Lisa notes

Books I read in December ’14

By LisaNotes December 30, 2014 Books I Recommend 24 Comments

I just finished a stack of books I’ve been reading for awhile. So it’s time for a new stack.

I started The Book Thief Sunday night. Oh my! Have you read it? The writing so far is phenomenal. Truly!

For better or worse, I finally dipped into my public library’s eBook collection this week. The downside is I’m not sure there’s a renewal period beyond the original 14 days (and I never finish a book that fast). But we’ll see.

Below is the rest of what’s on my nightstand that I’m sharing with 5 Minutes for Books. My year-end list of 10 Favorite Books of 2014 is here.

BOOKS I FINISHED FROM NOVEMBER’S LIST

1. Nudge
Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness
by Richard H. Thaler

This book intrigued me from beginning to end about how we often make decisions based on how the questions are set up. We all have power to architect our own and others’ choices as well by designing the choice environments more thoughtfully. I’ll be thinking about this one for a long while.

2. The Dawning of Indestructible Joy
Daily Readings for Advent
by John Piper

I picked up this devotional for free during Advent. The daily readings were brief yet rich. I’ll look forward to reading through it again in another Advent season.

3. Writing about Your Life
A Journey into the Past
by William Zinsser

I admit that I checked out this library book because I love to read Zinsser, regardless of what he’s writing about. (After all, he made On Writing Well interesting; I reread it every few years.) Of course his material here is interesting too, not just about how to write, but about what he chooses to write about himself.

4. The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction
by Alan Jacobs

Reading is alive and well. Jacobs reminds us that, yes, continue to read for information, but also continue to read at whim. My periodic trips to the library keep my whim reading going strong.

5. A Captain’s Duty
Somali Pirates, Navy SEALs, and Dangerous Days at Sea
by Richard Phillips

A fascinating and true story about Capt. Phillips’ capture by Somali pirates in 2009 (great movie also). The book kept me captivated even though I knew how it was going to end (it made my top 10 list of books read in 2014).

6. Jake Fades
A Novel of Impermanence
by David Guy

I enjoyed this novel about spirituality (mainly Buddhism) and how the main characters worked through the hard questions of life.

7. Mudhouse Sabbath
An Invitation to a Life of Spiritual Discipline
by Lauren Winner

A quick and short read, this is a practical book on incorporating the best of Jewish spiritual practices into our Christian faith. I enjoyed it and want to use more of Winner’s ideas in my own spiritual disciplines.

8. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up
The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing
by Marie Kondo

My full review here

I really enjoyed this book. Kondo gives enough new tips to make it worth my while to read yet another book on organizing. Her philosophy is more about what you keep than what you discard.

9. Jesus Feminist
An Invitation to Revisit the Bible’s View of Women
by Sarah Bessey

My review here

This isn’t just for or about women, but for all who want to contribute their gifts to the Kingdom. I enjoy Sarah’s honesty about pieces of her own journey and how they relate to ours. She is a strong encourager to go, do, and love, right where you are, whoever you are.

10. A Christian Survival Guide
A Lifeline to Faith and Growth
by Ed Cyzewski

My review here

This book covers very relevant territory. Ed addresses questions honestly and bluntly on prayer, violent Bible stories, hell, doubts, and more. As he puts it, he takes on some of the “most challenging threats to my faith and the faith of those I know.” Good stuff!

BOOKS I’M READING NOW

1. The Book Thief
by Markus Zusak

I’m only 50 pages in, and I can already say this writing is incredibly beautiful art! From the very first page onward, I’ll read a few sentences, then have to pause to soak in how phenomenally these sentences are constructed. I know the WW2 storyline is also good (I’ve seen the movie), but how these words are crafted is blowing me away.

2. Think Like a Freak
by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner

I so enjoy these anecdotal stories of culture and economics from the authors of Freakonomics. This book comes highly recommended from some of you blogger friends so I know it’s a win. (I also love their podcast Freakonomics.)

3. Born to Blog
Building Your Blog for Personal and Business Success One Post at a Time
by Mark Schaefer and Stanford Smith

I definitely don’t blog for business, but I do like to read books about things I like to do. This was one of the library eBook freebies that caught my eye. I’ll let you know next month if it’s useful for the casual blogger or not.

