inspiring books
Books that helped me navigate or hang on during the hardest times of my healing journey. Asterisks (*) are indicated must-read books to help you navigate your personal journey. Thanks Chris for reminding me to do this.
2024
The System: Who Rigged it, How We Fix It by Robert B. Reich
For those of us who are a bit less knowledgeable about our government and the details of how our government bailout for big companies affects us, this was a nice more “colored” perspective on this. There is a lot of bias perspective on how things can be done to change our government but obviously it is meant to rally citizens to fight and shape the government they want and make it fair for everyone. It is hard to tell how much of what he says can be implemented but his writing is always informative and helpful to understand how our government operates and how folks have learned to utilize it for personal gain.
TiHKAL: The Continuation by Alexander and Ann Shulgin
Love the science and focus on now tryptamine such as DMT and now diving a bit further in how his first book has become both the opener for so many academics to explore psychedelics as well as ammunition for the DEA to learn how to build a case for war on drugs.
Finding Me By Viola Davis*
What an amazing human being who had to fight so much to survive and was able to express herself and others through her acting. This is another person who I felt that her childhood tragedy is somewhat similar to mind especially when you don’t have parents who are around to protect you. She had to fight through the different versions of poverty while learning to find a better life for herself. Her powerful transformation after going to Africa was so amazing and the way she integrates her self-discovery in her work is inspiring.
Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distanct, Rejecting, or Self-involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson, PsyD
I want to emphasize how valuable the frameworks that the author taught the reader to understand both the adult child and/or parents' ways of processing and executing their actions that usually mask emotions. The framework of internalizers vs. externalizers helps contextualize how people cope, process issues, and how each carries the burden. It's validating to hear how these frameworks play out for adult children to immature parents. The mini-workbook section of healing fantasy and role self is novel and very helpful in revealing how you see yourself and the world around you.
However, as a way to over-validate adult children, the author uses language that villainizes "emotionally immature" parents rather than really emphasizing how in some ways they are also adult children to immature parents as well. In many ways, this book is written by an adult child, which helps us understand the framework but is not helpful if we hope for adult children to break the cycle and heal. As a child of a narcissistic parent who had to escape war, I understood my mother's behaviors and empathetic characteristics are not a great survival skill. But the focus should have been on learning skills in setting up proper boundaries. It seems very accusatory which doesn't help the adult child trying to heal but instead ignites a false sense of justice as being seen. It would be helpful to put some context ahead of time because of charged words like "malignant guessing game". The section on learning about affect phobia made sense and helped me understand why most people don't talk about their feelings. But then the tone goes back to emotionally immature people "resist facing their mistakes" and expect to get them "off the hook" immediately. You can't give what you were given and it takes a lot of time and capacity to research and learn new skills. Eventually, the author provides helpful ways to view your parents as they are in order to know what type of boundaries to set up but that's NOT the tone of the book in the beginning.
I do recommend this book and it helps validate these relationship dynamics but you have to listen carefully to extract the helpful frameworks and new skills the author teaches you later.
PiHKAL: A Chemical Love Story by Alexander and Ann Shulgin*
An amazing story of the risk both Ann, Alexander, and their friends took to explore the outer boundaries of the human consciousness, universal truths, and empathy. Of course, it was sprinkled with a few love triangle romances, which smooth out the deep science and nerdiness of the process. I love how it demonstrates how people need to be bold and continue to question the structural frameworks we all follow in society as they are truly just arbitrary suggestions.
The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch*
What an amazing collection of personal life lessons when Randy’s life was cut short due to pancreatic cancer. I had the pleasure to know the best friend mentioned in this book and got his side of the story. But honestly, the friendship displayed in this book is something we all wish in our life: unconditional love and trust.
2023
Fellowship of the River: A Medical Doctor’s Exploration into Traditional Amazonian Plant Medicine by Joseph Tafur, MD
An amazing journey of a medical student who found plant medicine to be more than just healing. He captures his experience as shaman and others on how powerful this tradition has become in healing deep subconscious wounds and how he and many other shamans are able to experience and identify the source of their trauma. I like his final message that as much as you gain insight into these traumas, it doesn’t necessary fix the root cause and in fact, one still has to come home and do the work.
A Hole in the World: Finding Hope in Rituals of Grief and Healing by Amanda Held Opelt*
After managing my brother’s brain cancer, I had this deep grief and wound in dealing with the potential of losing him. This book helped me overcome the motions of grief and taught me the meaning of acceptance and patience. Once you experience it, it doesn’t go away and in fact creates the shared human experience that we can empathize with. It helped reset my equilibrium by teaching me to let go of what’s expected of me. An example is even with very little sleep, we are still able to function more than 85% of the task at hand and why are so harsh on ourselves otherwise? It’s the small day-to-day acceptance of the little pains and challenges that helps us slowly heal.
This amazing author shares a world of invisible spirits such as jinns and Islamic and Arabic traditions in her fantasy fiction.
And Finally: Matters of Life and Death by Henry Marsh
Helpful to learn about how cancer affects patients and families through the eyes of a brain surgeon who had to face cancer himself. Having to navigate this for my brother, I’ve connected to his words more deeply and even as he meanders through some of his experiences as a patient, I can still follow, relate, and connect to the pain and frustration of knowing how your life ends.
