Editor's Picks: Motivational Reading for the New Year

While I am the Local Editor for Glen Ellyn Patch full-time, I’m also a practitioner of yoga. Through my yoga practice, I’ve learned that the obstacles I face on my mat are very similar to those I face in daily life. The yoga doesn’t end once I roll that mat up.

Yoga and life have taught me that life is about choices and in any moment I have a choice at how I see things and react. Attitude is everything, as the saying goes.

As we head into a New Year, I thought I’d share some of the books that I’ve read, which have made a positive impact in my life or which have offered me inspiration. 

Have a favorite book that you feel has been helpful in motivating you to achieve your goals? Share them in comments.

Before I share my list, let me share this poem from Ralph Waldo Emerson, which seems fitting as we head into a new year:

Write it on your heart

that every day is the best day in the year.
He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day
who allows it to be invaded with fret and anxiety.

Finish every day and be done with it.
You have done what you could.
Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in.
Forget them as soon as you can, tomorrow is a new day;
begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit
to be cumbered with your old nonsense.

This new day is too dear,
with its hopes and invitations,
to waste a moment on the yesterdays.

Inspiring books from my personal library:

The Alchmist by Paulo Coelho: Everyone has a personal legend they are on earth to fulfill, but most people give up before they are at the point of success. I’ve read this book several times and it always offers insight into challenges I’ve faced and overcome and keeps me moving forward to my goals.

The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks: This was a Christmas present from a close friend and it’s a very helpful and insightful book. The book looks at the way people tend to sell themselves short in life, business, love, family – life in general. The book addresses the factors that keep people from achieving their best life and living in their “zone of genius.”

The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff: The book uses the lovable Winnie the Pooh to explain Taoism or the Wu Wei, or as Hoff says, the Pooh Way. Winnie the Pooh is guileless and simple, but he lives in the moment and though he may not know where he is going, he arrives where he’s supposed to be and usually gets his honey.

The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer: This is heavy and deep, but worth approaching. We create so many stories, we start to believe them all and those stories can really hold us back. But, what happens when we let go of the lies we tell ourselves? We live in the moment, are our true selves and see things as they truly are. Life gets much easier. That is my synopsis of what this book is about.

Journey to the Heart: Melody Beattie: This is a book of daily meditations, which can be read in order or as I like to do – opened up to any page for some insight. They offer an honest perspective on everything from living a contented life to dealing with loss.