4. The Narcissist Next Door
Understanding the Monster in Your Family, in Your Office, in Your Bed–in Your World
by Jeffrey Kluger

Another trial library eBook. Although it’s not written necessarily from a believer’s viewpoint, pride is a universal struggle that affords addressing from any angle, so this book might prove interesting. If not, nothing lost.

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What’s one of your favorite books from 2014? What do you want to read in 2015? Please share here.

My books on Goodreads
Previous reading lists

14 Favorite Posts from 2014

By LisaNotes December 29, 2014 Links I like 10 Comments

Looking back over 2014, these 14 posts were some favorites (in no particular order), including quotes from some favorite books. Thanks for reading and commenting this year.

I look forward to continuing our conversations in 2015!

1. You don’t choose how you’ll die {Tuesdays with Morrie}, 4/2/14

2. It matters to me. Does it to you? Alabama tornadoes, 5/5/14

3. 5 helps for memorizing Bible verses, 6/18/14

4. Ready for your second chance?, 5/12/14

5. Where do you go to church? {Reimagining Church}, 5/22/14

6. Body, I forgive you, 10/22/14

7. What? No plans?, 3/24/14

8. Get your brave on {Let’s All Be Brave}, 9/22/14

9. Favorite Bible verses to memorize, 1/27/14

10. How do you stay soft in a hard world?, 1/8/14

11. Insomnia isn’t punishment {Finding Spiritual Whitespace}, 6/3/14

12. God is present now {Letters by a Modern Mystic}, 6/9/14

13. You can’t do it all—Choose less {Essentialism}, 7/10/14

14. Flips are God’s specialty, 9/8/14

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“The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up” – Book review

By LisaNotes December 26, 2014 Book reviews 7 Comments

“Don’t focus on reducing, or on efficient storage methods, for that matter. Focus instead on choosing the things that inspire joy and on enjoying life according to your own standards. This is the true pleasure of tidying.”
-Marie Kondo, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up

Like me, you may have read a few books on organizing and decluttering. They basically say the same thing: get rid of stuff and organize better.

But The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up is different enough that I’d recommend you reading it. Instead of focusing on discarding what you don’t need (which you’ll still need to do—it’s step 1), it focuses more on holding on to what brings you joy and where best to keep it.

Author Marie Kondo suggests not tidying room by room, but rather category by category. She recommends this order: clothes, books, papers, komono (miscellany), and lastly, mementos.

She gets very specific on how to work through each category so I’m going to re-read this book in 2015 to work through it closer. Not all of it will be useful (there were parts I couldn’t relate to at all either practically or philosophically), but for the most part, it is an inspiring book.

Here are some tips from the book . . .

“If you think tidying is an endless chore that must be done every day, you are gravely mistaken. There are two types of tidying—‘daily tidying’ and ‘special event tidying.’ . . . The purpose of this book is to inspire you to tackle the ‘special event’ of putting your house in order as soon as possible.”

~ * ~

“Putting things away creates the illusion that the clutter problem has been solved. But sooner or later, all the storage units are full, the room once again overflows with things, and some new and ‘easy’ storage method becomes necessary, creating a negative spiral. This is why tidying must start with discarding.”

~ * ~

“People who can’t stay tidy can be categorized into just three types: the ‘can’t-throw-it-away’ type, the ‘can’t-put-it-back’ type, and the ‘first-two-combined’ type. Ninety percent [of my clients] fall into the third category.”

~ * ~

“When you attend a seminar, do so with the resolve to part with every handout distributed. If you regret recycling it, take the same seminar again, and this time apply the learning. It’s paradoxical, but I believe that precisely because we hang on to such materials, we fail to put what we learn into practice.”

~ * ~

“The true purpose of a present is to be received. Presents are not ‘things’ but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. When viewed from this perspective, you don’t need to feel guilty for parting with a gift. Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it.”

~ * ~

“Truly precious memories will never vanish even if you discard the objects associated with them. We live in the present. No matter how wonderful things used to be, we cannot live in the past. The joy and excitement we feel here and now are more important.”

~ * ~

“A common mistake many people make is to decide where to store things on the basis of where it’s easiest to take them out. . . . Storage should reduce the effort needed to put things away, not the effort needed to get them out.”

~ * ~

“Never pile things: vertical storage is the key. . . . I am particularly obsessed with this point. I store every item vertically if possible, including clothes, which I fold and stand on edge in my drawers, and stockings, which I roll up and stand in a box.”

