Recommended Resources

The Desire Map – Danielle La Porte

‘A Guide to Creating Goals with Soul’

I’ve always been an ambitious and motivated person, which can be counter-productive for cultivating presence in our immediate life. This book changed that – rather than setting goals that are designed to achieve outside objectives and that fuel the ‘life exists in the future’ mindset that our productivity-focused culture creates, it flips the entire motivation for your goals inside out. It starts with the question, how do you want to feel in life? You can then build your life and goals around cultivating these intentions in life.

It’s a way of bringing desire and intentions into the present moment and getting really clear on what drives you, how you can be of service and where your deepest joy will come from.

Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha – Daniel M Ingram

The subtitle of this book ‘An Unusually Hardcore Dharma Book’ sums it up pretty well. This book basically tells you everything you need to know if you want to find out how to get enlightened.

It’s incredibly comprehensive, both from the point of view of its understanding of historical Buddhist texts, from Daniel sharing his personal experiences of his own process and from his observations on the stages of insight.

It presents its topic without dogma – giving really clear, open advice and insight into what it is possible to experience if you meditate really hard, including covering a lot of the weird end of what can come up and some of the risks of things like the dark night.

You can download it for free here.

Braving the Wilderness – Brené Brown

Another great subtitle, ‘The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone’.

Brené Brown is a researcher who studies courage, vulnerability, shame and empathy. This book turns our understanding of belonging on its head. It is not about fitting in with a community but about developing the courage to be our true selves, even when we don’t fit in.

She gives the tools we need to show up as our true selves and connect with our lives and each other, by learning to face the wilderness of uncertainty and criticism.

“The wilderness is an untamed, unpredictable place of solitude and searching. It is a place as dangerous as it is breathtaking, a place as sought after as it is feared. But it turns out to be the place of true belonging, and it’s the bravest and most sacred place you will ever stand.”

Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most

This book by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen is a game changer.

It gives the tools to fundamentally change how you communicate in life; moving away from criticism and defensiveness and being able to speak from a place of self-worth and vulnerability.

It helps reshape difficult situations as an opportunity to problem solve and work together with people, ensuring that everyone feels heard and understood. It was invaluable in me learning to be a good leader in a work context as well as for helping with relationships in my personal life.

A huge part of the path is changing our relationships and how we interact with other people and this book offers a way of being able to do this in a mature and effective way.

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying – Mari Kondo

Taken at face value this is a really powerful book. Our environments are so important for shaping who we are and how we feel about ourselves and our lives.

We are culturally numb to the absurdity of how much stuff we own and Mari Kondo gives the perfect structure and tools for helping us to get rid of all the crap that we don’t actually want or need and that is sucking the life force out of us. Creating an environment where you are surrounded with only the stuff that sparks joy is truly life-changing.

If you read into the deeper meaning, it also gives you a way of examining your inner pysche: how and why you feel attached to things and how you can explore learning to let go of that which isn’t aligned with your deepest self. As well as to take pleasure in the things that do give us joy.

This book has given me much more insight into letting go than any Dharma teachings ever have.

Deconstructing Yourself Podcast – Michael Taft

Michael Taft interviews experienced spiritual practitioners with a level of honesty and openness that provides deep insight into a wide range of both spiritual traditions and the cutting-edge of awakening and meditation.

It’s an amazing resource that gives the opportunity to explore the deep-end of a huge range of ideas without having to buy into any dogmas or spend decades hanging out in a community. It’s also pretty fun.

You can find it here.

Jung

Jung’s work covers a wide range of personal and spiritual experiences including archetypes, individuation, shadows and the collective conscious.

An understanding of his work can be invaluable for navigating emergent experiences, particularly the dark night of the soul.

His work centres around the process of integrating our subconscious thoughts, behaviours and energies into our conscious lives in order to achieve wholeness.

This offers a vital balance to the more transcendent nature of a lot of spiritual practice.

Jung’s own writing is pretty impenetrable. I found this book, ‘Jung: A Very Short Introduction’, a useful and comprehensive overview of his life story and key ideas.

There are also a range of practical tools that have been developed based on Jung’s ideas, for example, the Myers Briggs test, which can be incredibly useful at helping us understand ourselves better.

Shadow Work Therapy

Shadow Work Therapy is a radical type of therapy grounded in lifting the shame of being human. It is built on the ideas of Jung and creates a safe space for expressing whatever you find in yourself, including the darkness and your golden shadows – the ways in which you are afraid to be your true self.

Its focus is on healing through experience – recognising that a vital part of healing is allowing our physical bodies to release trauma and recalibrate.

Shadow Work provides a safe and structured place for people to access the parts of themselves they wouldn’t otherwise have the opportunity to, in order for them to reintegrate them into their being.

You can find out more here.

Heartfulness

Heartfulness is super important to me and I’ve written some practice guides for cultivating it.

I’ve been asked if there are any teachings on it that I would recommend. I actually believe that it is less about what is being taught and more about how.

If something feels cold and dry to you, then it’s a sign it’s probably not being taught very whole-heartedly.

If something is being taught heart-fully it will feel warm, joyful, caring or very inspiring or important in some way.

I think there are some clichés and stereotypes about heartfulness that aren’t always that helpful. One of the great things about heartfulness is that it can include everything. Very masculine, structured teachings or content that goes into the dark side of things can be just as heartful as gentle, feminine yoga teaching for example.

This is also about finding a resonance with who you are and where you are on your journey, so trusting who and what you feel drawn to is really important.

Retreats

I do think that retreats are a sacred space and they tend to find you as much as you find them. When people ask my advice about finding retreats, I encourage people to follow their gut and pay attention to the opportunities that come across their path.

However, it is my strong belief that fully silent retreats are not that supportive for deepening our practice. Some kind of support, sharing and/or ritual is always beneficial in my experience.

I have always thrown myself into retreat experiences – the best way to get the most out of them is to assume that this is exactly where you need to be and that you will hear exactly what you need to at this moment in your path.

Fiction, Films, Poetry, Music and Dharma Talks

I have got at least as much insight from fiction, films, poetry and music as I have from more explicit spiritual content.

We consume a lot of media as a distraction in our culture but if you slow down and really pay attention to the books, films and music that you come across and that you choose, you will find layers of meaning and storytelling that help you navigate your experience and understanding of the world.

I believe that we often happen to find exactly the right story at the right time. It can be quite magical.

For me, dharma talks and guided meditations also fit in this category. I experience them as a type of poetry, that can tell us the stories we need to navigate through these moments in our lives, deepening our connection with life and ourselves in the process.

Opening to receiving the heartfelt meaning of what someone is saying in this very moment opens a door to receiving the teachings on a level that impacts us more deeply, too.