Happy Summer!
WOW! Lots of goodness on the blog today — summer, books, and my FIRST GIVEAWAY {and of course, it’s a giveaway of books for your summer reading! 🙂 }
I know some of us are still in school, and technically summer doesn’t start until the solstice in a few weeks. But June 1st is the beginning of meteorological summer, it was almost 90 degrees this weekend, and dance recitals are over, so I am proclaiming summer! And we are kicking off summer at Left Brain Buddha with an awesome giveaway to make the next few months our time to THRIVE and BE HAPPY!
What are your intentions for the next three months? What do you hope to do, feel, and experience this summer?
We will all answer this question differently. I have many trips planned this summer {a family vacation to Europe, a training retreat with Mindful Schools, and the BlogHer ’14 Conference}, and my children have summer activities scheduled, but I don’t want a “busy” summer. I want a slow, restful, peaceful, rejuvenating, and inspiring summer. I want to enjoy my time with my children, and I hope to have time to work on important projects {like my book!} that I haven’t had time for during the school year.
To that end, I will be taking a bit of time off from the blog this summer. I will still be posting new content here, but less frequently {approximately once a week, but sometimes I’ll take a whole week off!} I plan to revise and share some of my earlier posts from last year when only a handful of people were reading.
I hope you’ll be reading, but I also hope you will be taking time this summer to enjoy your family, the warm weather, the neighborhood parties, the vacations, the swimming, and what the Italians call dolce far niente — “the sweetness of doing nothing.” Deliciously idling. Thriving. Being Happy.
THRIVE Â and BE HAPPY
I have just the books to inspire your slow and mindful summer!
I am so excited that two recent New York Times Bestsellers are books about meditation and mindfulness. I’ve already shared with you how much I loved reading those books: Arianna Huffington’s Thrive and Dan Harris’s 10% Happier. Clearly, people want to learn more about slowing down, reducing stress, and living with well-being, wisdom, and wonder.
I think these books can be our inspiration for a summer of rest and rejuvenation. In Thrive, Huffington suggests several ways that we can redefine success and eliminate {or at least reduce} “busy-ness.” Among her recommendations are practicing meditation and mindfulness, detoxing from our digital devices, getting adequate sleep, making time for our self-care, honoring our intuition, cultivating gratitude, cherishing coincidence, and giving of ourselves to our communities. How could we not thrive this summer if we made those our priorities?!
“So find your place to stand — your place of wisdom and peace and strength. And from that place, remake the world in your own image, according to your own definition of success, so that all of us — women and men — can thrive and live our lives with more grace, more joy, more compassion, more gratitude, and yes, more love. Onward, upward, and inward!”
– Arianna Huffington, in THRIVE
I loved reading about Arianna Huffington’s personal experiences, which she intermixes with fascinating new research about the mind, the body, and the mind-body connection. I have a feeling if you like my blog, you’ll LOVE this book!
And if that isn’t enough to convince you, check out Dan Harris’s 10% Happier. The Good Morning America coanchor describes his on-air panic attack that led him to ultimately seek out mindfulness and meditation as a way to reduce the stress in his life. He writes honestly about his skepticism towards these practices — would he become a checked-out hippie? a meditating zombie? Could he really embrace a practice that emphasizes letting go and not getting wrapped up in thoughts, and still be successful in a high-pressure, intensely analytical industry? The answer, he discovers, is a resounding YES.
“Acceptance [of the present moment] is not passivity. Sometimes we are justifiably displeased. What mindfulness does is create some space in your head so you can, as the Buddhists say, ‘respond’ rather than simply ‘react.'”
Dan Harris, in 10% HAPPIER
Harris also interweaves his journey with the most up-to-date research on meditation, as well as his accounts of his meetings with Eckhart Tolle, Deepak Chopra, and several contemporary Buddhist scholars. Ultimately, this book is a great introduction to mindfulness for beginners. As Harris writes, “everything we experience in this world goes through one filter — our minds — and we spend very little time bothering to see how it works.”
An Exciting Giveaway!
You’ve read my takeaways, now for an awesome giveaway!
I am thrilled to let you know that Harmony Books has provided me with FIVE (!) COPIES of Thrive to give away to my readers, and itbooks (of Harper Collins) has provided me with a copy of 10% Happier to give away too! That’s SIX WINNERS — happy summer indeed!
You can enter the giveaway up to six times via the Rafflecopter form below. Everyone gets an entry just for being here, and then you can earn additional entries by following me on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest (or if you already follow me!)
Additionally, you can earn TWO MORE entries by signing up for my mailing list. I’m really hoping you’ll sign up, because…
I am launching a monthly newsletter, which will premiere in July! Each month, I will share inspirational words, provide links to a carefully curated roundup of the best online reads, and offer additional tips for mindful, joyful, and thought-full living. You’ll also get “behind the scenes” updates about the blog and upcoming projects. I am so excited about this new venture!
{If you already receive email updates from me, you’ll receive the newsletter. If you haven’t signed up yet, please do so below!}
Have a wonderful summer! Namaste 🙂
Enter the Giveaway
The giveaway ends at midnight (CST) on Friday, June 6th.
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