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“The most common item I use is an empty shoebox.”

~ * ~

“But when we really delve into the reasons for why we can’t let something go, there are only two: an attachment to the past or a fear for the future.”

~ * ~

“Human beings can only truly cherish a limited number of things at one time. As I am both lazy and forgetful, I can’t take proper care of too many things. That is why I want to cherish properly the things I love, and that is why I have insisted on tidying for so much of my life.”

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Do you have a favorite organization book? A tip for decluttering? Please share here.

Thanks to Blogging for Books for my review copy

From our tree to yours

By LisaNotes December 24, 2014 Miscellaneous 13 Comments

Merry Christmas . . . “because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”
Luke 1:78-79

10 Favorite Books of 2014

By LisaNotes December 17, 2014 Books I Recommend 30 Comments

Looking over the books I read in 2014 (not necessarily published in 2014 because I usually wait for the library copy so I read for free), these ten or so books were either the most informative, entertaining, or motivating.

Top 10

1. Being Wrong
Adventures in the Margin of Error
by Kathryn Schulz

This one was the most fascinating by far! Most of us want to always be right, but this book showed how often we are wrong, about what things, and why. It also addressed what to do about it and how to make peace with it. My review here.

2. Daring Greatly
How the Courage to Be Vulernable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead
by Brené Brown

Dr. Brené Brown is a researcher who discovered in her own life and through 12 years of research how to live wholeheartedly. This message encourages us to more meaningful connect with others and with ourselves despite the risks involved. My review here.

3. Everything Belongs
The Gift of Contemplative Prayer
by Richard Rohr

Have you read any books yet by Richard Rohr? If you like being challenged to take your spirituality to deeper levels, this is a great book to take you there. Rohr wants you to see yourself and your connection to God in new and more truthful ways. (I wish I’d done a book review on this one, but I could never wrap my head around it all. Maybe later.)

4. Nickel and Dimed
On (Not) Getting By in America
by Barbara Ehrenreich

Is it possible to live the American dream on minimum wage? Author Barbara Ehrenreich went undercover to find out. She took low-paying jobs, lived in cheap lodging, and discovered how difficult it is to be one of the working poor. This book shifted again my already-changing views on how we middle-class Americans are too hard and judgmental on those struggling to get by.

5. Vanishing Grace
What Ever Happened to the Good News?
by Philip Yancey

This book hurts. But also gives hope. In our culture, the church is more likely to be judged negatively than positively. Yancey attributes part of that to the church’s underwhelming show of grace, and he gives many examples of how we can change that. My review here.

6. A Captain’s Duty
Somali Pirates, Navy SEALs, and Dangerous Days at Sea
by Richard Phillips with Stephan Talty

This was the most riveting book I read. Even after seeing the movie (twice!), the real-life story in the book still captivated me. Phillips doesn’t wax philosophical too often in the retelling, but he does give insights periodically into what he was thinking when he was being held hostage by Somali pirates at sea. “The thing I saw the clearest was the lesson I learned on the lifeboat: we are stronger than we think we are.”

7. Decisive
How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work
by Chip and Dan Heath

I believe God used this book to help me make a “yes” decision to go to Guatemala last September. So of course I love it because it was a fantastic trip. But I continue to return to principles taught here using the WRAP process. (Not to mention that I love all books so far written by Chip and Dan Heath.) My review here.

8. The Four Agreements
by Miguel Ruiz

Because of this short book, I have these four statements on my bedroom mirror: 1–Be true to yourself. 2–Don’t take it personally. 3–Don’t assume. 4–Always do your best. Luiz’s lessons on #2 and #3 in particular are helping me me not make as many mountains out of molehills.

9. Delete
The Virtue of Forgetting in the Digital Age
by Viktor Mayer-Schönberger

Much like the book Being Wrong, this book helps you make peace with another part of being human: forgetting things. We’re not designed to remember everything. Many things are best forgotten. This book does a great job in exploring how valuable is our ability to forget. My review here.

10. The Power of Now
A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
by Eckhart Tolle

This book fascinated me so much when I read my borrowed copy, that I’ve since bought the book and will spent 2015 rereading it much slower. Overall it contains a simple message: live more in the present than in the past or future. But it’s easier said than done for me. I can’t wait to start this book (and process) again. My review here.

