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Sloww Sunday Newsletter 124 (Nov 20, 2022) — Inner Games, Intentional Books, Interconnections, & More
Sloww Sunday shares creations from Sloww along with curations of fascinating finds to 10,000+ students of life. If you enjoy this issue, please help grow Sloww by forwarding the email version of this newsletter to others.
🌎 Lighter Living
Intentional Living Book Recos
Here are the book recommendations I received from last week’s newsletter:
· Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman (Book Summary)
· Your Money or Your Life by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez (on my reading list)
· Intentional Living by John C. Maxwell
· A Book of Simple Living by Ruskin Bond
· Life’s Great Question by Tom Rath
· Built to Serve by Evan Carmichael
· Dedicated by Pete Davis
· Die Empty by Todd Henry
· Sparked by Jonathan Fields
· Authentic Relating by Ryel Kestano
· Radical Wholeness by Philip Shepherd
· Shared Visions, Shared Lives by Bill Metcalf
Explore more: How do I design a lighter life (Sloww Stage 1)?
🧭 Higher Purpose
What to Learn about Human Development from a Rose and Lettuce
Be and become what you are:
“When we plant a rose seed in the earth, we notice that it is small, but we do not criticize it as ‘rootless and stemless.’ We treat it as a seed, giving it the water and nourishment required of a seed. When it first shoots up out of the earth, we don’t condemn it as immature and underdeveloped; nor do we criticize the buds for not being open when they appear. We stand in wonder at the process taking place and give the plant the care it needs at each stage of its development. The rose is a rose from the time it is a seed to the time it dies. Within it, at all times, it contains its whole potential. It seems to be constantly in the process of change; yet at each state, at each moment, it is perfectly all right as it is.” — Timothy Gallwey
“When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don’t blame the lettuce. You look for reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce. Yet if we have problems with our friends or family, we blame the other person. But if we know how to take care of them, they will grow well, like the lettuce. Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade using reason and argument. That is my experience. No blame, no reasoning, no argument, just understanding. If you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love, and the situation will change.” — Thich Nhat Hanh
Get the eBook: Ikigai 2.0: A Step-by-Step Guidebook to Finding Life Purpose & Making Money Meaningfully (+ Bonus Workbook)
Explore more: How do I find higher purpose (Sloww Stage 2)?
🧠 Mental Wealth
🆕 Book Summary: The Inner Game of Tennis by W. Timothy Gallwey
I don’t play tennis, but I thoroughly enjoyed the short book The Inner Game of Tennis (Book Summary | 🔒Premium Summary). It covers mental mastery, brain hemispheres, spirituality, wu wei, and more—all without using any of those exact words.
Highlights include: Outer Game & Inner Game, Self 1 & Self 2, Natural Learning, Nonjudgmental Awareness & Focus, Effortless Concentration & Consciousness, Peak Performance & “Winning”, and more.
“How to develop the inner skills, without which high performance is impossible, is the subject of The Inner Game of Tennis … It is the thesis of this book that neither mastery nor satisfaction can be found in the playing of any game without giving some attention to the relatively neglected skills of the inner game.” — W. Timothy Gallwey
Build mental wealth: Mini Mind: 365 Daily Emails of Bite-Size Brain Food
Explore more: How do I master the mind (Sloww Stage 3)?
☯️ Timeless Wisdom
The many roads leading back to Sri Aurobindo
Who influenced Ken Wilber, Jean Gebser, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, and more? Sri Aurobindo—best known for his philosophy on human evolution, supermind, and Integral Yoga. This week I published a Twitter thread with my favorite quotes. My top takeaway from Aurobindo is his emphasis on diversity and unity:
“The real aim of Nature is a true unity supporting a rich diversity.”
“In this harmony between our unity and our diversity lies the secret of life; Nature insists equally in all her works upon unity and upon variation.”
“All unity between creatures is in its essence a self-finding, a fusion with that from which we have separated, a discovery of one’s self in others.”
Explore more: How do I embody wisdom (Sloww Stage 4)?
🤯 Mind Expanding
Inspiration on Interconnectedness
I fell down a mini rabbit hole about how everything is connected—and came out the other side with this Twitter thread of 10 top quotes.
“Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.” — Leonardo da Vinci
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Go with the Sloww,
Kyle Kowalski
Synthesizer & Solopreneur
