Best of
Philosophy

2019

A Matter of Death and Life


Irvin D. Yalom - 2019
    But never had he faced the need to counsel himself until his wife, esteemed feminist author Marilyn Yalom, was diagnosed with cancer. In A Matter of Death and Life, Marilyn and Irv share how they took on profound new struggles: Marilyn to die a good death, Irv to live on without her.In alternating accounts of their last months together and Irv's first months alone, they offer us a rare window into facing mortality and coping with the loss of one's beloved. The Yaloms had numerous blessings--a loving family, a Palo Alto home under a magnificent valley oak, a large circle of friends, avid readers around the world, and a long, fulfilling marriage--but they faced death as we all do. With the wisdom of those who have thought deeply, and the familiar warmth of teenage sweethearts who've grown up together, they investigate universal questions of intimacy, love, and grief.Informed by two lifetimes of experience, A Matter of Death and Life is an openhearted offering to anyone seeking support, solace, and a meaningful life.

Moral Fiber - A Practical Guide to Living Our Values


Shawn Vij - 2019
    Taking an innovative and secular approach to business Ethics, moral fiber shows us how living our values unlocks a more purposeful life and career. This book helps us to re-discover the inherent core values, such as fairness, respect, compassion, and honesty, and then how to genuinely Act on them daily.This practical guide is filled with tips, tales, and tools to identify and eliminate toxic behaviors and motivators, as well as priceless lessons from top industry leaders and powerful research from academics. TESTIMONIALS“[Shawn] shares with us how compassion, gratitude and wisdom opens our inner door, unlocking a more purposeful life and career.” — HIS HOLINESS THE DALAI LAMA“Moral Fiber takes us on a beautiful journey of how capitalism and compassion must co-exist to improve our human condition.” — JOHN MACKEY, CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, WHOLE FOODS MARKET“At a time of great uncertainty, Moral Fiber is a welcome tonic and an authentic reminder of how having capitalism with compassion elevates us all.” — JENNIFER REINGOLD, FORMER MANAGEMENT WRITER, FORTUNE MAGAZINE, FAST COMPANY AND BUSINESSWEEK“Moral Fiber drops us head-first into a world of awakening.” — THOMAS DONALDSON, PROFESSOR OF BUSINESS ETHICS, WHARTON SCHOOL, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA“In Moral Fiber, Vij creatively shows us how our core values can be a key to personal happiness and professional success.” — HOWARD C. CUTLER, M.D., NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLING AUTHOR OF THE ART OF HAPPINESS

How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius


Donald J. Robertson - 2019
    The Meditations, his personal journal, survives to this day as one of the most loved self-help and spiritual classics of all time. In How to Think Like a Roman Emperor, cognitive psychotherapist Donald Robertson weaves the life and philosophy of Marcus Aurelius together seamlessly to provide a compelling modern-day guide to the Stoic wisdom followed by countless individuals throughout the centuries as a path to achieving greater fulfillment and emotional resilience.How to Think Like a Roman Emperor takes readers on a transformative journey along with Marcus, following his progress from a young noble at the court of Hadrian—taken under the wing of some of the finest philosophers of his day—through to his reign as emperor of Rome at the height of its power. Robertson shows how Marcus used philosophical doctrines and therapeutic practices to build emotional resilience and endure tremendous adversity, and guides readers through applying the same methods to their own lives.Combining remarkable stories from Marcus’s life with insights from modern psychology and the enduring wisdom of his philosophy, How to Think Like a Roman Emperor puts a human face on Stoicism and offers a timeless and essential guide to handling the ethical and psychological challenges we face today.

Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World


Tyson Yunkaporta - 2019
    He asks how contemporary life diverges from the pattern of creation. How does this affect us? How can we do things differently?Sand Talk provides a template for living. It’s about how lines and symbols and shapes can help us make sense of the world. It’s about how we learn and how we remember. It’s about talking to everybody and listening carefully. It’s about finding different ways to look at things.Most of all it’s about Indigenous thinking, and how it can save the world.

Figuring


Maria Popova - 2019
     Stretching between these figures is a cast of artists, writers, and scientists--mostly women, mostly queer--whose public contribution has risen out of their unclassifiable and often heartbreaking private relationships to change the way we understand, experience, and appreciate the universe. Among them are the astronomer Maria Mitchell, who paved the way for women in science; the sculptor Harriet Hosmer, who did the same in art; the journalist and literary critic Margaret Fuller, who sparked the feminist movement; and the poet Emily Dickinson.Emanating from these lives are larger questions about the measure of a good life and what it means to leave a lasting mark of betterment on an imperfect world: Are achievement and acclaim enough for happiness? Is genius? Is love? Weaving through the narrative is a set of peripheral figures--Ralph Waldo Emerson, Charles Darwin, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Herman Melville, Frederick Douglass, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Walt Whitman--and a tapestry of themes spanning music, feminism, the history of science, the rise and decline of religion, and how the intersection of astronomy, poetry, and Transcendentalist philosophy fomented the environmental movement.

The School of Life: An Emotional Education


Alain de Botton - 2019
    That's why we need The School of Life - a real organisation founded ten years ago by writer and philosopher Alain de Botton. The School of Life has one simple aim: to equip people with the tools to survive and thrive in the modern world. And the most important of these tools is emotional intelligence.This book brings together ten years of essential and transformative research on emotional intelligence, with practical topics including:- how to understand yourself- how to master the dilemmas of relationships- how to become more effective at work - how to endure failure- how to grow more serene and resilientThe School of Life is nothing short of a crash course in emotional maturity. With all the trademark wit and elegance of Alain de Botton's other writings, and rooted in practical, achievable advice, it show us a path to the better lives we all want and deserve.

On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts


James K.A. Smith - 2019
    In a way, it's a book Augustine has written about each of us. Popular speaker and award-winning author James K. A. Smith has spent time on the road with Augustine, and he invites us to take this journey too, for this ancient African thinker knows far more about us than we might expect.Following Smith's successful You Are What You Love, this book shows how Augustine can be a pilgrim guide to a spirituality that meets the complicated world we live in. Augustine, says Smith, is the patron saint of restless hearts--a guide who has been there, asked our questions, and knows our frustrations and failed pursuits. Augustine spent a lifetime searching for his heart's true home and he can help us find our way. "What makes Augustine a guide worth considering," says Smith, "is that he knows where home is, where rest can be found, what peace feels like, even if it is sometimes ephemeral and elusive along the way." Addressing believers and skeptics alike, this book shows how Augustine's timeless wisdom speaks to the worries and struggles of contemporary life, covering topics such as ambition, sex, friendship, freedom, parenthood, and death. As Smith vividly and colorfully brings Augustine to life for 21st-century readers, he also offers a fresh articulation of Christianity that speaks to our deepest hungers, fears, and hopes.

Stillness Is the Key


Ryan Holiday - 2019
    In his new book, Stillness Is the Key, Holiday draws on timeless Stoic and Buddhist philosophy to show why slowing down is the secret weapon for those charging ahead.All great leaders, thinkers, artists, athletes, and visionaries share one indelible quality. It enables them to conquer their tempers. To avoid distraction and discover great insights. To achieve happiness and do the right thing. Ryan Holiday calls it stillness--to be steady while the world spins around you.In this book, he outlines a path for achieving this ancient, but urgently necessary way of living. Drawing on a wide range of history's greatest thinkers, from Confucius to Seneca, Marcus Aurelius to Thich Nhat Hanh, John Stuart Mill to Nietzsche, he argues that stillness is not mere inactivity, but the doorway to self-mastery, discipline, and focus.Holiday also examines figures who exemplified the power of stillness: baseball player Sadaharu Oh, whose study of Zen made him the greatest home run hitter of all time; Winston Churchill, who in balancing his busy public life with time spent laying bricks and painting at his Chartwell estate managed to save the world from annihilation in the process; Fred Rogers, who taught generations of children to see what was invisible to the eye; Anne Frank, whose journaling and love of nature guided her through unimaginable adversity.More than ever, people are overwhelmed. They face obstacles and egos and competition. Stillness Is the Key offers a simple but inspiring antidote to the stress of 24/7 news and social media. The stillness that we all seek is the path to meaning, contentment, and excellence in a world that needs more of it than ever.

Immortal Talks (- Book 2)


Shunya - 2019
    Hundreds of miles away from her home, the immortal Guru and His secret disciples meet in a forested mountain to discuss metaphysical ways of steering her soul back to a life of happiness and prosperity. This treasure is the second instalment in the Immortal Talks book series. It contains six priceless chapters: A Thousand Lives; The Linga Code; Incomplete; The Invisible Four; The Awareness Setting; Continuity.

100 Fun Bible Facts: The Exciting way to Learn (100 Bible Facts Book 1)


Ginger Baum - 2019
    This is because they are fascinated by how they can connect in a real way to these exciting truths. This is a tried-and-true motivating method that gives a clear understanding, while keeping a grasp on comprehension. This is the first book of its kind, and it keeps the awe-inspired reader continuously interested. Every person that has the privilege to absorb this kind of wisdom will hold onto it throughout their precious lives as it paves the way to an accurate road of faith and strength. This carefully crafted timeless piece will help build self-confidence, self-expression, and closeness to the Lord. Readers won't be able to hold in all of the magnificent facts that they've learned, and will quickly share their enthusiasm with others.

No Self, No Problem: How Neuropsychology Is Catching Up to Buddhism


Chris Niebauer - 2019
    When he presented his findings to a professor, his ideas were quickly dismissed as “pure coincidence, nothing more.”Fast-forward 20 years later and Niebauer is a PhD and a tenured professor, and the Buddhist-neuroscience connection he found as a student is practically its own genre in the bookstore. But according to Niebauer, we are just beginning to understand the link between Eastern philosophy and the latest findings in psychology and neuroscience and what these assimilated ideas mean for the human experience.In this groundbreaking book, Niebauer writes that the latest research in neuropsychology is now confirming a fundamental tenet of Buddhism, what is called Anatta, or the doctrine of “no self.” Niebauer writes that our sense of self, or what we commonly refer to as the ego, is an illusion created entirely by the left side of the brain. Niebauer is quick to point out that this doesn't mean that the self doesn't exist but rather that it does so in the same way that a mirage in the middle of the desert exists, as a thought rather than a thing. His conclusions have significant ramifications for much of modern psychological modalities, which he says are spending much of their time trying to fix something that isn’t there.What makes this book unique is that Niebauer offers a series of exercises to allow the reader to experience this truth for him- or herself, as well as additional tools and practices to use after reading the book, all of which are designed to change the way we experience the world—a way that is based on being rather than thinking.

