Collection: Spirituality & Religion

Now on Netflix as a 4-part documentary series!

"Pollan keeps you turning the pages . . . cleareyed and assured." --New York Times

A #1 New York Times Bestseller, New York Times Book Review 10 Best Books of 2018, and New York Times Notable Book

A brilliant and brave investigation into the medical and scientific revolution taking place around psychedelic drugs--and the spellbinding story of his own life-changing psychedelic experiences

When Michael Pollan set out to research how LSD and psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) are being used to provide relief to people suffering from difficult-to-treat conditions such as depression, addiction and anxiety, he did not intend to write what is undoubtedly his most personal book. But upon discovering how these remarkable substances are improving the lives not only of the mentally ill but also of healthy people coming to grips with the challenges of everyday life, he decided to explore the landscape of the mind in the first person as well as the third. Thus began a singular adventure into various altered states of consciousness, along with a dive deep into both the latest brain science and the thriving underground community of psychedelic therapists. Pollan sifts the historical record to separate the truth about these mysterious drugs from the myths that have surrounded them since the 1960s, when a handful of psychedelic evangelists inadvertently catalyzed a powerful backlash against what was then a promising field of research.

A unique and elegant blend of science, memoir, travel writing, history, and medicine, How to Change Your Mind is a triumph of participatory journalism. By turns dazzling and edifying, it is the gripping account of a journey to an exciting and unexpected new frontier in our understanding of the mind, the self, and our place in the world. The true subject of Pollan's "mental travelogue" is not just psychedelic drugs but also the eternal puzzle of human consciousness and how, in a world that offers us both suffering and joy, we can do our best to be fully present and find meaning in our lives.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - Discover the life-changing memoir that has inspired millions of readers through the Academy Award(R)-winning actor's unflinching honesty, unconventional wisdom, and lessons learned the hard way about living with greater satisfaction.

"The No. 1 celebrity memoir of the past 10 years."--USA Today

"McConaughey's book invites us to grapple with the lessons of his life as he did--and to see that the point was never to win, but to understand."--Mark Manson, author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck

I've been in this life for fifty years, been trying to work out its riddle for forty-two, and been keeping diaries of clues to that riddle for the last thirty-five. Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel, and things that made me laugh out loud. How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me.

Recently, I worked up the courage to sit down with those diaries. I found stories I experienced, lessons I learned and forgot, poems, prayers, prescriptions, beliefs about what matters, some great photographs, and a whole bunch of bumper stickers. I found a reliable theme, an approach to living that gave me more satisfaction, at the time, and still: If you know how, and when, to deal with life's challenges--how to get relative with the inevitable--you can enjoy a state of success I call "catching greenlights."

So I took a one-way ticket to the desert and wrote this book: an album, a record, a story of my life so far. This is fifty years of my sights and seens, felts and figured-outs, cools and shamefuls. Graces, truths, and beauties of brutality. Getting away withs, getting caughts, and getting wets while trying to dance between the raindrops.

Hopefully, it's medicine that tastes good, a couple of aspirin instead of the infirmary, a spaceship to Mars without needing your pilot's license, going to church without having to be born again, and laughing through the tears.

It's a love letter. To life.

It's also a guide to catching more greenlights--and to realizing that the yellows and reds eventually turn green too.

Good luck.

The short dust jacket included with this hardcover edition is an intentional design choice.

The most popular book in the "How To" series: advice, practices, and food for thought from a Zen Master on our most universal emotion.

The third book in the bestselling Mindfulness Essentials series, a back-to-basics collection from world-renowned Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh that introduces everyone to the essentials of mindfulness practice.

Nhat Hanh brings his signature clarity, compassion, and humor to the thorny question of how to love. He distills one of our strongest emotions down to four essentials: you can only love another when you feel true love for yourself; love is understanding; understanding brings compassion; deep listening and loving speech are key ways of showing our love.

Pocket-sized, with original two color illustrations by Jason DeAntonis, How to Love shows that when we feel closer to our loved ones, we are also more connected to the world as a whole. With sections on Love vs. Need, Being in Love, Reverence, Intimacy, Children and Family, Reconciling with Parents, and more, How to Love includes meditations you can do alone or with your partner to go deep inside and expand your own capacity to love.

