Christine Carter: Books that Provide Inspiration and Hope

That I get to read a lot! I’m always learning new things and applying what I’ve learned to help real people grow and live their best lives.

I’m a very unsurprising person. Whenever I do something that surprises me I tend to write about it extensively. Like when I admitted that I used to hate Mother’s Day.

I always have a bunch of books going. I read a lot of nonfiction in the morning to start my workday; right now I’m reading Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein. This book has turned my (science-based!) beliefs about achievement totally upside down. I probably love it because it validates the way I work and even the way I read.

I’m always listening to fiction while I’m walking the dogs and in the car; right now I’m listening to The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes and the dogs are getting a lot of walking time because it is so good. Ever since I graduated from college, I’ve read cookbooks for pleasure before bed. Right now I’m reading Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat. I’ve given this book as a gift for years but never read it myself.

At bedtime, I also like to read books on spirituality. I’ve just started Oneness by Rasha which I learned about from this website. And I’d be remiss not to mention that I love to read books about health; I’ve just (finally!) finished How Not to Die by Michael Greger and it has dramatically changed the way I eat.

The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum. I had the full record set, and I would listen to it in its entirety, often in a single weekend, while following along in the book. This is probably how I learned to read, as I was young enough that I was supposed to be napping when I was doing this. On days when my mom wouldn’t let me listen, I would sit in my bed not-napping, looking out the window imagining Dorothy was going to skip down Meadow Lane (the street I grew up on) and take me to Oz.

I love the moment when the book contract is in place and I get to sit down to actually write. It’s like being able to finally go on a trip that I’ve been planning for a year or so. I clear my mornings of meetings and coaching sessions. I have a focus routine that helps me drop into a flow state when I write, so I do that, and then, come hell or high water, I write 250 words. I write five days a week, even if I’m speaking or coaching. Often I write more, if I’ve finished researching a particular subject, or if I’ve already written a blog post that serves as a base for the section of the book I’m writing on. But many (maybe most) days I only squeak out that 250 words. It doesn’t sound like a lot, and it isn’t, but do the math: you can write an entire 60,000-word book in 11 months if you commit to 250 words a day, five days a week.

I buy too many books. Despite the pandemic, I still frequent my favorite local book store (Book Passage) and also I impulse buy on Amazon. It’s a problem. And my author friends send me their new releases, so good ones arrive in the mail as fun surprises all the time. This week I’ve acquired:

Sunny room, reading chair, a place to put a cup of tea, pencil for underlining, post-it tags for flagging pages I want to come back to.

You don’t need to nag your kids. There are more effective ways to get them to do the things we want them to do. Really! When kids know we are going to nag them, they don’t monitor themselves—they wait to be reminded. Sometimes many, many times.

Instead of nagging, we can ask kids questions when we need to. My all-time favorite question is this one: What’s your plan?

As in, “What’s your plan for getting some exercise?” or “What’s your plan for getting your homework done this weekend?” This makes it clear that they are still in control of their own behavior, and it helps put them in touch with their own motivations and intentions. Often kids simply need to make a plan, and sometimes if they aren’t asked to articulate it, they won’t do it—especially kids who are used to being nagged because they know their parents will eventually get frustrated and do their planning for them.

I like to read books that people are talking about, so I don’t know that I actually have any obscure books. But I do have many of the cookbooks my grandmothers used when they were young, including the original Gourmet hardcover. I treasure them.

The best cookbook: Milk Street: The New Rules: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook by Christopher Kimball.

The best nonfiction book: The Practice by Seth Godin.

The best fiction book: The Book of Longings by Sue Monk Kidd.

I make an effort to focus on the process of doing my work and living my life without paying much attention to my achievements. I believe this is a key to happiness, maybe the key to happiness. I love being an author, speaker, and coach. I’m proud of my published books and my most recent TEDtalk, and of the progress that my coaching clients are making. I love being the mom of four adolescents. My kids certainly aren’t my achievements, but I’m enormously proud of them.

I currently have a lot of books on my coffee table, but no visitors to impress given the pandemic. I would want friends who are sitting in my living room alone, with time to read, to pick up The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World by the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu. Every page has a kernel of wisdom that is potentially life-changing.

Loving What Is by Byron Katie taught me that I don’t have to believe every stressful thought that I have. Sounds obvious and simple, and it is, but it was truly life-changing for me. I met Katie at a conference where we were both speaking and she asked me a simple question: “Who would you be without your fear, sweetheart?” Turns out I’d be a lot less stressed and more joyful.

I find so much inspiration and hope in books about people who’ve done great good in the world. My favorites are Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson and Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship by Gregory Boyle.

Oh, there are so many. I’m looking forward to reading Lifespan: Why We Age – and Why We Don’t Have To by David Sinclair. And Anne Lamott’s new book Dusk, Night, Dawn: On Revival and Courage, though technically that’s not quite on my shelf yet. Basically, I’m just excited to read.