Can Science Explain Everything?


John C. Lennox - 2019
    Science, and the technologies it has spawned, has delivered so much to the world: clean water; more food; better healthcare; longer life. And we live in a time of rapid scientific progress that holds enormous promise for many of the problems we face as humankind. So much so, in fact, that many see no need or use for religion and belief systems that offer us answers to the mysteries of our universe. Science has explained it, they assume. Science and religion just do not mix.Oxford Maths Professor and Christian believer Prof. John Lennox offers a fresh way of thinking about science and Christianity that dispels the common misconceptions about both. He reveals that not only are they not opposed, but they can and must mix to give us a fuller understanding of the universe and the meaning of our existence.

The Devil's Deceptions: Is There Life After Death?


Ginger Baum - 2019
    In a world that is overflowing with man's traditions, that often put a dark cloud over God's truth, you will be astonished by the answers that now await you concerning the mysteries of death.

Becoming Beauvoir: A Life


Kate Kirkpatrick - 2019
    Her novels won prestigious literary prizes and The Second Sex transformed the way we think about sex and gender. She was also the long-term lover of Jean-Paul Sartre, but it was to film-maker Claude Lanzmann that she wrote 'You are my destiny, my eternity, my life ...' in letters which only came to light in 2018.Kate Kirkpatrick draws on previously unavailable diaries and letters, including those written to Lanzmann.The new personal details about her life revealed for the first time by the book can only deepen the mystery and our fascination with her. Why did this 'feminist icon' edit her image so much? Why did she lie about her relationship with Sartre so often, or claim not to be a philosopher? Perhaps with so much that's new here we'll get a little closer to understanding who Beauvoir really was.

That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation


David Bentley Hart - 2019
    But today, this view is no longer prevalent within Christian communities.   In this momentous book, David Bentley Hart makes the case that nearly two millennia of dogmatic tradition have misled readers on the crucial matter of universal salvation. On the basis of the earliest Christian writings, theological tradition, scripture, and logic, Hart argues that if God is the good creator of all, he is the savior of all, without fail. And if he is not the savior of all, the Kingdom is only a dream, and creation something considerably worse than a nightmare. But it is not so. There is no such thing as eternal damnation; all will be saved. With great rhetorical power, wit, and emotional range, Hart offers a new perspective on one of Christianity’s most important themes.

Learning from the Germans: Race and the Memory of Evil


Susan Neiman - 2019
    Neiman is a white woman who came of age in the civil rights–era South and a Jewish woman who has spent much of her adult life in Berlin. Working from this unique perspective, she combines philosophical reflection, personal stories, and interviews with both Americans and Germans who are grappling with the evils of their own national histories.Through discussions with Germans, including Jan Philipp Reemtsma, who created the breakthrough Crimes of the Wehrmacht exhibit, and Friedrich Schorlemmer, the East German dissident preacher, Neiman tells the story of the long and difficult path Germans faced in their effort to atone for the crimes of the Holocaust. In the United States, she interviews James Meredith about his battle for equality in Mississippi and Bryan Stevenson about his monument to the victims of lynching, as well as lesser-known social justice activists in the South, to provide a compelling picture of the work contemporary Americans are doing to confront our violent history. In clear and gripping prose, Neiman urges us to consider the nuanced forms that evil can assume, so that we can recognize and avoid them in the future.

Lessons in Stoicism: What Ancient Philosophers Teach Us about How to Live


John Sellars - 2019
    But what exactly did the Stoics believe? In Lessons in Stoicism, philosopher John Sellars weaves together the key ideas of the three great Roman Stoics -- Seneca, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius -- with snapshots of their fascinating lives, to show us how their ideas can help us today. In vivid prose, Sellars shows how the works of these three Stoics have inspired readers ever since, speaking as they do to some of the perennial issues that face anyone trying to navigate their way through life. Their works, fundamentally, are about how to live -- how to understand one's place in the world, how to cope when things don't go well, how to manage one's emotions and how to behave towards others. Consoling and inspiring, Lessons in Stoicism is a deeply thoughtful guide to the philosophy of a good life.

The Little Book of Stoicism: Timeless Wisdom to Gain Resilience, Confidence, and Calmness


Jonas Salzgeber - 2019
    Even though these schools don’t exist anymore, you and I and most people are in as much need of a philosophy that guides us through life as we ever were.This compelling, highly actionable guide shows you how to deal more effectively with whatever life throws at you and live up to your best self.A mix of timeless wisdom and empowering advice, The Little Book of Stoicism will point the way to anyone seeking a calm and wise life in a chaotic world.

Economy of Truth: Practical Maxims and Reflections


Vizi Andrei - 2019
    A very pleasant and creative work.” ―Dr. Larry Sanger, ex-founder of Wikipedia Economy of Truth is a collection of practical maxims and reflections either designed through clever artwork or in the form of writing only.In an enjoyable and impactful manner, Vizi Andrei aims to challenge our long-held beliefs about art, education, courage, progress, happiness, intelligence, and creativity. Readers who come to this book expecting practical guidance will not be disappointed, but they will be delighted to see that such guidance is being delivered rather artistically―via short stories that read like modern poetry, beautifully accompanied by vivid illustrations. The wisdom this book permeates with comes from figures such as Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Confucius, Epicurus, Antisthenes, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Michel de Montaigne, Emil Cioran, Leo Tolstoy, Mircea Eliade, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Friedrich Nietzsche, Blaise Pascal, Arthur Schopenhauer, Luc de Clapiers but also Carlo M. Cipolla, Umberto Eco, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Alain de Botton, Rory Sutherland, or Naval Ravikant.“An urgent book ... Vizi's work is bursting with many irreverent lessons ready to help you remove the chains of modernity. This book will sharpen your thinking and help you gain clarity on a variety of crucial topics.” ―Ruben Chavez, founder of ThinkGrowProsper “A well-reasoned collection of meditations ... They will contagiously make you think!” ―Luca Dellanna, author of Operational Excellence “Written in a quaint voice, this book charms the reader―mixing just the right amount of reflective self-awareness with cutting insight. For those who consider musings of great import, a pleasant stroll through Economy of Truth would be time well-spent.” ―Jack Peach, teacher and traveler

Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control


Stuart Russell - 2019
    Conflict between humans and machines is seen as inevitable and its outcome all too predictable.In this groundbreaking book, distinguished AI researcher Stuart Russell argues that this scenario can be avoided, but only if we rethink AI from the ground up. Russell begins by exploring the idea of intelligence in humans and in machines. He describes the near-term benefits we can expect, from intelligent personal assistants to vastly accelerated scientific research, and outlines the AI breakthroughs that still have to happen before we reach superhuman AI. He also spells out the ways humans are already finding to misuse AI, from lethal autonomous weapons to viral sabotage.If the predicted breakthroughs occur and superhuman AI emerges, we will have created entities far more powerful than ourselves. How can we ensure they never, ever, have power over us? Russell suggests that we can rebuild AI on a new foundation, according to which machines are designed to be inherently uncertain about the human preferences they are required to satisfy. Such machines would be humble, altruistic, and committed to pursue our objectives, not theirs. This new foundation would allow us to create machines that are provably deferential and provably beneficial.In a 2014 editorial co-authored with Stephen Hawking, Russell wrote, "Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history. Unfortunately, it might also be the last." Solving the problem of control over AI is not just possible; it is the key that unlocks a future of unlimited promise.

Democracy May Not Exist, But We'll Miss It When It's Gone


Astra Taylor - 2019
    From a cabal of thieving plutocrats in the White House to rising inequality and xenophobia worldwide, it is clear that democracy--specifically the principle of government by and for the people--is not living up to its promise.In Democracy May Not Exist, but We'll Miss It When It's Gone, Astra Taylor shows that real democracy--fully inclusive and completely egalitarian--has in fact never existed. In a tone that is both philosophical and anecdotal, weaving together history, theory, the stories of individuals, and conversations with such leading thinkers as Cornel West, Danielle Allen, and Wendy Brown, Taylor invites us to reexamine the term. Is democracy a means or an end, a process or a set of desired outcomes? What if the those outcomes, whatever they may be--peace, prosperity, equality, liberty, an engaged citizenry--can be achieved by non-democratic means? Or if an election leads to a terrible outcome? If democracy means rule by the people, what does it mean to rule and who counts as the people?The inherent paradoxes are too often unnamed and unrecognized. By teasing them out, Democracy May Not Exist, but We'll Miss It When It's Gone offers a better understanding of what is possible, what we want, and why democracy is so hard to realize.

For Small Creatures Such as We: Rituals for Finding Meaning in Our Unlikely World


Sasha Sagan - 2019
    Read her work; you'll have a deeper appreciation for your every step, every bite, and every breath." --Bill NyeSasha Sagan was raised by secular parents, the astronomer Carl Sagan and the writer and producer Ann Druyan. They taught her that the natural world and vast cosmos are full of profound beauty, that science reveals truths more wondrous than any myth or fable.When Sagan herself became a mother, she began her own hunt for the natural phenomena behind our most treasured occasions--from births to deaths, holidays to weddings, anniversaries, and more--growing these roots into a new set of rituals for her young daughter that honor the joy and significance of each experience without relying on religious framework.As Sagan shares these rituals, For Small Creatures Such as We becomes a tribute to a father, a newborn daughter, a marriage, and the natural world--a celebration of life itself, and the power of our families and beliefs to bring us together.