Scientific studies indicate that meditation contributes tremendously to well-being, general health, and longevity. How to Love is a unique gift for those who want a comprehensive yet simple guide to understanding the many different kinds of love, along with meditative practices that can expand the understanding of and capacity for love, appropriate for those practicing in any spiritual tradition, whether seasoned practitioners or new to meditation.

THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

The seven rules to follow to realize your true purpose in life--distilled by Arnold Schwarzenegger from his own journey of ceaseless reinvention and extraordinary achievement, and available for absolutely anyone.

The world's greatest bodybuilder. The world's highest-paid movie star. The leader of the world's sixth-largest economy. That these are the same person sounds like the setup to a joke, but this is no joke. This is Arnold Schwarzenegger. And this did not happen by accident.

Arnold's stratospheric success happened as part of a process. As the result of clear vision, big thinking, hard work, direct communication, resilient problem-solving, open-minded curiosity, and a commitment to giving back. All of it guided by the one lesson Arnold's father hammered into him above all: be useful. As Arnold conquered every realm he entered, he kept his father's adage close to his heart.

Written with his uniquely earnest, blunt, powerful voice, Be Useful takes readers on an inspirational tour through Arnold's tool kit for a meaningful life. He shows us how to put those tools to work, in service of whatever fulfilling future we can dream up for ourselves. He brings his insights to vivid life with compelling personal stories, life-changing successes and life-threatening failures alike--some of them famous; some told here for the first time ever.

Too many of us struggle to disconnect from our self-pity and connect to our purpose. At an early age, Arnold forged the mental tools to build the ladder out of the poverty and narrow-mindedness of his rural Austrian hometown, tools he used to add rung after rung from there. Now he shares that wisdom with all of us. As he puts it, no one is going to come rescue you--you only have yourself. The good news, it turns out, is that you are all you need.

Written for those of us who struggle with codependency, these daily meditations offer growth and renewal, and remind us that the best thing we can do is take responsibility for our own self-care.

Melody Beattie integrates her own life experiences and fundamental recovery reflections in this unique daily meditation book written especially for those of us who struggle with the issue of codependency. Problems are made to be solved, Melody reminds us, and the best thing we can do is take responsibility for our own pain and self-care. In this daily inspirational book, Melody provides us with a thought to guide us through the day and she encourages us to remember that each day is an opportunity for growth and renewal.

A dazzling, evidence-based account of one man's quest to heal from complex PTSD by turning to endangered coral reefs and psychedelic plants after traditional therapies failed--and his awakening to the need for us to heal the planet as well.

Professor Greg Wrenn likes to tell his nature-writing students, "The ecological is personal, and the personal is ecological." What he's never told them is how he's lived out those correspondences to heal from childhood abuse at the hands of his mother.

Weaving together memoir and cutting-edge science, Mothership is not just a queer coming-of-age story. It's a deeply researched account of how coral reefs and a psychedelic tea called ayahuasca helped Greg heal from complex PTSD--a disorder of trust, which makes the very act of bonding with someone else panic-inducing. From the tide pools in Florida where he grew up, to Indonesia's Raja Ampat archipelago and the Amazon rainforest, this is his search for wholeness when talk therapy and pharmaceuticals did little to help. Along the way, as his ecological conscience wakes up, he takes readers underwater to the last pristine reefs on earth, and into the psyche.

Written with prophetic urgency, Mothership ultimately asks if doses of nature will be enough to save us before it's too late.

Practice self-love with guided shadow work exercises and journaling prompts that help you heal old wounds, break harmful cycles, and accept all parts of yourself.

Shadow work is the process of uncovering the parts of you that you subconsciously hide or reject, such as unwanted traits or characteristics suppressed during childhood, and bringing them into your awareness. It allows you to identify, heal, and accept all parts of yourself--including the "bad" parts you've repressed--so you're no longer held back by emotional triggers, self-sabotaging behaviors, and self-limiting beliefs. 

