THISday by Philip Gabbard

Hello, Book Thinkers family! Today's book tip is going to come from This Day: Modern Essays of Enlightenment by Philip Gabbard. I loved reading this book. It took me about a month or so, and that's because oftentimes I would finish one of these essays and I would need to reflect on what I had just learned because I had some sort of profound realization or something like that. This book was really well written, and I really enjoyed reading it. I'm actually going to go as far as saying that it was one of my favorite books of 2019. I gifted a bunch of copies to friends and family for the holidays, and I think that this is one of those books that will spread slowly over time as more people read it, pick it up, and then share their experience with other readers. So I really liked it. I did develop a conversational relationship with Philip while I was reading this book, and he kind of jokes around— he's the author of the book but has a hard time describing it to other people. So I'm going to do my best here. I hope that you do read this book though. Out of the content section of the book, Philip does a much better job than would, so I'm going to read his description of the book to you first and then talk a little bit more about my experience with it. Let me introduce you to what you are about to read, for it has no table of contents. Like life, there is only what we write into the middle pages that adds content and contentment to our story. That is what I have done here. Like life, it's random. There is a beginning and an end. What happens in between is simply chunks of experience, phantom fears, choice. But fear Fear no more suffering and suffer no more from your fear of conformity, as you will likely survive this day. This day, it is more like a playlist from an unintended journey of enlightenment with an added opportunity to discover a renewed zest and brilliance in your days, months, and years, regardless of the order of things to come. Welcome to this day. As he says, this book reads more like a playlist. Philip talks about life experience in this book, and he's so revealing and transparent and vulnerable that you do feel like you're having a conversation with him. It's not a standard self-help or personal development book. It's not an autobiography. He's not sitting here lecturing to us. He's having a conversation, and he's so transparent and vulnerable and revealing, like I was saying, that I wish I could communicate that way with my friends and family and following. But I'm not as articulate as he is, and I'm not that great of a writer. I would have a tough time communicating the way that he communicates these lessons. They're essays. They're essays on his pathway to enlightenment, and he allows the reader to connect with him and develop a relationship throughout the course of the book that allows you to understand what he's understanding and come to the conclusions in the way that he came to certain conclusions. And it's sort of profound. It's going to resonate with every single reader in a different way, and that's one of the things that I respect. My biggest takeaways, or the things that I bracketed off or circled or highlighted in this book, are going to be very different from your biggest takeaways or the things that you bracket or circle or fold over the page or however you take notes, right? Because my relationship with him now is going to be very different than yours is. I know that might not make a lot of sense, and I'm having a hard time describing the book because it's so different in such a positive way. I really did enjoy reading this book. I would sit there kind of reading at night and kind of an unassuming sentence would just hit me, and I'd think, wow, I wish I could describe that to my followers, but without all the background context, without developing a relationship to Philip by reading his book, it's going to be a hard thing to do that. So I'm going to leave you with this: I would highly recommend picking up a copy of this book, sharing some of the passages as I'm going to do on my story over the next couple days, and I would like you to read this book and then share with me some of those passages as well. Let me know what resonated with you. I'll put— I'll post a couple of those at the end of this video as well. But anyway, I really enjoyed reading, reading this book. I'd Highly encourage that you pick up a copy. I think that Philip is a super cool guy. He's very articulate, and I'd love to write a book or at least interact with people the way that he does someday. With that, I hope you go out there, you read this book, you read something, and you have a fantastic day. Happy holidays, everybody. Adios. Bye.