On Meditation: Finding Infinite Bliss and Power Within


Sri M. - 2019
    

The Vedas and Upanishads for Children


Roopa Pai - 2019
    Three thousand years ago, deep inside the forests of India, agreat ‘thought revolution’ was brewing.In those forest labs, the brightest thinker–philosopherscontemplated the universe, reflected on ancient texts called theVedas and came up with startling insights into questions westill don’t have final answers to, like:• What is the universe made of?• How do I know I’m looking at a tree when I see one?• Who am I? My body, my mind, my intelligence, my emotions,or none of the above?And where did they put those explosive findings?In a sprawling body of goosebumpy and fascinating oralliterature called the Upanishads! Intimidated? Don’t be! Forthis joyful, fun guide to some of India’s longest-lasting secularwisdoms, reinterpreted for first-time explorers by Roopa Pai, isguaranteed to keep you turning the pages.Why haven’t you read it yet?

Understanding Marxism


Richard D. Wolff - 2019
    It clearly serves the 1% far, far better than what it is doing to the vast mass of the people.Marx was a social critic for whom capitalism was not the end of human history. It was just the latest phase and badly needed the transition to something better. We offer this essay now because of the power and usefulness today of Marx’s criticism of the capitalist economic system.

Mystic Road Warrior


Medha Narwani - 2019
    The mystical intervention that saves his life upends his privileged existence by forcing him to finally confront age-old questions of consciousness, reality and the infinite, which have hounded him since his parents’ untimely deaths. Seized with spiritual restlessness, Lawrence travels extensively in India—to crowded holy sites, drought-stricken cities and the glacial Himalayas where he meets 400-year-old yogis with mind-bending fantastic superpowers common to true yogis. To attain spiritual mastery himself, Lawrence must renounce all material pursuits and attachment to his fiancée pulling him back home. Intellectually, emotionally and physically at a breaking point, Lawrence finally returns to a realised master whose watchful guidance throughout has been testing him and preparing him for the ultimate journey within. Based on Vedanta, Mystic Road Warrior is a compelling tale of inner evolution and a higher state of being.'Enjoyed reading Mystic Road Warrior. The narrative blends the metaphysical with the practical in an interesting way. It's a good read!
'- Ruskin Bond, Acclaimed Author 'Mystic Road Warrior is an enchanting novel. It is a meeting point of the spiritual, miraculous and mystical dimensions within us. It vividly brings to life the immense possibilities that the practice of the ancient systems of yoga and vedanta bring to its genuine and persistent practitioners. The appeal of its plot and story line is timeless.'- Kartik Vyas, Executive Coach and Yoga Mentor

The Idea of the World: A Multi-Disciplinary Argument for the Mental Nature of Reality


Bernardo Kastrup - 2019
    The Idea of the World offers a grounded alternative to the frenzy of unrestrained abstractions and unexamined assumptions in philosophy and science today. This book examines what can be learned about the nature of reality based on conceptual parsimony, straightforward logic and empirical evidence from fields as diverse as physics and neuroscience. It compiles an overarching case for idealism - the notion that reality is essentially mental - from ten original articles the author has previously published in leading academic journals. The case begins with an exposition of the logical fallacies and internal contradictions of the reigning physicalist ontology and its popular alternatives, such as bottom-up panpsychism. It then advances a compelling formulation of idealism that elegantly makes sense of - and reconciles - classical and quantum worlds. The main objections to idealism are systematically refuted and empirical evidence is reviewed that corroborates the formulation presented here. The book closes with an analysis of the hidden psychological motivations behind mainstream physicalism and the implications of idealism for the way we relate to the world.

High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Experiences in the Seventies


Erik Davis - 2019
    Dick, Terence McKenna, and Robert Anton Wilson, High Weirdness charts the emergence of a new psychedelic spirituality that arose from the American counterculture of the 1970s. These three authors changed the way millions of readers thought, dreamed, and experienced reality—but how did their writings reflect, as well as shape, the seismic cultural shifts taking place in America?In High Weirdness, Erik Davis—America's leading scholar of high strangeness—examines the published and unpublished writings of these vital, iconoclastic thinkers, as well as their own life-changing mystical experiences. Davis explores the complex lattice of the strange that flowed through America's West Coast at a time of radical technological, political, and social upheaval to present a new theory of the weird as a viable mode for a renewed engagement with reality.

Dauntless (2019)


Marcus Follin - 2019
    The collected teachings of The Golden One.Dauntless: The Wild Hunt Edition (2021) is a greatly updated version of this book.

DYING TO LIVE: THE END OF FEAR: A Direct Approach To Freedom From Psychological And Emotional Suffering


David Parrish - 2019
    This is a presentation of the essential teaching of this direct path to freedom that focuses on the recognition and realization of the True Self. This book identifies the root cause of suffering as the identification with the mind and the belief that the psychological construct that is considered the "person" is actual. It is shown that this idea we have of who we are is an illusion that has been taken to be real and thus creates all forms of psychological suffering and confusion. The freedom from this illusion is shown to be available to anyone who is willing to recognize and realize the truth of who they are. This is a non-dual approach to psychological treatment that is becoming a new approach that has the potential to bring an end to all psychological disorders.

Ice Cream Man


Dax Flame - 2019
    Having run out of options, former YouTube star Dax Flame must get a job at an ice cream shop in order to make ends meet.

A Week With Enya: We live blind...


Amar B. Singh - 2019
    Where we don't, we read, we ask, we learn and then, we solve! What happens when there are no answers though? When nobody in the world knows! When we see the need to invent Gods even if we can't discover Him. Through a string of poems, the author narrates such an experience with his non-verbal and autistic daughter, Enya. What started as a week of babysitting for him soon became a seeking to change her into 'normal'. But, that seeking ended up transforming the seeker!The narrative in the form of poetry touches upon the revelation that comes out of desperation of not finding an answer at all and therefore, the thoughts getting tired of themselves and the mind taking a back seat. In that silence, the author says, things become clear and all aspects of life show their inter-relation! The intellect gives way to the intelligence, the body and mind as 'me' gives way to the world as 'me'! The mind map once seen, one starts to see the true nature of the 'me' and that perspective and clarity make everything clear and possible in life...

TRUTH ETERNAL-THE HEARTFULNESS WAY SERIES: By the spiritual scientist who rediscovered Yogic Transmission


Ram Chandra - 2019
    This is yogic science at its most profound, a masterpiece of our time, by one of the great visionaries of the 19th and 20th century, Ram Chandra of Fatehgarh. TRUTH ETERNALis a masterpiece of our time. It illuminates the science of existence itself: shedding new light on consciousness, the mind, the soul, and on Vedic wisdom and our relationship with the Cosmos.This book beautifully describes the origins of the universe and our place in it, challenging our beliefs and ushering in a new era of spiritual enquiry. About the Author: Ram Chandra of Fatehgarh was known to many as Lalaji. He was born in 1873 in Fatehgarh, Uttar Pradesh, North India. A great sage and spiritual scientist of the highest calibre, he became the first Heartfulness Guide. He was also a family man of perfect human etiquette and civility. Lalaji rediscovered the ancient art of Pranahuti or Yogic Transmission, which is the speciality of Heartfulness. By doing so, he revolutionized meditation practices so that all interested seekers can reach the highest approach in this lifetime. His discovery defines the modern era of spirituality, and the greatness of his contribution to humanity is yet to be revealed.

The Future Starts Here: Adventures in the Twenty-First Century


John Higgs - 2019
    The idea that our civilisation is doomed is not established fact. It is a story we tell ourselves.' In the 1980s, we gave up on the future. When we look ahead now, we imagine economic collapse, environmental disaster and the zombie apocalypse. But what if we are wrong? What if this bleak outlook is a generational quirk that afflicted those raised in twentieth century, but which is already beginning to pass? What if we do have a future after all?John Higgs takes us on a journey past the technological hype and headlines to discover why we shouldn't trust the predictions of science fiction, why nature is not as helpless as we assume and why purpose can never be automated. In the process, we will come to a better understanding of what lies ahead and how, despite everything - despite all the horrors and instability we face - we can build a better future.

Emancipation After Hegel: Achieving a Contradictory Revolution


Todd McGowan - 2019
    After the decline of the Marxist Hegelianism that dominated the twentieth century, leading thinkers are rediscovering Hegel’s thought as a resource for contemporary politics. What does a notoriously difficult nineteenth-century German philosopher have to offer the present? How should we understand Hegel, and what does understanding Hegel teach us about confronting our most urgent challenges?In this book, Todd McGowan offers us a Hegel for the twenty-first century. Simultaneously an introduction to Hegel and a fundamental reimagining of Hegel’s project, Emancipation After Hegel presents a radical Hegel who speaks to a world overwhelmed by right-wing populism, authoritarianism, neoliberalism, and economic inequalities. McGowan argues that the revolutionary core of Hegel’s thought is contradiction. He reveals that contradiction is inexorable and that we must attempt to sustain it rather than overcoming it or dismissing it as a logical failure. McGowan contends that Hegel’s notion of contradiction, when applied to contemporary problems, challenges any assertion of unitary identity as every identity is in tension with itself and dependent on others. An accessible and compelling reinterpretation of an often-misunderstood thinker, this book shows us a way forward to a new politics of emancipation as we reconcile ourselves to the inevitability of contradiction and find solidarity in not belonging.

Nordic Ideology: A Metamodern Guide to Politics, Book Two (Metamodern Guides 2)


Hanzi Freinacht - 2019
    This book can be read independently of the first one and it outlines a path to a metamodern society, emerging from the Nordic countries—one that emerges from, but ultimately cancels and outcompetes modern society as we know it, while saving the world-system from collapse. How can this be achieved? Here, things get real. Not only do you get an overview of how society develops—what is higher freedom, deeper equality, a more intricate order of self-organization?—you get an actual plan-of-action for how to transform all of society and the people in it; indeed, even a strategy for how to organize and take charge of political development. Loved and despised, Hanzi leaves few readers untouched. No issue is too controversial, no source of knowledge taboo; while committed to deep democracy and freedom, Hanzi does not shy away from learning from the totalitarian ideologies of the 20th century. And indeed, the power of his vision, and the six new forms of metamodern politics introduced in the book, compels readers to act—to actualize the vision, or to stop the metamodernists at any cost. Serious meets fun, as sincerity meets irony, as politics meets poetry in this magisterial work of a unique and dangerous rebel scholar.