With Shadow Work Journal for Self-Love, you'll connect with your inner child, release shame, guilt, and fear, and face the world anew as your whole, authentic self.  

• Embrace your shadow to embrace yourself with a step-by-step approach to shadow work that prioritizes self-love 

• Use guided shadow work exercises and activities to find your most vulnerable parts and hold them with gentle awareness  

• Support yourself with loving self-care rituals to care for your mind, body, and spirit as you explore uncharted territory 

• Grow more self-aware with 75 journaling prompts to explore your shadow and its impact on your life 
  

A comforting and informative guide that demystifies our end-of-life journey, from the compassionate expert known as @hospicenursejulie

What if we didn't consider death the worst possible outcome? What if we discussed it honestly, embraced hospice care, and prepared for the end of our lives with hope and acceptance?
In this compassionate and knowledgeable guide, TikTok star Julie McFadden--known online as "Hospice Nurse Julie"--shares the valuable lessons she's learned in her fifteen years as an RN in the ICU and in hospice. Expertly interweaving emotional insight and practical advice, Nothing to Fear demystifies end-of-life care for both patients and caregivers, covering topics including:

• the biological details of dying
• which medical interventions help and which only make things worse
• the otherworldly beauty of deathbed phenomena
• financial and logistical preparations for death
• facts and myths about hospice care
• the most important conversations to have before you die
• the grieving process, before and after death

Sure to be a go-to resource for years to come, McFadden's first book proves a better death goes hand in hand with a better life.

"This is a breakthrough work coming from the heart of evangelical Christianity and offered into the heart of evangelical Christianity," writes David P. Gushee, the prolific Christian author and Director of the Center for Theology and Public Life at Mercer University. In describing this book, Gushee continues: "It is unlike other books that demand revision of traditional Christian sexual ethics but do so primarily by rejecting the authority of the Bible. That is not how evangelicals think, and it is not what Ken Wilson does here. Instead Wilson shows how God has led him on a journey toward a rethinking of what the fully authoritative and inspired Bible ought to be taken to mean in the life of the church today."

"This is a remarkable and timely book," writes Tanya Luhrmann, an author about contemporary religious life and the Watkins University Professor in the Stanford Anthropology Department. "It is clear to an observer like me that evangelical Christianity is at a crossroad. ... That problem is the broad and widening gap between evangelical Christianity and its young. ... The book you hold is a passionate and courageous argument. Many people will not like it. But they should read it and weigh whether it is true, because more hangs on the argument than the fate of gay marriage within evangelical Christianity. At its heart, this book asks Christians to rethink what God and scripture may be saying about what it means to be a good and decent person. The answer to that question will shape what the church becomes in twenty years."

Best-selling author and journalist Phyllis Tickle, an expert on religion widely quoted in news media, says of this book: "We Christians ...rarely think of our clergy as men and women who routinely spend agonizing hours and days and weeks pouring studiously over sacred texts in relentless, on-going attempts to penetrate the mysteries contained there, to discover their wisdom, their instruction, their relevance, and to consider the means and repercussions of their implementation within our here and now. ... This is midrash. ... And in the pages that follow, we have before us one of the most exquisite, painful, candid, brilliant pieces of contemporary Christian midrash that I have ever seen."

The second edition of Letter to My Congregation includes expanded material.

Learn tarot to reveal a story of personal growth

When you unlock the meanings of the tarot, and apply it to the patterns and experiences in your day, you will begin to see what you couldn't before. Tarot for Beginners will open you up to intuition, bring you greater confidence in facing life's challenges, and lead you to reach new levels of awareness.

This accessible guide helps beginners learn how to read a tarot deck, and provides techniques for relating abstract archetypes and symbols in the cards to concrete details in your life.

Inside this easy-to-use beginner's book, you'll find:

• A welcoming environment-A positive, open space to learn the basics of tarot, and the hows and whys, written with passion and care.
• Tarot demystified-This simple-to-understand, well-written resource takes the perceived complexities of tarot, and brings it down to earth.
• Easy how-tos-Quickly pick up how to select, use, and care for your deck. Learn the structure of the deck, and how to state questions and arrange card spreads.
• Full descriptions of the cards-Thorough and informative, historical and insightful, the book explores and interprets the physical as well as the symbolic aspects of the tarot.