A Psalm of the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
The Mindful Path of Self-Compassion by Christopher K. Germer, PhD
Why Buddhism is True by Robert Wright
Unconditional Confidence by Pema Chodron
Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Bodhisattva Mind by Pema Chodron
Legacy by Nora Roberts
How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain by Lisa Feldman
Holotropic Breathwork by Stanislav Grof, Christina Grof
2022
Good Morning, Monster: A Therapist Shares Five Heroic Stories of Emotional Recovery by Catharine Gildinier*
One of the most impactful book for trauma survivors/heroes by providing distinct examples that provides insights into different psychological definitions of the types of trauma responses and ways people overcome it. It is the first of its kind that recognizes non-Western practices to healing. She is one of the first to acknowledge that therapists can influence the focus of therapy based on their own trauma or recognition of it. Most importantly, how trauma lives in your body and truly can cause havoc to your physical health. This can be as severe as cancer.
Daring Greatly by Brene Brown
This book is a misuse of the total daring greatly but more focused around helping parents identify their own shame and guilt and its origins and how that influences the way we parent or develop relationship with others.
This book is all about saving the human species by making them smarter, but the precision of this gene editing technology has not yet been perfected. So two siblings are at odds on whether it’s humane to infect the entire human population with less than 50% chance of survival.
Recursion by Blake Crouch
Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
Would you go through the infinite multi-verse to find true happiness? This scientist did and realized the dark consequences of pursuing such a ambitious dream.
What Happened to You? by Oprah Winfrey and Bruce Perry*
One of my favorite books by far on reframing the children’s behavior questions that might be stemming from trauma to “what happened to you” rather than “why are you like this”. This reframing delves into how we can build infrastructures and ways to recognize disruptive behaviors in children originating from places of trauma. Here are some of the most profound quotes:
“...for the next 40 years, that pattern of conditioned compliance, the results of deeply rooted trauma would define every relationship, interaction, and decision of my life.” - Oprah Winfrey
“A dysregulated adult cannot regulate a dysregulated child.” - Bruce D. Perry
Unwinding Anxiety by Judson Brewer*
It goes into scientific detail on how to dissect the underlying triggers and pinpoint the source of anxiety while honing into your anxiety outlets that are rewarding them. He focused on breaking down anxiety into 3 parts: (1) First gear - mapping your habit loop and understanding what feeds your anxiety, (2) second gear - disillusion your habit loop or disassociate your habits that is feeding your anxiety, (3) third gear - breaking free from the habit loop or be curious and explore your emotions and reactions.
Chasing My Cure by David Fajgenbaum*
This book was the tipping point for me to pursue my cure. Although I’ve been doing this for myself since 2010, I’ve decided to my cure and helping others my priority. Thank you for simplifying the urgency for creating communities around rare diseases and developing cures. David does an amazing job of capturing both the challenges within the medical landscape from the perspective of a medical student, a patient, and a patient advocate. It is a book of lessons that will only inspire you as it has done for me. If you want to help Castlemen’s Disease, please check out his website here.
Gumption by Nick Offerman
I love the examples of Americans who have fought hard for what they stand for and what it means to go against the grain and swim upstream to do things that are right.
Paddle Your Own Canoe by Nick Offerman
I Tried to Change So You Don’t Have To by Loni Love*
I have so many shared experiences with women of color especially black women in this country. They are truly strong, spiritual, and rich in wisdom and Loni Love shared so many insights about children of trauma and learning to navigate a world not built for you. She is one of the few women who I admire and aspire to speak the deep truth to the realities and challenges she had to face and overcome. I hope to take some of my privileges and help others overcome societal barriers.
The Constant Rabbit by Jasper Fforde
An adult fiction version of Zootopia. Here’s my favorite quote: “To travel joyously is better than to arrive.”
Unconditional Confidence by Pema Chodron
Pema Chodron is an amazing scholar and Buddhist nun that helps capture the true underlying human condition that holds you back from unconditional confidence. She does this through personal stories, real-time lecture-style audiobooks with lots of humor.
The Lady’s Handbook for Her Mysterious Illness by Sarah Ramey*
Her story resonates so much with me with the challenges of not getting answers and support from the medical system.
Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee by Sarah Silverman
My favorite part in all of this is quite vulgar, but all-in-all she’s hilarious and this book is a nice light approach to her trias and tribulations of being a comedian and bedwetter.
2021
Mindhunter: Inside the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit by John E. Douglas and Mark Olshaker
Ruth Vader Ginsburg: A Life by Jane Sherron De Hart - 11/08/2021
Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey - 11/10/2021
Catch and Kill by Ronan Farrow - 11/16/2021
Getting Unstuck by Pema Chodron* - 11/30/2021
Awakening Compassion by* Pema Chodron
Yearbook by Seth Rogan 12/30/2021
2020
Body Keeps The Score by Bessel van der Kolk
Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance
White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo
2019
Failure is An Option by H Jon Benjamin
Dear Girls by Ali Wong