This Life: Secular Faith and Spiritual Freedom


Martin Hägglund - 2019
    Ranging from fundamental existential questions to the most pressing social issues of our time, This Life shows why our commitment to freedom and democracy should lead us beyond both religion and capitalism.In this groundbreaking book, the philosopher Martin Hägglund challenges our received notions of faith and freedom. The faith we need to cultivate, he argues, is not a religious faith in eternity but a secular faith devoted to our finite life together. He shows that all spiritual questions of freedom are inseparable from economic and material conditions. What ultimately matters is how we treat one another in this life, and what we do with our time together.Hägglund develops new existential and political principles while transforming our understanding of spiritual life. His critique of religion takes us to the heart of what it means to mourn our loved ones, be committed, and care about a sustainable world. His critique of capitalism demonstrates that we fail to sustain our democratic values because our lives depend on wage labor. In clear and pathbreaking terms, Hägglund explains why capitalism is inimical to our freedom, and why we should instead pursue a novel form of democratic socialism.In developing his vision of an emancipated secular life, Hägglund engages with great philosophers from Aristotle to Hegel and Marx, literary writers from Dante to Proust and Knausgaard, political economists from Mill to Keynes and Hayek, and religious thinkers from Augustine to Kierkegaard and Martin Luther King, Jr. This Life gives us new access to our past--for the sake of a different future.

Hope in the Hard Places: How to Survive When Your World Feels Out of Control


Sarah Beckman - 2019
    

Christian Worldview


Herman Bavinck - 2019
    For the First Time in English, a Foundational Work of One of the Church's Most Important Theologians As some point in life, we all wonder: Who am I? What is the world, and what is my place within it? Only Christianity offers answers to these questions in a way that meets our truest needs and satisfies our deepest longings.In this important book, translated into English for the first time, Herman Bavinck provides a framework for understanding why the Christian worldview is the only solution to the discord we feel between ourselves, the world, and God.

Kalam Cosmological Arguments


Mohammed Hijab - 2019
    The author grapples with both medieval and contemporary interrogations of the argument with reference to Greek, Enlightenment and Medieval philosophers. It gives the reader an insight into some of the main areas of controversy (for example discussions of infinity and contingency) and attempts to make critical assessments throughout. The book concludes with the author’s understanding of the ‘strongest forms’ which attempt to postulate the most undercutting arguments for the existence of God.

Diderot and the Art of Thinking Freely


Andrew S. Curran - 2019
    But his most daring writing took place in the shadows. Thrown into prison for his atheism in 1749, Diderot decided to reserve his best books for posterity--for us, in fact. In the astonishing cache of unpublished writings left behind after his death, Diderot challenged virtually all of his century's accepted truths, from the sanctity of monarchy, to the racial justification of the slave trade, to the norms of human sexuality. One of Diderot's most attentive readers during his lifetime was Catherine the Great, who not only supported him financially, but invited him to St. Petersburg to talk about the possibility of democratizing the Russian empire.In this thematically organized biography, Andrew S. Curran vividly describes Diderot's tormented relationship with Rousseau, his curious correspondence with Voltaire, his passionate affairs, and his often iconoclastic stands on art, theater, morality, politics, and religion. But what this book brings out most brilliantly is how the writer's personal turmoil was an essential part of his genius and his ability to flout taboos, dogma, and convention.

The History of Philosophy


A.C. Grayling - 2019
    But since the long-popular classic Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy, first published in 1945, there has been no comprehensive and entertaining, single-volume history of this great intellectual journey.With his characteristic clarity and elegance A. C. Grayling takes the reader from the world-views and moralities before the age of the Buddha, Confucius and Socrates, through Christianity's dominance of the European mind to the Renaissance and Enlightenment, and on to Mill, Nietzsche, Sartre, and philosophy today. And, since the story of philosophy is incomplete without mention of the great philosophical traditions of India, China and the Persian-Arabic world, he gives a comparative survey of them too.Intelligible for students and eye-opening for philosophy readers, he covers epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics, logic, the philosophy of mind, the philosophy of language, political philosophy and the history of debates in these areas of enquiry, through the ideas of the celebrated philosophers as well as less well-known influential thinkers. He also asks what we have learnt from this body of thought, and what progress is still to be made.The first authoritative and accessible single-volume history of philosophy for decades, remarkable for its range and clarity, this is a landmark work.

Unoffendable: The Art of Thriving in a World Full of Jerks


Einzelgänger - 2019
    It’s a good thing to strive for more kindness and compassion. But wishing that humanity becomes entirely inoffensive is pointless because there’s always something that offends someone. Fortunately, there’s another path... The ancient Stoics observed that some things are in our control and others are not. We cannot control the foul language of people, opinions that oppose our own, and that there will always be a bunch of trolls that intend to trigger us for fun. What happens in our environment isn’t up to us. But what is up to us, is the way we handle it. Many choose to spend heaps of time and energy on the mere words of others, which withholds them to pursue meaningful goals and to be at peace in an unruly universe. What a waste! Unoffendable explores philosophical ideas backed by personal anecdotes to figure out how we can thrive in a world full of jerks, bullies, and people we simply don’t agree with.

Aristotle's Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science


Edward Feser - 2019
    Aristotle's Revenge argues that these concepts are not only compatible with modern science, but are implicitly presupposed by modern science.Among the many topics covered are:- The metaphysical presuppositions of scientific method- The status of scientific realism- The metaphysics of space and time- The metaphysics of quantum mechanics- Reductionism in chemistry and biology- The metaphysics of evolution- Neuroscientific reductionismThe book interacts heavily with the literature on these issues in contemporary analytic metaphysics and philosophy of science, so as to bring contemporary philosophy and science into dialogue with the Aristotelian tradition.

In This World of Wonders: Memoir of a Life in Learning


Nicholas Wolterstorff - 2019
    Beloved professor. Author of the classic Lament for a Son. Nicholas Wolterstorff is all of these and more. His memoir, In This World of Wonders, opens a remarkable new window into the life and thought of this remarkable man.Written not as a complete life story but as a series of vignettes, Wolterstorff’s memoir moves from his humble beginnings in a tiny Minnesota village to his education at Calvin College and Harvard University, to his career of teaching philosophy and writing books, to the experiences that prompted some of his writing—particularly his witnessing South African apartheid and Palestinian oppression firsthand.In This World of Wonders is the story of a thoughtful and grateful Christian whose life has been shaped by many loves—love of philosophy, love of family, love of art and architecture, love of nature and gardening, and more. It’s a lovely, wonderful story.

This Could Be Our Future: A Manifesto for a More Generous World


Yancey Strickler - 2019
    We see them as truth. They're not. They're a point of view that previous generations accepted. It's time we replace them with something new.This Could Be Our Future is about how we got here, and how we change course. While the pursuit of wealth has produced innovation and prosperity, it also established an implicit belief that the right choice in every decision is whichever option makes the most money. This belief in financial maximization has produced dire consequences: environmental collapse, corruption, inequality, and a growing dissatisfaction around the world. The answer isn't to get rid of money; it's to expand our concept of value. By assigning rational value to other values besides money--things like community, purpose, and sustainability--we can refocus our energies to build a society that's generous, fair, and ready for the future. By recalibrating our definition of value, a world of scarcity can become a world of abundance.Hopeful but firmly grounded, full of concrete solutions and bursting with creativity, This Could Be Our Future brilliantly dissects the world we live in and shows us a road map to the world we are capable of making.

The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity


Eugene McCarraher - 2019
    Eugene McCarraher reveals how mammon ensnared us and how we can find a more humane, sacramental way of being in the world.If socialists and Wall Street bankers can agree on anything, it is the extreme rationalism of capital. At least since Max Weber, capitalism has been understood as part of the "disenchantment" of the world, stripping material objects and social relationships of their mystery and sacredness. Ignoring the motive force of the spirit, capitalism rejects the awe-inspiring divine for the economics of supply and demand.Eugene McCarraher challenges this conventional view. Capitalism, he argues, is full of sacrament, whether or not it is acknowledged. Capitalist enchantment first flowered in the fields and factories of England and was brought to America by Puritans and evangelicals whose doctrine made ample room for industry and profit. Later, the corporation was mystically animated with human personhood, to preside over the Fordist endeavor to build a heavenly city of mechanized production and communion. By the twenty-first century, capitalism has become thoroughly enchanted by the neoliberal deification of "the market."Informed by cultural history and theology as well as economics, management theory, and marketing, The Enchantments of Mammon looks not to Marx and progressivism but to nineteenth-century Romantics for salvation. The Romantic imagination favors craft, the commons, and sensitivity to natural wonder. It promotes labor that, for the sake of the person, combines reason, creativity, and mutual aid. In this impassioned challenge, McCarraher makes the case that capitalism has hijacked and redirected our intrinsic longing for divinity--and urges us to break its hold on our souls.

The Morals of the Market: Human Rights and the Rise of Neoliberalism


Jessica Whyte - 2019
    Yet, rather than rejecting rights, they developed a distinctive account of human rights as tools to depoliticise civil society, protect private investments and shape liberal subjects. Honing in on neoliberal political thought, Whyte shows that the neoliberals developed a stark dichotomy between politics, conceived as conflictual, coercive and violent, and civil society, which they depicted as a realm of mutually-beneficial, voluntary, market relations between individual subjects of rights. In mobilising human rights to provide a moral language for a market society, neoliberals contributed far more than is often realised to today’s politics of human rights.

