Ignore Everybody And 39 Other Keys to Creativity
Hugh MacLeod
Macleod has done a marvelous job of distilling the basics of being successful at being creative. This is not the same this being monetarily successful at being creative. Like The Happiness Project, Ignore Everybody makes you take a good long look at your perceptions and how outside influences color your desires and definitions of happiness and success.
McLeod covers two main areas of creativity that you rarely hear about. The first is that you should find time and headspace to make your art. It should be what you want to create and it should not be something you agonize over. If you are suffering for your art, you’re doing it wrong. Creating should be a pleasure.
The other aspect that is talked about even less is that creativity is...
The Cheapskate Next Door and The Ultimate Cheapskate’s Road Map to True Riches
Jeff Yeager
Lesson number one rule in Yeager’s amusing and instructive books: cheapskate is a GOOD word. I couldn’t agree more. Rather than going down the usual money-saving how-to roads, namely the “how to save money by reusing old string and cardboard boxes to make shoes” and the “just stop drinking that triple frappe half-caf latte every morning and you’ll be rich in no time” books, Yeager focuses on helping you find your inner cheapskate.
He lays out the major areas of our lives where people often make poorly informed choices with little forethought. His advice runs the gamut of being below your means, considering the total cost of a purchase (including upkeep, repair, etc), ways of saving money and amount of...
The Happiness Project
Gretchen Rubin
Rubin is a book-dork and I love her for it. Like me, when she has a problem to solve her first reaction is to find a book on the topic. After deciding that, on the whole, her life is good but there were areas that need work, Rubin set out to do some research. Dividing up her life into categories she thought deserved a polish, Rubin set out to find solutions to her problems. What she came up with some wonderful ideas. More importantly, she came up with some of her own life truths:
What’s fun for other people may not be fun for you — and vice versa.
What you do EVERY DAY matters more than what you do ONCE IN A WHILE
Plus commandments such as:
Do it now.
Let it go.
Spend out (spend money to make life better).
Some may apply to...
Stumbling on Happiness
Daniel Gilbert
As long as your brain’s guess about the next word turns out to be right, turning black squiggles into ideas, scenes, characters, and concepts, blissfully unaware that your nexting brain is predicting the future of the sentence at a fantastic rate. It is only when your brain predicts badly that you suddenly feel avocado.
That is, surprised. See?
Human minds are weird. Half of what we perceive is fictionalized by our mind for us. Even the most logical of minds makes strange errors and creates story lines. Gilbert does an excellent job of pointing out the ways our minds fool, confuse and console us. He points to studies on happiness that...
Half-Assed: A Memoir
Jeanette Fulda
I have long been a fan of the blog pastaqueen.com and loved every minute of Fulda’s book. Topping out at nearly 400 lbs, Jeannette decided to loose over half her body weight. However, instead of the usual attempts – weight loss surgery, liquid diet, WeightWatchers/Atkins/Grapefruit Diet – she did what so few people ever try. She ate less and exercised more. What makes her so wonderful to read is that she never hated herself, even at her most unhealthy times. She rarely berates herself just gently eases into trying new things and going it bit further. For a self-proclaimed homebody she certainly has made a huge impact on many people. The scorching ...
Do Everything Better (Urawaza)
Lisa Katayama
Urawaza is a secret or trick to do things better – life-hacking. This collection of Urawaza offers a myriad of ideas to fix and do things in a cheap and easy way – often as alternatives to a more standard way. For instance, have glass all over the floor? Don’t try to sweep or mop it up, but use a piece of soft bread to gently lift up the shards. Other tips are equally practical. Cat scratching your table legs? Wrap them in rope. Candle wax in the carpet? Use layers of paper and an iron to soak the wax out. Others seem a bit more iffy. I doubt I’ll stick scallions up my nose to clear congestion, nor do I think I will rub white shoe-polish ...