sunset tonight – must bust out the dslr more often

So reading. I’m currently all about the self-improvement and the non-fiction and October was very oriented to that.

You’ll recall that I was testing a bunch of sample chapters, and I pulled the trigger on a couple of them. I’m pretty surprised at how little I read.

✪ Pia Edburg: The Cozy Life: Rediscover the Joy of the Simple Things Through the Danish Concept of Hygge
Lesson: I should know by now to avoid self-published books. It wasn’t too bad, but wasn’t too great either. The author is very sweet, but this is pitched to an audience that is not me. If you know a 12-14 year old, I think this might actually be pretty well suited for them.

✪ Bill Burnett, Dave Evans: Designing Your Life: Build a Life that Works for You.
I didn’t really connect with the voice – kind of a hokey, jolly, bonhomie that I find a smidge grating. Nonetheless, I did get a good deal out of this – if only to pass on the learnings to my peeps at SML. I find I’m very oppositional to written exercises from books, being of the “screw you man, you can’t make me” school, but I did them in my head and was particularly challenged by the think of 3 alternative career paths exercise (as were my peeps). I’m still challenged, but I’m pretty convinced that I’d love to pursue private investigating as my wild and crazy option. Either that or be an assassin.

✪ I’m currently half way through Derren Brown: Happy – Why More or Less Everything is Absolutely Fine .
Honestly, I’m struggling. I was compelled to buy it after the sample chapter brilliantly slammed The Secret, and there is very much good within – but it is so rambling and discursive that I can’t keep track of where I’m at. I’m totally down with the principles, and I’m enjoying learning more about stoicism, but this really, really, desperately needed a good editor (and a whole lot of culling).

Perhaps I need a break and to move onto something else.

xxx

I’ve downloaded another bunch of sample chapters and picked up a couple of new, as yet unread, books – both as a result of podcasts:

✪ The aforementioned Chade-Meng Tan: Joy on Demand: The Art of Discovering the Happiness Within.

✪ Willard Spiegelman: Senior Moments – Looking Back, Looking Ahead discovered on the always excellent virtual memories podcast.

xxx

As an aside, I’m trying to wean myself from reading news as distraction at SML. You know, those times when you’re in the middle of something fiendishly complex and need to mentally step away? I’m trying the kindle web app and all manner of sample chapters as an alternative to my mental step-away. This is working a treat so far – makes for a much less cranky me!

But maybe I just need to get myself onto some good escapist fiction.