The Way of Nature


Zhuangzi - 2019
    C. TsaiC. C. Tsai is one of Asia's most popular cartoonists, and his editions of the Chinese classics have sold more than 40 million copies in over twenty languages. This volume presents Tsai's delightful graphic adaptation of the profound and humorous Daoist writings of Zhuangzi, some of the most popular and influential in the history of Asian philosophy and culture.The Way of Nature brings together all of Tsai's beguiling cartoon illustrations of the Zhuangzi, which takes its name from its author. The result is a uniquely accessible and entertaining adaptation of a pillar of classical Daoism, which has deeply influenced Chinese poetry, landscape painting, martial arts, and Chan (Zen) Buddhism.Irreverent and inspiring, The Way of Nature presents the memorable characters, fables, and thought experiments of Zhuangzi like no other edition, challenging readers to dig beneath conventional assumptions about self, society, and nature, and pointing to a more natural way of life. Through practical insights and far-reaching arguments, Zhuangzi shows why returning to the spontaneity of nature is the only sane response to a world of conflict.A marvelous introduction to a timeless classic, this book also features an illuminating foreword by Edward Slingerland. In addition, Zhuangzi's original Chinese text is artfully presented in narrow sidebars on each page, enriching the book for readers and students of Chinese without distracting from the self-contained English-language cartoons. The text is skillfully translated by Brian Bruya, who also provides an introduction.

Deuteronomy: Renewal of the Sinai Covenant (Covenant & Conversation Book 5)


Jonathan Sacks - 2019
    Chief Rabbi Sacks fuses Jewish tradition, Western philosophy, and literature to present a highly developed understanding of the human condition under Gods sovereignty. Erudite and eloquent, Covenant & Conversation allows us to experience Chief Rabbi Sacks sophisticated approach to life lived in an ongoing dialogue with the Torah.

What It Means to Be Moral: Why Religion Is Not Necessary for Living an Ethical Life


Phil Zuckerman - 2019
    In What It Means to Be Moral: Why Religion Is Not Necessary for Living an Ethical Life, Phil Zuckerman argues that morality does not come from God. Rather, it comes from us: our brains, our evolutionary past, our ongoing cultural development, our social experiences, and our ability to reason, reflect, and be sensitive to the suffering of others. By deconstructing religious arguments for God-based morality and guiding listeners through the premises and promises of secular morality, Zuckerman argues that the major challenges facing the world today-from global warming and growing inequality to religious support for unethical political policies to gun violence and terrorism-are best approached from a nonreligious ethical framework. In short, we need to look to our fellow humans and within ourselves for moral progress and ethical action.

The Bhagavad Gita: The Song of God Retold in Simplified English


Edward Viljoen - 2019
    This unique edition of the timeless epic is designed to be accessible for readers without any prior experience of Hinduism. Not simply a translation of the original, Viljoen has simplified and restated the Gita's complex ideas, so that a first-time reader can fully appreciate the scope and beauty of this magnificent Indian classic. Written in concise, modern language the retelling vividly captures the power and depth of the original work.Part of the Mahabharata, the Gita is a dialogue between Prince Arjuna and Lord Krishna. Its verses contain some of the key ideas of Hindu philosophy--Dharma, Moksha, and various yogic practices. Originally written well over a thousand years ago, the Gita has proven to be a timeless source of wisdom, inspiring philosophers and revolutionaries alike in the millennia since it was written.In addition to the retelling of the text, this edition includes a character list, a glossary of important terms, and chapters exploring the back-story from the Mahabharata and the impact and meaning of the Bhagavad Gita itself. The Bhagavad Gita is an approachable way for today's readers to engage with one of history's richest spiritual epics.

In the Ruins of Neoliberalism: The Rise of Antidemocratic Politics in the West


Wendy Brown - 2019
    Is this phenomenon the end of neoliberalism or its monstrous offspring?In the Ruins of Neoliberalism casts the hard-right turn as animated by socioeconomically aggrieved white working- and middle-class populations but contoured by neoliberalism’s multipronged assault on democratic values. From its inception, neoliberalism flirted with authoritarian liberalism as it warred against robust democracy. It repelled social-justice claims through appeals to market freedom and morality. It sought to de-democratize the state, economy, and society and re-secure the patriarchal family. In key works of the founding neoliberal intellectuals, Wendy Brown traces the ambition to replace democratic orders with ones disciplined by markets and traditional morality and democratic states with technocratic ones.Yet plutocracy, white supremacy, politicized mass affect, indifference to truth, and extreme social disinhibition were no part of the neoliberal vision. Brown theorizes their unintentional spurring by neoliberal reason, from its attack on the value of society and its fetish of individual freedom to its legitimation of inequality. Above all, she argues, neoliberalism’s intensification of nihilism coupled with its accidental wounding of white male supremacy generates an apocalyptic populism willing to destroy the world rather than endure a future in which this supremacy disappears.

Voltaire: A Life from Beginning to End


Hourly History - 2019
     Free BONUS Inside! Voltaire, born François-Marie Arouet in Paris, France, was a writer and leading figure of the Enlightenment. His insistence that all authority could and must be questioned was so radical, he ended up in prison several times and was ultimately exiled. Voltaire’s writings were instrumental in influencing the American and French revolutions. Man as a being with natural rights was a radical concept at the time, but one which the American founding fathers embraced. Voltaire’s anger was specifically directed at the arbitrary powers of the state and the church. The French legal system treated aristocrats differently than ordinary citizens. The Catholic church, too, wielded its dictatorial power. Voltaire incurred the wrath of both kings and bishops with his unrelenting attacks on such abuses of freedom. Unwilling to be silenced, Voltaire continued his demand for individual freedom throughout the span of his entire life. Only after his death was he officially welcomed back to Paris, and Voltaire’s remains now rest in the Parisian Panthéon, the burial place for the country’s national heroes. Discover a plethora of topics such as Literary Success and Financial Failure Émilie: The Love of His Life Years in Exile Candide and Morality Voltaire’s Final Year and Death And much more! So if you want a quick and easy to read book on Voltaire, simply scroll up and click the "Buy now" button for instant access!

The Conservative Sensibility


George F. Will - 2019
    Will has attempted to discern the principles of the Western political tradition and apply them to America's civic life. Today, the stakes could hardly be higher. Vital questions about the nature of man, of rights, of equality, of majority rule are bubbling just beneath the surface of daily events in America. The Founders' vision, articulated first in the Declaration of Independence and carried out in the Constitution, gave the new republic a framework for government unique in world history. Their beliefs in natural rights, limited government, religious freedom, and in human virtue and dignity ushered in two centuries of American prosperity. Now, as Will shows, conservatism is under threat -- both from progressives and elements inside the Republican Party. America has become an administrative state, while destructive trends have overtaken family life and higher education. Semi-autonomous executive agencies wield essentially unaccountable power. Congress has failed in its duty to exercise its legislative powers. And the executive branch has slipped the Constitution's leash. In the intellectual battle between the vision of Founding Fathers like James Madison, who advanced the notion of natural rights that pre-exist government, and the progressivism advanced by Woodrow Wilson, the Founders have been losing. It's time to reverse America's political fortunes. Expansive, intellectually thrilling, and written with the erudite wit that has made Will beloved by millions of readers, The Conservative Sensibility is an extraordinary new book from one of America's most celebrated political writers.

Beyond The Night Before The Dawn


Nilesh Joshi - 2019
    he is later found in a vegetative state at a railway station, where an old rag-picker takes him to his home where Mumukshu gradually recovers.Eventually, the old man dies leaving Mumukshu alone once again. slowly Mumukshu realizes that the old man was much wiser than what he appeared to be. he soon starts teaching the slum children from where he is eventually invited to serve in well known NGO.With his focus and dedication, Mumukshu becomes a well - known personality, yet he still feels a void inside him. One day almost 25 years post fateful incident of his wife's demise, Mumukshu meets tara, a young reporter, who constantly reminds him of his late wife. As the bond between the two grows, Mumukshu must find out the truth behind the same and decode the mysteries of life as he stands at the crossroads once again.About the Author:Niles is a writer, a poet a philanthropist but most importantly a seeker. His first book " Ladakh: Chronicles from the land of lamas " which was published in 2009. "Beyond The Night. Before the Dawn" is an attempt from him to share his experiences and learnings through the aid of a comprehensible fictional narrative of love story stretching beyond life.

Ancient Teachings for Modern Times: The Way to a Rich and Deeply Satisfying Life


Peta Morton - 2019
    Peta Morton shares the timeless spiritual wisdom of the ages in a modern, non-religious context and invites you on a journey of self-discovery. 'Peta Morton elegantly weaves together practical wisdom from a diverse array of traditions to provide a 'one stop shop' for anyone interested in personal development and well-being. This synthesis of important teachings and modalities, ranging from the power of breathing, thoughts, gratitude, and beyond, has the potential to shift the reader's perspective and clears the path for a happier, more peaceful life. Mark Gober, author of An End to Upside Down Thinking

The Modern Chakra Guide: 7 Steps to Awaken Your Energy in Today’s World


Carol Tuttle - 2019
    With reassurance and timely perspective, her personal perspective will help you counter the rush, confusion, and fear of today’s world. Through this book, you will be able to:• Feel more daily joy than you’ve imagined is possible• Recognize how chakra energy influences you• Navigate the energetic shift of our time with ease• Awaken and activate your energy to upgrade your lifeIf you are a person who wants to feel balanced, aware, and joyful—even with today’s world swirling around you—then this book is for you.

Spinal Catastrophism: A Secret History


Thomas Moynihan - 2019
    G. Ballard, Georges Bataille, William Burroughs, Andre Leroi-Gourhan, Elaine Morgan, and Friedrich Nietzsche, in the late twentieth century Daniel Barker formulated the axioms of spinal catastrophism: If human morphology, upright posture, and the possibility of language are the ramified accidents of natural history, then psychic ailments are ultimately afflictions of the spine, which itself is a scale model of biogenetic trauma, a portable map of the catastrophic events that shaped that atrocity exhibition of evolutionary traumata, the sick orthograde talking mammal.Tracing its provenance through the biological notions of phylogeny and "organic memory" that fueled early psychoanalysis, back into idealism, nature philosophy, and romanticism, and across multiform encounters between philosophy, psychology, biology, and geology, Thomas Moynihan reveals the historical continuity of spinal catastrophism. From psychoanalysis and myth to geology and neuroanatomy, from bioanalysis to chronopathy, from spinal colonies of proto-minds to the retroparasitism of the CNS, from "railway spine" to Elizabeth Taylor's lost gill-slits, this extravagantly comprehensive philosophical adventure uses the spinal cord as a guiding thread to rediscover forgotten pathways in modern thought.Moynihan demonstrates that, far from being an fanciful notion rendered obsolete by advances in biology, spinal catastrophism dramatizes fundamental philosophical problematics of time, identity, continuity, and the transcendental that remain central to any attempt to reconcile human experience with natural history.

