Research has shown that integrating little daily practices into your life can actually change the way your brain works.This guide offers simple things you can do routinely, mainly inside your mind, that will support and increase your sense of security and worth, resilience, effectiveness, well-being, insight, and inner peace. For example, they include: taking in the good, protecting your brain, feeling safer, relaxing anxiety about imperfection, not knowing, enjoying your hands, taking refuge, and filling the hole in your heart.  At first glance, you may be tempted to underestimate the power of these seemingly simple practices. But they will gradually change your brain through what’s called experience-dependent neuroplasticity.Moment to moment, whatever you're aware of—sounds, sensations, thoughts, or your most heartfelt longings—is based on underlying neural activities. This book offers simple brain training practices you can do every day to protect against stress, lift your mood, and find greater emotional resilience.Just one practice each day can help you to:Be good to yourself Enjoy life as it is Build on your strengths Be more effective at home and work Make peace with your emotions With over fifty daily practices you can use anytime, anywhere, Just One Thing is a groundbreaking combination of mindfulness meditation and neuroscience that can help you deepen your sense of well-being and unconditional happiness.

    Infused with beloved iconoclastic author Michelle Tea’s unique insight, inviting pop sensibility, and wicked humor, Modern Tarot is a fascinating journey through the cards that teaches how to use this tradition to connect with our higher selves.Whether you’re a committed seeker or a digital-age skeptic—or perhaps a little of both—Tea’s essential guide opens the power of tarot to you. Modern Tarot doesn’t require you to believe in the supernatural or narrowly focus on the tarot as a divination tool. Tea instead provides incisive descriptions of each of the 78 cards in the tarot system—each illustrated in the charmingly offbeat style of cartoonist Amanda Verwey—and introduces specially designed card-based rituals that can be used with any deck to guide you on a path toward radical growth and self-improvement.Tea reveals how tarot offers moments of deep, transformative connection—an affirming, spiritual experience that is gentle, individual, and aspirational. Grounded in Tea’s twenty-five years of tarot wisdom and her abiding love of the cards, and featuring 78 black and white illustrations throughout, Modern Tarot is the ultimate introduction to the tradition of the tarot for millennial readers.

    In The Altar of My Soul, Marta Moreno Vega recounts the compelling true story of her journey from ignorance and skepticism to initiation as a Yoruba priestess in the Santería religion. This unforgettable spiritual memoir reveals the long-hidden roots and traditions of a centuries-old faith that originated on the shores of West Africa.As an Afro-Puerto Rican child in the New York barrio, Marta paid little heed to the storefront botanicas full of spiritual paraphernalia or to the Catholic saints with foreign names: Yemayá, Ellegua, Shangó. As an adult, in search of a religion that would reflect her racial and cultural heritage, Marta was led to the Way of the Saints. She came to know Santería intimately through its prayers and rituals, drumming and dancing, trances and divination that spark sacred healing energy for family, spiritual growth, and service to others. Written by one who is a professor and a santera priestess, The Altar of My Soul lays before us an electrifying and inspiring faith–one passed down from generation to generation that vitalizes the sacred energy necessary to build a family, a community, and a strong, loving society.

    In an effort to help those who've been hurt by or turned off by negative religion, Martin Thielen explains that there is an alternative to abandoning religion: good religion. Thielen uses personal stories to illustrate the dangers of religion that is judgmental, anti-intellectual, and legalistic. While addressing the growth of the new atheism movement and the "Nones" (people that have no religious affiliation), this book argues that leaving religion is not practical, not helpful, and not necessary. Thielen provides counterparts to the characteristics of bad religion, explaining that good religion is grace-filled, promotes love and forgiveness, and is inclusive and hope-filled. Perfect for individual, group, or congregational study, a Leader's Guide and a Worship and Outreach Kit are also available to further the discussion and increase community involvement.

    But now comes a guide that enables anyone to pick up the book and use its ineluctable power "without fear or risk" according to editor Simon.

    In First Guru, a fictional Wagner narrates the tale of a Buddhist living in Big Sur, who achieves enlightenment in the horrific aftermath of his child’s suicide. In Second Guru, Queenie, an aging wild child, returns to India to complete the spiritual journey of her youth. Told in ravaged, sensuous detail to the author-narrator by two strangers on opposite sides of the country, years apart from each other, both stories illuminate the random, chaotic nature of human suffering and the miraculous strength of the human spirit. A deeply affecting and meditative reading experience, The Empty Chair is an exquisitely rendered, thought-provoking, and humbling new work.

    The human journey is an emotional quest to find truth and meaning.Countless books have presented this journey through the eyes of people who concluded their search with devotion to God, salvation by Jesus, or commitment to religion.But there's a changing zeitgeist in America and the world: a growing number of people are finding truth and meaning from the opposite perspective.Through 25 personal narratives, Generation Atheist tells their stories.