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But stop at 10 favorites? That’s too hard! Here are some bonus picks that I also truly enjoyed.

Favorite Fiction

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
The Circle by Dave Eggers
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Housseini
The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

Favorite Biographies

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
Does Jesus Really Love Me? by Jeff Chu
Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

Favorite Spiritual

Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life by Karen Armstrong
A New Kind of Christianity by Brian McLaren
Naked Spirituality by Brian McLaren
Apprenticeship with Jesus by Gary Moon
Strength to Love by Martin Luther King, Jr.
Made for Goodness by Desmond Tutu
The Shack Revisited by Baxter Kruger
Unfollowers by Ed Cyzewski and Derek Cooper

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What is a favorite book you read in 2014? I’d love to hear!

Related:

7 lessons from one word: Compassion

By LisaNotes December 15, 2014 Compassion 29 Comments

“I told her to do something unexpected: go where there is pain. ‘If you want to discover your purpose,’ I explained, “then you need to hang out in places where there is brokenness.’ ”
– Jeff Goins, Wrecked: When a Broken World Slams into Your Comfortable Life

This time last year, I had a word picked out for One Word: 2014. And it wasn’t Compassion.

But by the end of December 2013, another word kept coming to me that I would use over and over throughout 2014 to teach me lessons, show me grace, and uncover truths: Compassion.

Here are 7 lessons I learned (and relearned) about compassion this year.

7. COMPASSION ISN’T ABOUT PITY

Don’t see projects; see people.

When Linda commented, “Nobody likes to be someone else’s project,” Andrew replied that was perfect.

Andrew is battling a hard physical illness. So listen when he says, “I wish caregivers would understand this. Sometimes their self-identification and sense of generating positive karma completely overshadows the fact that the person for whom they are caring is still a human being.
It becomes the caregiver’s story. Not invalid, but also not appropriate.”

Compassion isn’t a superior helping an inferior. Compassion is one human relating to another through an avenue of love.

6. EVERYONE WON’T UNDERSTAND YOUR COMPASSION

Some will say you’ve gone too far. But maybe you know you’ve not gone far enough.

I’ve learned to speak up more on some things, but at other times to be quieter. I’m still working this out, mainly learning the hard way each time (sorry, friends and family).

I still need to understand more myself—through listening, through talking, through experiencing, through reading.

5. COMPASSION CAN WRECK YOU

When I visited with families inside the hovels they called homes outside the garbage dump in Guatemala, my heart hurt. When I saw bruises on the teen girl’s arm now living in the group home, it felt too heavy. When I listened second-hand to the ugly comments that my gay friend heard first-hand, I just wanted it all to stop.

I needed to be reminded of these truths from Jeff Goins in Wrecked (one of my favorite books I read in 2013):

“So often we want to move quickly past these moments. We want resolution; we want to justify ourselves. But these are the experiences we need. Our brokenheartedness at the injustices we witness is what gives us compassion. So when we rush past these messy and uncomfortable moments, we take away the experiences that teach us mercy.”
– Jeff Goins

4. SOMETIMES COMPASSION IS QUIET

Compassion doesn’t always use words.

Sometimes compassion is dressing down among lower-income friends so they don’t feel awkward. Sometimes it’s making eye contact to say, “I notice you.” Sometimes it’s wearing all black to church for “Black Lives Matter Sunday.”

Sometimes compassion is a quiet change of heart on the inside, to be lived out loud later on the outside.

3. YOU MAY FEEL GUILTY FOR NOT DOING MORE

Once you start looking deeper at others’ needs, the more you’ll discover. And the more you discover, the more inadequate you feel to make a difference.

I feel I’m not doing enough for some homeless friends of mine. Their needs outstrip my resources in every way. So I do a little, then walk away; return to do a little more, than walk away again.

I remind myself of this from Wrecked, “Everything you do matters. So do something. Anything. Just move.”

I haven’t moved far. I don’t move fast. But I refuse to stand still.

2. WE’RE ALL BEGINNERS AT COMPASSION

Compassion is about starting over. And over. And over again.

Nobody has this down pat. Every day presents fresh opportunities to better learn how to love others. If I’ve learned anything this year, it’s how deep and wide this thing can run. So I’ve watched Fran and Alene and others who do compassion well and often, so I can learn some more.