Die Now to Live Forever


Sanjay Singh - 2019
    It depicts a typical middle-class Indian family mindset. Throughout his life, Vinay has been taught to dream big and work hard. After years of tireless effort, he becomes a doctor but things turn sour as he starts to perceive unusual psychiatric symptoms. He falls victim to major psychiatric disorders, OCD and Depression. With each passing day life increasingly becomes a burden on him. He looses his loved ones. He takes few futile attempts to balance work and life, but nothing works out. It is when he turns absolutely distraught that he decides to end his life. But one dream has changed it all. He discovers a new realm of life. He is a different man now. The story describes how one can find much-longed happiness, how one can break the cycle of desires and sorrows and how one can become Buddha in their own lives. The author gives a lucid description of novel concepts like “Self witnessing”, “Self-conditioning”, “Self-love” and “Buddhahood”. He describes ways to attain the supreme form of happiness. This book is unique in the sense that it touches the much-neglected topic of mental health. India is a country with the highest burden of people suffering from major psychiatric disorders. Additionally, it ranks number one in suicide rates all over the world. This book has been written by a medical professional- Dr. Sanjay Singh. It is second in line to books written by him after “Oh dear happiness! The lost story of contentment”. He has written a blog named “The story behind the Dark Disease - Depression" which has been read more than two lacs times. He hopes that this book will pave the way to a new way of life to those who are extremely depressed and suffering from various psychiatric illnesses.

Forgotten Roots


Karol Kolbusz - 2019
    The essays explore the connection between the symptoms of the epidemic of modernity: depression, anxiety, and hopelessness, and their causes: the rotten foundations of our civilisation, the disconnection of modern people from their own cultural roots, and a lack of spiritual purpose in their lives. The book aims to show meaningful ways in which individuals who are inwardly detached from the insanity of the modern world can return to the old ways of our ancestors, radically opposite predominant trends and fashions, and lead spiritually fulfilling lives.

God in Himself: Scripture, Metaphysics, and the Task of Christian Theology


Steven J. Duby - 2019
    Some, such as Thomas Aquinas, have argued that we know God through both natural and supernatural revelation, while others, especially Karl Barth, have argued that we know God only on the basis of the incarnation. Contemporary discussions of these issues sometimes give the impression that we have to choose between a speculative doctrine of God driven by natural theology or metaphysics and a Christ-centered doctrine of God driven by God's work in the history of salvation. In this volume in IVP Academic's Studies in Christian Doctrine and Scripture series, Steven J. Duby casts a vision for integrating natural theology, the incarnation, and metaphysics in a Christian description of God in himself.

Ask Peter Kreeft: The 100 Most Interesting Questions He's Ever Been Asked


Peter Kreeft - 2019
    

Martin Buber: A Life of Faith and Dissent


Paul Mendes-Flohr - 2019
    The book is organized around several key moments, such as his sudden abandonment by his mother when he was a child of three, a foundational trauma that, Mendes-Flohr shows, left an enduring mark on Buber’s inner life, attuning him to the fragility of human relations and the need to nurture them with what he would call a “dialogical attentiveness.” Buber’s philosophical and theological writings, most famously I and Thou, made significant contributions to religious and Jewish thought, philosophical anthropology, biblical studies, political theory, and Zionism. In this accessible new biography, Mendes-Flohr situates Buber’s life and legacy in the intellectual and cultural life of German Jewry as well as in the broader European intellectual life of the first half of the twentieth century.

Philosopher of the Heart: The Restless Life of Søren Kierkegaard


Clare Carlisle - 2019
    Over about a decade in the 1840s and 1850s, writings poured from his pen analysing love and suffering, courage and anxiety, religious longing and defiance, and forging a new philosophical style rooted in the inward drama of being human.As Christianity seemed to sleepwalk through a changing world, Kierkegaard dazzlingly revealed its spiritual power while exposing the poverty of official religion. His restless creativity was spurred on by his own failures: his relationship with the young woman whom he promised to marry, then left to devote himself to writing, haunted him throughout his life.Though tormented by the pressures of celebrity, he deliberately lived amidst the crowds in Copenhagen, known by everyone but, he felt, understood by no one. When he collapsed exhausted at the age of 42, he was still pursuing the question of existence: how to be a human being in this world?Clare Carlisle's innovative and moving biography writes Kierkegaard's remarkable life as far as possible from his own perspective, conveying what it was like to be this Socrates of Christendom - as he put it, living life forwards yet only understanding it backwards.

Samanya Dharma – Ethical Duties Common to All


Nithin Sridhar - 2019
    It is a compendium of what constitutes universal values carefully culled from primary and secondary sources.The book bridges the past and present by reinforcing the relevance of Samanya dharma in contemporary times.

How Reason Can Lead to God: A Philosopher's Bridge to Faith


Joshua Rasmussen - 2019
    Beginning with his own story of losing faith and the belief in any ultimate purpose in life, he then builds a bridge to faith. Using only the instruments of reason and common experience, Rasmussen constructs a pathway--step by step, brick by brick--that he argues can lead to meaning and, ultimately, a vision of God.

The Scene That Became Cities: What Burning Man Philosophy Can Teach Us about Building Better Communities


Caveat Magister (Benjamin Wachs) - 2019
    It has been the subject of fawning media profiles, an exhibit in the Smithsonian, and is beloved by tech billionaires and boho counterculturalists alike. But why does it matter? What does it actually have to offer us? The answer, Caveat Magister writes, is simple: Burning Man's philosophy can help us build better communities in which individuals' freedom to follow their own authentic passions also brings them together in common purpose. Burning Man is a prototype, and its philosophy is a how-to manual for better communities, that, instead of rules, offers principles. Featuring iconic and impossible stories from "the playa," interviews with Burning Man's founders and staff, and personal recollections of the late Larry Harvey--Burning Man's founder, "Chief Philosophical Officer," and the author's close friend and colleague--The Scene That Became Cities introduces readers to the experience of Burning Man; explains why it grew; posits how it could impact fields as diverse as art, economics, and politics; and makes the ideas behind it accessible, actionable, and useful.

How to Think about War: An Ancient Guide to Foreign Policy


Thucydides - 2019
    How to Think about War presents the most influential and compelling of these speeches in an elegant new translation by classicist Johanna Hanink, accompanied by an enlightening introduction, informative headnotes, and the original Greek on facing pages. The result is an ideally accessible introduction to Thucydides's long and challenging History.Thucydides intended his account of the clash between classical Greece's mightiest powers--Athens and Sparta--to be a "possession for all time." Today, it remains a foundational work for the study not only of ancient history but also contemporary politics and international relations. How to Think about War features speeches that have earned the History its celebrated status--all of those delivered before the Athenian Assembly, as well as Pericles's funeral oration and the notoriously ruthless "Melian Dialogue." Organized by key debates, these complex speeches reveal the recklessness, cruelty, and realpolitik of Athenian warfighting and imperialism.The first English-language collection of speeches from Thucydides in nearly half a century, How to Think about War takes readers straight to the heart of this timeless thinker.

Jed Talks #3: The Tao of the Large-Breasted Goddess with the Shapely Behind


Jed McKenna - 2019
    CONTENTS - I Am an Apple Tree - Over the Moon - Goddess I: The Tao That Can Be Told - I Call It Consciousness - Marichelle 7: A Pretty Big Problem - Goddess II: Darkness Within Darkness - Spiritual DNA - Adult Utopia - Goddess III: Soft & Yielding - Marichelle 8: Trouble Is Fine - The Folly of Human Conceits - The Tao of Self-Annihilation - Goddess IV: Yield and Overcome - Total Perspective Vortex - Medifuckintation - Goddess V: The Eternal Tao - Marichelle 9: Broken Compass - Belated Rebirth Matrices - Goddess VI: The Mother of All Things - The Tao of Pain - Mystery Prize

Speaking Being: Werner Erhard, Martin Heidegger, and a New Possibility of Being Human


Bruce Hyde - 2019
    In this book, those ideas and methods are revealed by presenting in full an innovative program he developed in the 1980s called The Forum--available in this book as a transcript of an actual course led by Erhard in San Francisco in December of 1989. Since its inception, Erhard's work has impacted the lives of millions of people throughout the world. Central to this study is a comparative analysis of Erhard's rhetorical project, The Forum, and the philosophical project of Martin Heidegger. Through this comparative analysis, the authors demonstrate how each thinker's work sometimes parallels and often illuminates the other.The dialogue at work in The Forum functions to generate a language which speaks being. That is, The Forum is an instance of what the authors call ontological rhetoric a technology of communicating what cannot be said in language. Nevertheless, what does get said allows those participating in the dialogue to discover previously unseen aspects of what it currently means to be human. As a primary outcome of such discovery, access to creating a new possibility of what it is to be human is made available.The purpose of this book is to show how communication of the unspoken realm of language--speaking being--is actually accomplished in The Forum, and to demonstrate how Erhard did it in 1989. Through placing Erhard's language use next to Heidegger's thinking--presented in a series of "Sidebars" and "Intervals" alongside The Forum transcript--the authors have made two contributions. They have illuminated the work of two thinkers, who independently developed similar forms of ontological rhetoric while working from very different times and places. Hyde and Kopp have also for the first time made Erhard's extraordinary form of ontological rhetoric available for a wide range of audiences, from scholars at work within a variety of academic disciplines to anyone interested in exploring the possibility of being for human beings.From the Afterword: I regard Speaking Being as an enormously important contribution to understanding Heidegger and Erhard. The latter has received far too little serious academic attention, and this book begins to make up for that lack. Moreover, the book's analysis of Heidegger's thought is among the best that I have ever read. I commend this book to all readers without reservation.Michael E. Zimmerman, Professor Emeritus, University of Colorado, Boulder

Awakening from the Meaning Crisis


John Vervaeke - 2019
    Audio version of the 50-episode lecture series

The World As Will And Idea: Complete: Volumes (1, 2 and 3)


Arthur Shopenhauer - 2019
    

Size Matters


John Locke - 2019
    Beat him to death with a tree branch after he threatened to rape her. But what started as self-defense became problematic for two reasons. First, she killed Robert Sims after he’d been rendered completely defenseless. And second, she inadvertently left her fingerprints at the scene. Allie is young, beautiful, the smartest person in any room. But she’s also been diagnosed as clinically insane. As her past catches up with her and her marriage starts to crumble, Allie is determined to survive at all costs. Size Matters is a taut, compelling novel that teaches us never to underestimate a woman with nothing to lose. PRELIMINARY REVIEWS: “Size Matters is so full of twists and turns and surprises I couldn’t have flipped the pages faster if you paid me! This novel surprised and delighted and kept me shaking my head time and again. Fans of Donovan Creed should be aware that he and Callie make a brief appearance that furthers their saga.” “‘I’ve done bad things,’ says Allie McPherson, ‘but that doesn’t make me a bad person.’ Well, that’s one opinion!” “This book is crazy! There are twists and turns on virtually every page! While I consider myself an expert on Locke novels, I have to admit he took me on a wild ride that made me guess wrong every single time.” “Size Matters is a cross between Alfred Hitchcock and Quentin Tarantino. From start to finish I was shocked, surprised, and hopelessly entertained.”

