big transformation, some moment, a stroke of insight, a miracle occurring, which is such a part of the Christian tradition (and probably others) that I had a hard time taking it seriously as anything other than a trope. I wanted to hear more about the gurus who gained enlightenment after a slow and steady path. These are the stories that feel most realistic to me.

That said, I have also had big, transformational moments in my life too. Haven’t we all? And there is a lot to learn from those moments too, and they are certainly more entertaining to read about.

The Path Made Clear by Oprah Winfrey

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Recently I’ve read several very digestible self-help books, so I’m going to do a few quick write ups for each. Before I do so, I want to say that I am very picky about this genre. There is a lot of crap out there that is not only just bad or ineffective, but is actually actively harmful, but is disguised as “help.” I won’t mention names, but a big breakthrough book came out in this genre with a catchy title, and I tried to read it twice and had to stop. It was horrible and harmful, imho.

The first in the series of self-help that I thought actually had some gems was The Path Made Clear by Oprah Winfrey. In audio form, this reads like a Ted Talk, with excerpts from interviews with Oprah, which captures the deepest and most poignant insights.

In this book, interviewees, along with Oprah, share insights as to how one can best find and follow one’s path. I think the principles apply broadly and are helpful, no matter the circumstances in which one might find one’s self. However, I did find myself wondering about manic illnesses, where people make big, life changing decisions/actions as symptomatic of their illness more so than as truly following their own paths.

Many of the interviewees describe big moments, events, or deep, sudden senses of knowing that caused them to make big changes to their lives. There are few, if any, examples in the book of these gurus making small and incremental changes over long periods of time to more fully express their own life paths. However, most of my successes have been the slow and steady kind. Yes, I’ve had sudden aha moments about the direction of my life, but even these were part of a clear trajectory. I think this book could be harmful for those who are prone to self-sabotage, self-destruction, or the like. For everyone else, the book is full of great reminders on how to follow one’s bliss and live life to the fullest and get outside the expectations of others and culture.

The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff

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I can now join your book club because I have finally finished reading Lauren Groff’s The Vaster Wilds. Now, what to say.

I am a fan of Groff since I read her book of shorts titled Florida. So, I knew The Vaster Wilds would be good, and it was. It was also torturous. I feel like culturally we have a Game of Thrones kind of obsession with torture right now, and that also makes sense culturally, and all of the anger, hate, and misogyny we see is reflected in our art, and so it does makes sense. However, that does not make it easy.

Still, the book is good and worth reading. This is especially true if you like popular books, but strive to read more literary works because this has some of the elements of popular fiction, while also feeding the nourishing steamed broccoli that is literary-quality writing. (Given the starvation of colonizers in early 1600s America, all food analogies probably fall flat.) Funnily enough, I was near the end before I realized the vaster in the title was not a reference to a proper noun. In years to come, I could see this piece taught in college courses because I think there is just so much here.

Secret Harvests: A Hidden Story of Separation and the Resilience of a family Farm by David Mas Masumoto

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Secret Harvests by David Mas Masumoto was a lovely, slow, circling meditation that encompassed such weighty topics as disability, the institutionalization of the disabled, family farming, and the Japanese internment of WWII. Each theme is threaded through the book, stitch by stitch. Masumoto mentions that he and his family are Buddhists, and it seemed that the practice was etched into this book, the questions, the acceptance of suffering, the cyclical nature, the peace. It’s a great book, and I wish more nonfiction was written in this way. I was inspired and hope to see more from this author and would especially like to read more of his ruminations on farming and on life. There are also gorgeous prints embedded throughout throughout the book!

Florida by Lauren Groff

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While awaiting the arrival of the highly praised The Vaster Wilds, I came across Lauren Groff’s collection of short stories entitled Florida, and what a delight.

First thing I’ll say is that this is a book of short stories that really deserves to be a book. The stories speak to each other so well that it’s almost like this is a way of making a “novel,” less linear, less plot driven, but still so very meaningful.

Next, I’ll say that, without subheadings or even making much mention of it in the blurb, this book captures motherhood is such a real and raw and genuine way. There are so many books on the market about motherhood, but many of them don’t capture my experience. However, the depictions of it in this book were so good.

That’s what I have to say about the book. I was on the fence about The Vaster Wilds, but now my curiosity is definitely piqued!

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett

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The only other book I’ve read by Ann Patchett was This is the Story of a Happy Marriage, which I read last year. My thinking is that Patchett has had a long and illustrious career and has earned the time and patience it takes the readers to complete her books. Tom Lake is no exception. It might even be her crowing achievement in time and patience, which is not to say that it isn’t worth it.

Perhaps what strikes me most about Patchett, and that generation of woman writer, is the way they interact with men. Men seem to hold a higher interest than in contemporary literature. The women, even the author, seems to defer to them for knowledge and guidance.

I know of one woman of the same generation who is this way too. I’m not even sure if it’s a bad thing, but it strikes me as a bygone way being and thinking. Yeah, that little thing is probably what struck me most.

Second, I was struck by how much attention the people in the book gave the narrator, who is an aging mother and former actress. Her daughters were mostly riveted by her stories, and her husband was patient with her as well. Near the end, the reason for this interest becomes clearer, but throughout the bulk of the book, the narrator seems tedious and detailed, even delighting in her story and drawing it out for emphasis in a way that felt somewhat irritating to both the daughter and the readers.

In the end, I think it is a good book, calculating, safe, comfortable, and revealing a unique story not often told. It’s worth reading, but with patience.

Rough House by Tina Ontiveros

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Rough House by Tina Ontiveros is excellent. Excellent. I don’t say it lightly when I say that I think she is like a female Raymond Carver–Carver, a magnificent writer, who, in my mind, so perfectly captured the unique culture of the Northwest, the logging, the mill towns, and the landscapes (portrayed unromantically, but true). In fact, Ontiveros has lived in some of the exact same towns as Carver!

Carver died decades ago, and the Northwest of the ’80s, ’90s, and today deserve their own new depictions. Ontiveros does just that. The author writes about her troubled childhood and geniusly pairs the horrific abuse with the love in that unique way that it is so often packaged together in families.

Because I am so deeply rooted in the Northwest, having grown up here myself, being a part of a larger family that has lived here since the time of the Oregon trail, and living in a family whose income came from logging, mill work and the like, Ontiveros’s novel was so very familiar to me. I loved how she captured the culture, the strong sense of place, even the language.

I am stunned by this work.