    A chapter from the Karmapa points out the toxicity and uselessness of anger, from a basic, interpersonal level to the wider society at large. In “I Take Up the Way of Letting Go of Anger,” Zen teacher Diane Eshin Rizzetto helps us look at how we relate to an emotion like anger and, rather than suppress it, she marks a clear pathway we can follow to awaken in its presence and not let it incite us to negative thoughts and actions. Jack Kornfield talks about how to succeed in bringing mindfulness and loving-kindness into arenas like politics and war zones. And a short selection from the chapter on patience in the Mahayana classic The Way of the Bodhisattva highlights that the real enemy is anger itself, not something or someone external.

    The next, I was marching in lockstep through the dark, snow-strewn streets of Sweden. Clad in an ill-fitting cheap blue suit—a Book of Mormon in my pocket—I was tasked with nothing less than saving the country of "godless fornicators from certain moral destruction." You've seen us. We are impossible to miss. We are iconic, and now even celebrated in a nine times over, Tony Awarding winning Broadway musical, The Book of Mormon. Most are boys, some girls. We always travel in pairs. Impeccably groomed, always smiling and polite, you can’t mistake us for anyone else. And, if you haven't met us already, we will soon be coming to knock on a door near you. I know. I was one of them. This is my story. Although raised in the LDS faith, nothing could have prepared me for what I experienced. My world was turned upside down. Nothing was as I expected: the country, the work, my fellow missionaries, and most of all, the Church. Had I not gone through the experience myself, I honestly would not believe a word of what follows. And yet, it’s true. Every last bit.

    Rewritten in clear, clean modern language, the words of the Buddha will connect with the modern reader. The Dhammapada has been called the distilled essence of Buddhism. In 423 brief verses, said to be actual sayings from the Buddha himself, you will find inspiration and guidance.

    The ancient call of Saint Francis to the simple life is sounded once again by America's foremost Franciscan, Richard Rohr, in "Simplicity: The Art of Living."

    After searching to fill her “God voids” in things, she learned what it meant to be the crown of her spiritual husband, God. Instead of chasing after unhealthy relationships, money and things, she sought a relationship with Jesus and He dusted her past off and made all things new. This book is a reminder that regardless of how far you have gotten away from God, He is still right there, ready to dust you off and make you whole. In this book, you will: • Learn what it means to be the crown of Jesus Christ and the crown of your physical husband, from the inside out. • Learn to protect your heart, mind and life from distractions. • Learn to enjoy the current season of your life and develop into the woman God called you to be. • Learn to refuse to settle for anything or anyone less than God’s best for your life. • See yourself how God sees you—valued, beautiful and special in His eyes. • Take advantage of the tests and trails and develop in patience Join Heather Lindsey on a heart-to-heart journey to becoming who God called you to be from the inside out. Dusty Crowns challenges women, whether single or married to be beautiful from the inside out and to accomplish the will of God for their life.

    Loeser MD, American Pain Society“Terrific corporate gift!”          —Ann T. Buivid, President, Remington“The Best!”                            —Canyon Ranch Living Essentials“As Good As It Gets” Issue    —Town & Country With a voice described as "liquid,” award-winning stress relief expert Susie Mantell has created a uniquely soothing guided meditation experience. Like an easy chair, Mantell’s exquisite narration carries listeners into soft, effortless relaxation, gently releasing worry, anxiety, depression and pain. An oasis from a busy day, or prelude to deep, restful sleep, this clinically approved mindfulness meditation CD is elegantly packaged; a thoughtful stress relief gift. Soft music enhances the warm meditation narration

    Out of the depth of her own spiritual experiences, world Christian Corrie ten Boom shares with her Christian readers that the victory has been already won and the enemy of our souls defeated in God's timeless eternity.

    Love has come to mean many things. It’s used to describe emotions. It’s the glue for relationships. It frames countless stories. And the greatest of these stories opens before time began and echoes throughout eternity. It’s the story of God’s unrelenting, overwhelming love for His people. Yet the truth of love is even more majestic, more staggering, and more extraordinary than we can understand: God doesn’t just love us. He is love. Renowned theologian and teacher Dr.R.C. Sproul takes a remarkable look at this most profound truth. God’s Love delves deep into Scripture to explore this dynamic attribute of God, which finds its ultimate expression in His Son. Dr. Sproul also examines seeming paradoxes of God, such as a loving God and divine hate, and how love coexists with His sovereignty. Practical, insightful, and revolutionary, God’s Love compels and calls us to reflect His nature of unconditional love.