The Analog Sea Review: Number Two


Jonathan SimonsFerdinand Hodler - 2019
    Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) 2020 Silver Medal Winner for AnthologiesIn the second edition of The Analog Sea Review, offline publisher Analog Sea continues to explore what artists and writers create when the machines are all sleeping and they find themselves back again amid that most valuable natural resource—time.Through interviews, stories, poetry, fine art, and essays by the likes of Oliver Sacks, Will Self, James Baldwin, Robert Bly, Ray Bradbury, Peter Mettler, and Alejandro Jodorowsky, this issue delves into questions on solitude, filmmaking, the northern lights, writing and the creative process, the cult of the image, quantum physics, the differences between direct experience and representation and, as ever, offline culture and the printed word.

Conjunction


A.D. Zoltan - 2019
    After the discovery of intergalactic travel technology, humankind initiates a mission to the four most likely habited planets in order to bring their own civilization to the next maturity level. ‘Keat’ who has a deep interest in the “big questions” of life is part of the first mission which turns their wealthy, human civilization upside down without facing any enemies.

Education in a Time Between Worlds: Essays on the Future of Schools, Technology, and Society


Zachary Stein - 2019
    The world we have known is disappearing and a new world is being born. The subjects taught in schools and universities today are becoming irrelevant at faster and faster rates. Not only are we facing complex challenges of unprecedented size and scope, we're also facing a learning and capacity deficit that threatens the future of civilization.Education in a Time Between Worlds seeks to reframe this historical moment as an opportunity to create a global society of educational abundance. Educational systems must be transformed beyond recognition if humanity is to survive the planetary crises currently underway. Human development and learning must be understood as the Earth's most valuable resources, with human potential serving as the open frontier into which energy and hope can begin to flow.The expansive essays within this book cover a diverse array of topics, including social justice, the neuroscience of learning, deschooling, educational technology, standardized testing, the future of spirituality, basic income guarantees, and integral meta-theory. As an invitation to re-vision the future of schools, technology, and society, Education in a Time Between Worlds replaces apathy and despair with agency, transformation, and hope.

Van Gogh


Olaf Mextorf - 2019
    As one of the founders of modern art he created a unique body of work, against all odds, which continues to enrapture a worldwide audience.

Being Numerous: Essays on Non-Fascist Life


Natasha Lennard - 2019
    Beginning with an interrogation of what it means to fight fascism, Natasha Lennard explores the limits of individual rights, the criminalization of political dissent, the myths of radical sex, and the ghosts in our lives. At once politically committed and philosophically capacious, Being Numerous is a revaluation of the idea that the personal is political, and situates as the central question of our time—How can we live a non-fascist life?

Tao of Alan Watts: 444 Expressions of Zen


Akṣapāda - 2019
    This pioneering interpreter of Zen Buddhismwas the most charismatic leader of the 1960’s ‘San Francisco Renaissance' movement. There are more than 25 books on his account including the best sellers ‘The Wisdom of Insecurity’, ‘Become What You Are’ and ‘The Way of Zen’. ‘Tao of Alan Watts: 444 Expressions of Zen’ is a perfect choice for Alan Watts lovers. This book is a reflection of his philosophy teachings on various topics like psychology, Zen practices, life, art and spirituality…

A Handbook for New Stoics: How to Thrive in a World Out of Your Control—52 Week-by-Week Lessons


Massimo Pigliucci - 2019
    But we can control our response to these everyday tensions—through the wisdom and practice of Stoicism. Stoicism is an ancient pragmatic philosophy that teaches us to step back, gain perspective, and act with intention. In A Handbook for New Stoics, renowned philosopher Massimo Pigliucci and seasoned practitioner Gregory Lopez provide 52 week-by-week lessons to help us apply timeless Stoic teachings to modern life. Whether you’re already familiar with Seneca and Marcus Aurelius, or you’re entirely new to Stoicism, this handbook will help you embrace challenges, thrive under pressure, and discover the good life!

Seeing Through the World: Jean Gebser and Integral Consciousness


Jeremy D. Johnson - 2019
    Writing in the midcentury during a period of intense cultural transformation and crisis in Europe, Gebser intuited a series of mutational leaps in the history of human consciousness, the latest of which emerging was the “integral” structure, marked by the presence of time-freedom. Gebser’s insights on the phenomenology of human consciousness has brought profound intellectual depth and spiritual transmission to the field of integral philosophy and consciousness studies, influencing the works of American historians such as William Irwin Thompson and the philosopher Ken Wilber. Further syncretic corroboration links Gebser’s integral age to those of the Indian revolutionary and yogi Sri Aurobindo’s “integral yoga” and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s evolutionary mysticism.Arguably, Gebser’s structures of consciousness are as significant an ontological insight as C. G. Jung’s “reality of the psyche.” Yet, until now, very little secondary literature has been available in the English-speaking world. Jeremy Johnson, the current president of the International Jean Gebser Society who has spent the last decade as an integral scholar and researcher, produces this introductory volume on the life and writings of Jean Gebser. Part companion piece to Gebser’s magnum opus, The Ever-Present Origin, part inspired treatise on an integral futurism, Jeremy guides the reader through the structures of consciousness and incepts integral scholarship as a divination that scries the age of ecological collapse and the ontological recodings of the Anthropocene.It is the first volume in the NuraLogicals series, produced in partnership with Nura Learning.

Steps to Liberation: The Buddha's Eightfold Path


Gil Fronsdal - 2019
    

Reason, Faith, and the Struggle for Western Civilization


Samuel Gregg - 2019
    But today that synthesis is under attack—from the East by radical Islam (faith without reason) and from within the West itself by aggressive secularism (reason without faith). The stakes are incalculably high. The naïve and increasingly common assumption that reason and faith are incompatible is simply at odds with the facts of history. The revelation in the Hebrew Scriptures of a reasonable Creator imbued Judaism and Christianity with a conviction that the world is intelligible, leading to the flowering of reason and the invention of science in the West. It was no accident that the Enlightenment took place in the culture formed by the Jewish and Christian faiths. We can all see that faith without reason is benighted at best, fanatical and violent at worst. But too many forget that reason, stripped of faith, is subject to its own pathologies. A supposedly autonomous reason easily sinks into fanaticism, stifling dissent as bigoted and irrational and devouring the humane civilization fostered by the integration of reason and faith. The blood-soaked history of the twentieth century attests to the totalitarian forces unleashed by corrupted reason. But Samuel Gregg does more than lament the intellectual and spiritual ruin caused by the divorce of reason and faith. He shows that each of these foundational principles corrects the other’s excesses and enhances our comprehension of the truth in a continuous renewal of civilization. By recovering this balance, we can avoid a suicidal winner-take-all conflict between reason and faith and a future that will respect neither.

Prajna: Ayurvedic Rituals For Happiness


Mira Manek - 2019
    This book extracts the essence of this Indian philosophy and provides a wealth of timeless rituals to effect positive change.Prajna offers rituals and routines for the entire day, from the moment you wake up and need the energy and positive mindset to help you start the morning, to night-time practices that allow you to wind down, relax and get the most benefit from the healing power of sleep. In between there are numerous breathing exercises, mindfulness techniques, yoga stretches and simple recipes to enjoy, all to help you destress and reset, bringing you back to yourself and to lasting peace and happiness.

The Flip: Epiphanies of Mind and the Future of Knowledge


Jeffrey J. Kripal - 2019
    Kripal, is “a reversal of perspective,” “a new real,” often born of an extreme, life-changing experience. The Flip is Kripal’s ambitious, visionary program for unifying the sciences and the humanities to expand our minds, open our hearts, and negotiate a peaceful resolution to the culture wars. Combining accounts of rationalists’ spiritual awakenings and consciousness explorations by philosophers, neuroscientists, and mystics within a framework of the history of science and religion, Kripal compellingly signals a path to mending our fractured world.

The Explorer's Mindset: Unlock Health Happiness and Success the Fun Way


Francis Shenstone - 2019
    Do you want more from life but don’t know how to change? Are you unable to pinpoint what would really improve your life?In The Explorer’s Mindset, you’ll learn simple habits and activities to transform your mindset and change your life.Discover through stories and activities how you can become the best version of yourself.You’ll learn:• The proper foundation, and mindset needed to get anything you want in life• The exact steps needed for success in all aspects of your life• How to discover yourself, happiness and your purpose• How to master your emotions like a champion• How to boost your productivity• And much more!By the end of The Explorer’s Mindset, you’ll have a stronger mindset, better habits and a happier and more fulfilling life.So, if you want to step into your new life, scroll to the top of this page, click the "Buy now" button, and start today.