Heighten your awareness and grow into the life you want with Tarot for Beginners.

Midsummer--also known as the Summer Solstice or Litha--is a time to rejoice in abundance and light. This guide to the history and modern celebration of Midsummer shows you how to celebrate and work with the energy of the longest day of the year.

• Rituals
• Recipes
• Lore
• Spells
• Divination
• Crafts
• Correspondences
• Invocations
• Prayers
• Meditations

Llewellyn's Sabbat Essentials explore the old and new ways of celebrating the seasonal rites that are the cornerstones of the witch's year.

People suffered thousands of years ago. Wise people thought about ways for people to not stress so much. Here we have the ancient wisdom of Buddhism. Fast forward to modern times, and people still suffer. Wise people are still thinking about ways for people to not stress so much. Now we have modern psychology and cognitive-behavioral therapy. This book explores the overlap of these two traditions in a practical guide for anyone suffering from anxiety, depression, or stress. The author is a clinical psychologist with 35 years of experience with hundreds of patients.

In today's multicultural cities and interconnected world, understanding different belief systems can help kids appreciate the differences of people they see every day, or people who live on the other side of the globe. This book introduces readers to the five major world religions by population: Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism.

Each mini-section opens with a fully illustrated spread representing one religion. Designed in a search-and-find style, the illustrated spreads are busy, bright, and jam-packed with details that show people worshipping among symbolic places, rituals, and objects. A text spread follows, pulling out details from the illustrated page and providing further information about the history, festivals, places of worship, celebrations, religious leaders, and gods of each religion.

Front matter gives broader overall context about religion and each featured belief system, making this a comprehensive go-to resource for introducing religion and global cultures.

A practical guide to connecting with your ancestors for personal, family, and cultural healing

- Provides exercises and rituals to help you initiate contact with your ancestors, find ancestral guides, and assist the dead who are not yet at peace

- Explains how to safely engage in lineage repair work by connecting with your more ancient ancestors before relating with the recently deceased

- Explores how your ancestors can help you transform intergenerational legacies of pain and abuse and reclaim the positive spirit of the family

Everyone has loving and wise ancestors they can learn to invoke for support and healing. Coming into relationship with your ancestors empowers you to transform negative family patterns into blessings and encourages good health, self-esteem, clarity of purpose, and better relationships with your living relatives.

Offering a practical guide to understanding and navigating relationships with the spirits of those who have passed, Daniel Foor, Ph.D., details how to relate safely and effectively with your ancestors for personal, family, and cultural healing. He provides exercises and rituals, grounded in ancient wisdom traditions, to help you initiate contact with your ancestors, find supportive ancestral guides, cultivate forgiveness and gratitude, harmonize your bloodlines, and assist the dead who are not yet at peace. He explains how to safely engage in lineage repair work by connecting with your more ancient ancestors before relating with the recently deceased. He shows how, by working with spiritually vibrant ancestors, individuals and families can understand and transform intergenerational patterns of pain and abuse and reclaim the full blessings and gifts of their bloodlines. Ancestral repair work can also catalyze healing breakthroughs among living family members and help children and future generations to live free from ancestral burdens. The author provides detailed instructions for ways to honor the ancestors of a place, address dream visits from the dead, and work with ancestor shrines and altars. The author offers guidance on preparing for death, funeral rites, handling the body after death, and joining the ancestors. He also explains how ancestor work can help us to transform problems such as racism, sexism, homophobia, and religious persecution.

By learning the fundamentals of ancestor reverence and ritual, you will discover how to draw on the wisdom of supportive ancestral guides, heal family troubles, maintain connections with beloved family after their death, and better understand the complex and interconnected relationship between the living and the dead.

By gaining a greater understanding of the cultures and beliefs of people around the world, children build respect and tolerance for the differences that make each of us unique.With objectivity and accessibility, this title in the Kids Book of series looks at the histories, scriptures, places of worship, religious leaders, gods and major festivals that are the foundations of many of the world's religions. Features a glossary and an index.