71 books like Come as You Are

This book helped me stop thinking about singular problems and solutions and taught me to think in terms of relationships. 

I read it at a time when I believed the electric car to be a solution to oil dependence and the greenhouse effect. Electric cars do not directly produce CO2 and are more energy efficient. What I missed was the fact that cars are much more than oil-burning CO2-emitters. They limit our street life and kill more than a million people in traffic each year.

By solving one problem without looking at the big picture, we enlarge other problems and create new ones. Will cobalt wars follow after the oil wars? Reading this book felt like walking around with a flashlight in my head and then a construction lamp switching on.

I often think that so many problems in the world could be solved with better communication. More and more we stick with people who think like us, because the challenge of bridging ideological gaps seems too great.

So, how to talk to people who have values that are in opposition to yours? How can you connect with people whose experiences have given them a life that you can’t relate to? In On Dialogue, David Bohm gives us a way to tear apart the fear and hesitation of the no-man’s land between ourselves and people we don’t understand.

There are always people with whom we don’t know how to communicate. We can’t let that stop us from trying. Bohm’s book will give you the tools to do just that.

We are all going to lose someone we love. We are all going to go through the pain of people we care about dying. We are all going to contemplate our mortality at some point and wonder if what we’re doing has much of a point, if we could do better, and if we could make life a little less painful somehow.

Keisha Blair lost her husband when they were both in their thirties, when their son was 8 weeks old. She shares what she learned about building from that wreckage in Holistic Wealth. The book puts the pain of loss front and center, and then offers insights from stories and interviews on how to take care of our money, our relationships, and our spirituality, and thus ourselves.

Most people, I think, when they start to understand the world better, they start to see the endless ways that it could be improved. Some of us though, we get stuck in the ideas of improvement, and never figure out how to just get on with it.

Amartya Sen won a Nobel Prize and has other thought-provoking books. But I like this one. The Country of First Boys is a series of essays that are technically about various issues in India, but which are easily extrapolated to depressingly common situations in most other countries. Central to the essays is the theme of not letting the idea of a perfectly just society get in the way of the business of reducing injustice. We can debate utopia until we take our last breath, but in the meantime, Sen inspires us that there is much we can do now to improve the world… show more.

In my practice with couples, this is my go-to recommendation for clients seeking to strengthen their relationship. In my original training as a couples counselor, I was trained with the Gottman method, and I still believe that the Gottman's insights resonate deeply with the challenges couples face, providing practical strategies rooted in empirical research.

This book isn't just theory; it's a roadmap for fostering communication and intimacy. What sets it apart is its emphasis on actionable steps that couples can take to nurture their bond.

I've witnessed firsthand the transformative impact of implementing Gottman's principles in sessions. Also, it is based on observing real couples in various phases of their lives. 

Esther Perel's exploration of the intricate dance between intimacy and desire resonates with many couples who are in long-term relationships, want it to work so desperately, and yet find themselves stuck. This book builds on the concepts of differentiation and attachment styles while inviting readers to embrace a new paradigm of eroticism within committed relationships.

What resonates deeply is Perel's grounded yet unflinching approach to addressing taboo topics and dismantling societal norms. Through her eloquent prose and compelling case studies, she illuminates the path to unlocking erotic intelligence and reigniting passion in long-term partnerships.

I discovered this book several years ago when I was leading a global team across North America, Europe, and Asia and desperately trying to navigate cultural differences and communication styles. The book was eye-opening for me as the author shared real-world examples of misunderstandings and differences in how people from different cultures interact in the workplace.

I especially appreciated Erin’s guidance for leading people in highly hierarchical cultures as I was trying to figure out how to get my large team of leaders in China to speak up about what was really going on (and I was going about it all wrong). For me, this book is the book to make us all better, more open-minded citizens of the world.

When it comes to sex, too often people focus on physical stimulation and not enough on psychological arousal.

Studies have shown that women can fantasize their way to orgasm without ever touching themselves, and fantasy is a powerful source of arousal regardless of sex. But putting fantasy into action, or just into words, can be daunting in our sex-avoidant culture. Discussing topics such as Core Erotic Themes, Jack Morin’s book is hands down the best book in my opinion for engaging the power of our sexual minds.

As I discussed, fantasy is a powerful engine of sexual arousal. And these days most men (and increasingly women) are stimulating their sexual imaginations with porn.

There’s nothing wrong with “ethical” porn in my book (think of it as the erotic equivalent of fair-trade coffee), but sometimes it’s nice to go old-school and just read something erotic. There is no better editor than Rachel Kramer Bussell who has consistently bringing the best literary erotica to our attention for nearly 20 years. This is just one of many volumes of erotica appealing to all tastes and temperaments. 

Attraction. Chemistry. Infatuation. Whatever the word, falling in love is a roller-coaster of emotions and Helen explains why.

As a neuroscientist she has scanned the brains of thousands of people in a state of being in love and expertly describes the dynamics of love. Too often we say that love and attraction fade with time, but by understanding what drives these processes we can better nurture them for the long term.