Books and Heroes

This book is now well-known and loved but if you haven’t read it yet I do recommend it.  It is her journey from a painful divorce to finding healing through pleasure and food in Italy, through the discipline of an Ashram in India, and through love in Indonesia.  I like the way it is written – personal, light and funny yet informative and facing hard issues head on. 

See also her follow-up book ‘Commitment’ which has a wealth of interesting material on marriage.

My second hero is Julia Cameron.  Her book ‘The Artist’s Way’ not only supported my creativity, but encouraged a sense of adventure and of life opening up to new possibilities when it had felt as if it was going down hill and closing down around me.  It is a book for artists of any description, but as she says, we are all artists, and creativity is a spiritual experience.  It is a workbook so requires you to apply yourself to specific tasks, but it is well worth it. 

The other book of hers which I loved is ‘God is no laughing matter: observations and objections on the spiritual path’, a book with a similar goal to the book I have been writing.  She says ‘It is my hope that you will find this book hardheaded, softhearted, and playful.’

See www.theartistsway.com

This book is set in Germany in 1943 and is written by Death.  But given that, the book is a complete surprise as it is written with such a light touch and is so full of life.  The quality that makes it very special is the language – it has the most beautiful figurative language with words and phrases good enough to eat.  In my book club we all gave it 10 out of 10, except for one who gave it 11! 

It is published by Black Swan 20007

My first hero is John O’Donohue, an Irish poet and philosopher who sadly died in January (’08) but whose rich words live on in all those who read or heard him. I first heard him at Greenbelt, and he had the ability to speak as poetically as he wrote. Reading his books is like sipping honey for the heart – I think his words changed the shape of my soul! One of my favourite quotes is:

"Prayer is taking silent time to overhear your soul’s conversation with God".

His books are:

• Echoes of Memory: poetry (now out of print)
• Anam Cara: Spiritual Wisdom from the Celtic World
• Eternal Echoes: exploring our hunger to belong
• Conamara Blues: a collection of poetry
• Divine Beauty: the invisible embrace
• Benedictus: a book of blessings

See www.jodonohue.com

(You might want to order books independently as his site links you to Amazon.com, the American site.)