Classic Wisdom for the Good Life


Book Description

The good life. In its simplest form, it is what you wish for those you love and care about, as well as for yourself. But what is it? What's the prescription? The truth of the matter is that no doctor can prescribe a pill that will make every heart content. But through the words of extraordinary men and women who have achieved a level of greatness, we can glean insights into passion, dedication, and wisdom. So, for today's astute students of the good life, you hold in your hands an admit-one ticket?a timeless collection of inspiration and wisdom. What you go on to do with it is up to you. "A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life." ?Muhammad Ali "It's easy to make a buck. It's a lot tougher to make a difference." ?Tom Brokaw "Look, I don't want to wax philosophic, but I will say that if you're alive you've got to flap your arms and legs, you've got to jump around a lot, for life is the very opposite of death, and therefore you must at very least think noisy and colorfully, or you're not alive." ?Mel Brooks "Anytime you see a turtle up on top of a fence post, you know he had some help." ?Alex Haley "College is something you complete. Life is something you experience. So don't worry about your grade, or the results or success. Success is defined in myriad ways, and you will find it, and people will no longr be grading you, but it will come from your own internal sense of decency." ?Jon Stewart "When the heart is right, the mind and the body will follow. ?Coretta Scott King "My heroes are the ones who survived doing it wrong, who made mistakes, but recovered from them. ?Bono




Classic Wisdom for the Professional Life


Book Description

The Professional Life. In the simplest of meanings, it is the part of your day or week or year or entire life that you spend working to make a living. Everyone knows that the way you spend those hours of your day can very easily carry over into every other aspect of your life. Do you know someone lucky enough to love what they do to support themselves? That happiness, pride, and satisfaction doesn’t just stop when they leave the office. It finds its way into their personal relationships and into their community activities. Loving your work is the biggest bonus you can give yourself. Classic Wisdom for the Professional Life has words of wisdom from some of the world’s preeminent business, political, and cultural leaders. Paying heed to one or one hundred of these quotes that really speaks to you can make a difference not only in the way you earn a paycheck now, but also in how you forge a career path for yourself. Be one of the lucky few who knows that a happy professional life is one huge part of really living the good life




Creating the Good Life


Book Description

Professionals and business people in midlife are increasingly asking themselves "what's next?" in their careers and personal lives. Creating the Good Life draws on the wisdom of the ages to help contemporary men and women plan for satisfying, useful, moral, and meaningful second halves of their lives. For centuries, the brightest people in Western societies have looked to Aristotle for guidance on how to lead a good life and how to create a good society. Now James O'Toole--the Mortimer J. Adler Senior Fellow of the Aspen Institute--translates that classical philosophical framework into practical, comprehensible terms to help professionals and business people apply it to their own lives and work. His book helps thoughtful readers address some of the profound questions they are currently struggling with in planning their futures: • How do I find meaning and satisfaction? • How much money do I need in order to be happy? • What is the right balance between work, family, and leisure? • What are my responsibilities to my community? • How can I create a good society in my own company? Bridging philosophy and self-help, O'Toole's book shows how happiness ultimately is attainable no matter one's level of income, if one uses Aristotle's practical exercises to ask the right questions and to discipline oneself to pursue things that are "good for us." The book is the basis for O'Toole's new "Good Life" seminar, where thoughtful men and women gather to create robust and satisfying life plans.




Learning the Good Life


Book Description

Discover the Good Life as you learn from the wise voices of the past. We've lost ourselves. Disconnected from the past and uncertain about the future, we are anxious about what our lives will be and troubled by a nagging sense of meaninglessness. Adrift in the world, many Christians have their identity completely wrapped up in work, and their definition of the "good life" is financial success. Fewer of are staying committed to the Christian faith, finding it difficult to reconcile their experience with their longings and desires. With so much uncertainty, where can we find a true vision of "the Good Life"? Learning the Good Life speaks to this malaise with a curated collection of voices from the past, inviting Christians into an ages-old dialogue with some of history's wisest and most reflective minds. Featuring thought-provoking writings from a diverse lineup of over 35 writers and thinkers: From the classic—including Confucius, Augustine, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Henry David Thoreau, and Frederick Douglass; To the modern—including W.E.B. DuBois, Flannery O'Connor, T.S. Eliot, and Simone Weil; To the contemporary—including Wendell Berry, David Foster Wallace, and Marilynne Robinson. Together these sages, writers, philosophers, and poets address important issues such as virtue, beauty, community, wonder, suffering, and meaning. Each of these texts are introduced by experts from a variety of Christian colleges and universities to help provide a richer narrative in which Christians can participate. Each text is also accompanied by discussion questions to provoke further thought and contemplation and to facilitate discussion when used in groups. Learning the Good Life is ideal for any Christian seeking a deeper connection to the wisdom of the past and wanting a more cohesive vision of the good life. Though not all these writers were themselves Christians, they all have a message for you. All of them are calling you to die to yourself, to your habits of indulgence, to your pride and ambition—and to dedicate your time to learning, thinking, and loving.




A Simple Life


Book Description

How do I put all the pieces of my life together? How can I keep my focus on God when novelty and consumerism constantly pull me in different directions? Saint Jane Frances de Chantal's steadfast pursuit of inner simplicity of life in God offers rest to our psyches and spirits.Her gentle counsels illustrate how to live in harmony with God's will and thus find peace.




Good Life, Good Death


Book Description

"This book is a must-read for those who have ever feared death for themselves or for those they love." -Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D., author of Kitchen Table Wisdom By the late Gehlek Rimpoche, the bestselling book that changed the way we think about death Who are we? Where did we come from? Where are we going? How do we get there? Many have asked these questions, and many have attempted to answer them. But there is another question Good Life, Good Death asks us to contemplate: how does the idea of life after death affect how we live our lives? Gelek Rimpoche tells stories of the mystical Tibet he lived in, as well as the contemporary America he is now a citizen of, and shares the wisdom of the great masters. He asks us to open our minds and see if we can entertain a bigger picture of life after life, even for a moment. He makes the connection between powerful emotions such as anger, obsession, jealousy and pride, and our past as well as our future.




On the Good Life


Book Description

For the great Roman orator and statesman Cicero, 'the good life' was at once a life of contentment and one of moral virtue - and the two were inescapably intertwined. This volume brings together a wide range of his reflections upon the importance of moral integrity in the search for happiness. In essays that are articulate, meditative and inspirational, Cicero presents his views upon the significance of friendship and duty to state and family, and outlines a clear system of practical ethics that is at once simple and universal. These works offer a timeless reflection upon the human condition, and a fascinating insight into the mind of one of the greatest thinkers of Ancient Rome.




Worldly Wisdom


Book Description

Explores the ideas expressed in some fifty classic writings that offer the reader insight into the meaning of life and how to live it more fully.




The Good Life Handbook


Book Description

The Good Life Handbook is a rendering of Enchiridion in plain English. It is a concise summary of the teachings of Epictetus, as transcribed and later summarized by his student Flavius Arrian. The Handbook is a guide to the good life. It answers the question, "How can we be good and live free and happy, no matter what else is happening around us?" Ancient Stoics lived in a time of turmoil under difficult conditions. So, the solutions they found to living free were tested under very stringent conditions. For example, the author of this Handbook was a lame slave who made himself free and happy later in life by following the principles set out in this book. Now The Stoic Gym offers The Good Life Handbook by Dr Chuck Chakrapani to interested readers in this handy pocket edition. Please get your copy in your favorite online bookstore.




50 Spiritual Classics


Book Description

A kaleidoscope of inspiration that lets the reader delve into the ideas of many of our great spiritual thinkers.