This Book Changed Everything: The Bible’s Amazing Impact on Our World


Vishal Mangalwadi - 2019
    He chose to become the president, the first among equals. Biblically inspired political, social and economic vision radically changed the course of our history, our institutions and our ideals, besides, of course, bringing deep changes in our individual selves. This Book Changed Everything, the latest book by a foremost Christian thinker of our age, Vishal Mangalwadi, is a tour de force that will redefine the way we look at the Bible’s transforming influence on everything that our modern world cherishes. The Bible, Mangalwadi argues, empowered little people who challenged the might of great empires and turned tiny nations into economic superpowers. It delivered humankind from superstition and gave them the courage and confidence to reshape the world. At the root of this revolution was the acknowledgment of God’s Revelation as the only reliable guide to build our lives as well as our nations on. In 15 well-argued chapters, Mangalwadi demonstrates the role of Revelation on areas as diverse as epistemology, language, law, economics, political offices, nations and communities, church and tolerance. Chapters on journalism and literature by Jenny Taylor and Ashish Alexander respectively contribute significantly to this volume’s argument—that This Book, indeed, Changed Everything! “When a brilliant philosopher from India gives his version of the history of the West, we should listen. In the 19th century, Tocqueville showed how the Bible made America different from France; today Vishal Mangalwadi shows why the Bible made Europe different from the rest of the world.” — ERIC METAXAS, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Martin Luther and Bonhoeffer; Nationally syndicated host of The Eric Metaxas Radio Show “I have come to believe that Vishal may well be Christianity’s most able global thinker. Not as famous as some, he travels deep into both the Bible and the historical record to uncover a treasure, and then he travels the globe sharing that treasure. I believe that he is one of the founders of the next great world-wide phase of Christian civilization.” — JERRY BOWYER, Financial Economist, Author, President of Bowyer Research; Editor of Townhall Finance. “This book changed everything? That is a bold statement. Can any book do that? Most people have no idea of the Bible’s influence upon our world. Vishal explores history, gives evidence and powerful arguments that the modern world is inconceivable without the Bible.” — STEVE GREEN, Chairman, Museum of the Bible, Washington DC “From his Eastern perspective, Vishal helps us Westerners recover our memory and true identity. Building on his earlier book, The Book that Made Your World, Vishal here re-tells us our own story and opens our eyes to recognize the true wellsprings of our civilization. Short memories breed short-sightedness. Vishal re-roots us in the past so that we regain a vision for the future in order to be effectively engaged in the present.” — JEFF FOUNTAIN, Founder, Schuman Study Centre, Amsterdam “Formerly Christian West has lost the foundational values and convictions for democracy; the ethics which valued human life, liberty, and dignity. Vishal Mangalwadi has worked amongst the destitute of India as well as taught in institutions of higher education. He has spoken to parliamentarians and senators, for he speaks with the clear perspective of a world pilgrim and a life experience that spans East and West alike.” — PROF. DR.

Sex and the Failed Absolute


Slavoj Žižek - 2019
    Alongside striking images of the M�bius strip, the cross-cap, and the Klein bottle, Zizek brings alive the Hegelian triad of being-essence-notion. Radical new readings of Hegel, and Kant, sit side by side with characteristically lively commentaries on film, politics, and culture.Here is Zizek at his interrogative best.

Theft Is Property!: Dispossession and Critical Theory


Robert Nichols - 2019
    Through close analysis of arguments by Indigenous scholars and activists from the nineteenth century to the present, Robert Nichols argues that dispossession has come to name a unique recursive process whereby systematic theft is the mechanism by which property relations are generated. In so doing, Nichols also brings long-standing debates in anarchist, Black radical, feminist, Marxist, and postcolonial thought into direct conversation with the frequently overlooked intellectual contributions of Indigenous peoples.

Practice of Vedanta


Chinmayananda Saraswati - 2019
    Study gives us information. Scriptures and Sāstras only give us a road map. However much you may study the road map, you will never reach the pilgrim centre. Study the map, roll it up and keep it handy by your side, as it may be useful en route the journey. Now get up from your chair, get into your vehicle and move on along the way the map indicates so clearly." "Work is unavoidable. Choose a field that inspires you, that is in line with your nobler tendencies."

The Age of Martha: A Call to Contemplative Learning in a Frenzied Culture


Devin O’Donnell - 2019
    S. Eliot characterizes modern life as having “neither plentitude nor vacancy,” and goes on to say that our lives are “distracted from distraction by distraction.” The truth is that the world is perennially too much with us. We’re always in danger of getting and spending and giving our hearts away, of trading our glimpses of Proteus rising from the sea for glimpses of the latest social-media craze. We have grown so used to our distractions that we have nearly forgotten what leisure is, that divine and gratuitous part of human existence that ennobles life and causes us to pause and reflect, pray and praise, fast as well as feast. This is why the Scriptures give us the story of Mary and Martha. We can be like Mary, who chose to be still and present for the most important thing. Or we can be like Martha, who chose instead to worry about earthly things and was admonished for her unwillingness to rest. Now, however, it seems there is almost no choice left at all, and we have nearly forgotten what it means for our souls to give attention. Even in our schools and churches—which should be the seats of contemplation—there is little place for the free and “useless” delight of the Transcendent and Divine. In this work, Devin O’Donnell seeks to frame a philosophy of academics rooted in leisure, one that sees school as scholé in principle and practice. If we are to be faithful with the inheritance of a liberal arts tradition, then we must return to seeing leisure as a guiding light in our educational efforts.

Ashtavakra Gita: (bootleg version)


Bart Marshall - 2019
    It gets to the heart of Truth and True Nature more directly and concisely than anything else I’ve encountered, and I agree with its last words: “No more can be said.” I call this the “bootleg version” because a PDF of my first draft of this translation, which I gave to a small group of friends, made its way onto the internet and subsequently was downloaded and read by a sizeable number of people, judging by the emails I’ve received thanking me for doing it, or requesting permission to translate it into their language—despite having no contact information in the PDF. Several years later I included a slightly revised version in my book, The Perennial Way, which judging by book sales has not reached nearly the same number of people. And so I thought I’d publish the original version separately as a paperback and e-book, on the theory that maybe it had its own mojo for some reason, and might find its way into the hands of a few folks who have not otherwise encountered it. The Translator’s Preface and Introduction are also from the original viral PDF.

The Hindu Way


Samarpan - 2019
    The Vedas mention how female sages studied and composed mantras alongside the sages.God alone exists. The world is the play of His divine power or maya, and is not perfect. Perfection lies only in the divine.

Haarkon Adventures: Japan


India Hobson - 2019
    It documents our photographs, details of our favourite places, as well as practical information that we feel is useful to know. Haarkon Adventures Japan is a celebration of our experiences in a spectacular part of the world.

A Summary of The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius


Robin Homer - 2019
    Meditations is essentially a scrapbook of thoughts written over a 19-year period, it’s not ordered and it repeats itself frequently as ideas reoccurred to the author at different times. For this reason, it can be hard for a casual reader to extract the myriad messages contained within. This summary helps in that by interpreting Meditations and reducing it from around 50,000 words down to 4,400. While it has been interpreted the author has done his best not to embellish it. If you ever wish to read the original, the modern Gregory Hays translation on Amazon is excellent as are the two public domain translations: A. S. L. Farquharson, 1944 and George Long, 1862, which are available for free on Wikisource.

How the Church Has Changed the World, Volume I


Anthony M. Esolen - 2019
     You know the Church supports your sacramental life, but did you know… - Who created the tradition of the Christmas manger? - Who is the father of modern genetics? - Who developed hospitals to continue the healing work of Christ? - That the greatest dramatist of all time was Catholic? - And more! Professor Esolen's captivating style is as entertaining as it is eye-opening. A great book to affirm that God guides his Church!

100 Truths You Will Learn Too Late


Luca Dellanna - 2019
    In this book, you will find 100 of the lessons I learnt.It will still require hard work from your side to internalize them and put into practice, but at least I hope to make this process easier for you, by letting you to avoid committing the same mistakes as I did.

The Courage to Confront Evil: The Most Important Challenge of Our Time


Caroline Myss - 2019
    With The Courage to Confront Evil, Caroline Myss delivers one of her most powerful presentations yet: a sweeping training in the practice of standing in your own light and integrity, so every choice you make becomes an act of healing in this extraordinary and challenging period of human history.Discover How to Harness the “Power Tools of Creation”In this time of profound transformation, your capacity to make a difference has never been greater—or more needed. “Darkness cannot be offset by bombs, bullets, or any external force,” Myss teaches, “but only by the power of the light within us.” In these seven audio sessions, she boldly investigates the spiritual nature of evil, the many masks it wears, and the temptations it offers us to be fearful, selfish, or disengaged. Here she trains you in the seven “power tools of creation”—the divine gifts of grace you can access with your words, prayers, and actions. “Every act of love weakens the forces of hate,” Myss says. “Every act of compassion and grace weakens evil’s legislation against humanity.” The Courage to Confront Evil is a clarion call for you to discover your role in this great unfolding of human evolution—and to become an “instrument of holy power” as only you can.[HIGHLIGHT BULLETS—Approx 6 bullets, Max 81 Characters w/spaces each]• Is evil real? How our collective denial gives power to darkness• The evolution of the soul in the atomic age—how we reached this turning point in history• Becoming fluent in the language of light• Activating your conscience• Why temptation works—when we fear the light and seek refuge in darkness• How entitlement shuts down your capacity for love• The nature of angels and demons—and how we invite both into our lives• How evil is a necessary factor in our own growth and awakening

Sin-A-Gogue: Sin and Failure in Jewish Thought


David Bashevkin - 2019
    Judaism has its own language and framework for sin that expresses themselves both legally and philosophically. Both legal questions--circumstances where sin is permissible or mandated, the role of intention and action--as well as philosophical questions--why sin occurs and how does Judaism react to religious crisis--are considered within this volume. This book will present the concepts of sin and failure in Jewish thought, weaving together biblical and rabbinic studies to reveal a holistic portrait of the notion of sin and failure within Jewish thought.The suffix "agogue" means to lead or grow. Here as well, Sin-a-gogue: Sin and Failure in Jewish Thought will provide its readers frameworks and strategies to develop even in the face of failure.