Emily

Books read this month

Reading / /

Company K by William March
I pulled this off my bookshelf at random while looking for the next book to read, and after skimming a few pages, I was sucked in. It’s considered one of the best war books of all time for a reason. Each chapter (and they’re short chapters) is a different soldier’s account of the war. It’s fiction, but I got more insight from this book than from many of the nonfiction books I’ve read this year. It’s seriously so, so good.

Epictetus: The Complete Works by Robin Waterfield
I’d been meaning to read this book for a while, and I’m so happy I finally dove in. This newer translation of Enchiridion and Discourses—two works I’ve been obsessed with since first reading them nine years ago—feels like a fresh conversation with an old friend. Epictetus himself never wrote anything down; everything we have comes from the careful notes of one devoted student.

One of my biggest takeaways: A person might be physically stronger than you. Five people could tackle and restrain you. A person may be smarter, healthier, more beautiful than you. But none of that makes them superior to you. The only thing that can make a person superior is their use of superior reasoning. If you wish to truly improve yourself, Epictetus insisted, improve your reasoning.

Also, he will make you laugh:

“‘So am I the only one who’s going to be decapitated today?’ What are you saying? Would you want everyone to have their heads cut off? Would that make you feel better?”

“Don’t complain. Don’t say, ‘Everyone hates me!’ Who wouldn’t hate someone who carries on like that?”

Oh, Epictetus. Always a pleasure.

Courage Under Fire by James Bond Stockdale
I bought this book (it’s more like a pamphlet—only about 21 pages) on vacation last year at The Painted Porch Bookshop. I’m not sure why I pulled it off the shelf this month, but it turned out to pair perfectly with Epictetus: The Complete Works, as Stockdale used Epictetus’s teachings to get through seven and a half years as a POW in Vietnam.

Socrates by Paul Johnson
Before Socrates, philosophy belonged to society’s elite—an abstract pursuit reserved for those with leisure and education. Socrates changed that. He brought philosophy down to earth, turning it into something practical, something any person could use in daily life. What is good and what is bad? What’s worth chasing and what’s worth avoiding? How should we define justice? At its heart: What makes a good life? Socrates laid the groundwork on which Stoicism would later be built. It’s no wonder he was Epictetus’s hero.

Discipline Is Destiny by Ryan Holiday
I reread this book—well, technically I listened to the audiobook for the first time—on a whim while driving to the Grand Canyon. It’s amazing how much I’d missed the first time through. If you haven’t read Discipline Is Destiny, you’re truly missing out. Also, the afterword is one of the best reflections on the writing process I’ve ever read.

Address Unknown by Kathrine Kressmann Taylor
Oh my gosh, this book is absolutely brilliant—and haunting. It’s the ultimate example of “words as weapons.” It’s short, too—you can probably read it in under an hour. By the end you’ll be smiling and thinking holy shit at the protagonist’s brilliance.

Reading Etty Hillesum in Context edited by Klaas A.D. Smelik, Gerrit Van Oord, Jurjen Wiersma
As I may have mentioned, I LOVE Etty Hillesum. After reading An Interrupted Life and Letters from Westerbork by Etty Hillesum, Etty Hillesum: A Life Transformed by Patrick Woodhouse, Enduring Lives: Living Portraits of Women and Faith in Action by Carol Lee Flinders (the section on Etty), and The Jungian Inspired Holocaust Writings of Etty Hillesum: To Write Is to Act by Barbara Morrill, I had to read this textbook that Morrill recommended. If you want a deeper understanding of who Etty was and the world in which she wrote her diary, this is the book to pick up.

This might be what’s holding you back

Life, Philosophy / /

Lately, I’ve been immersed in the diaries of Etty Hillesum.

What unfolds on those pages is one of the most radical shifts in perspective I’ve ever seen. You watch her go from restless and frustrated to calm, confident, and courageous—in the span of just a few years, and under the shadow of the Nazi regime that would eventually claim her life.

“I really must become simpler,” she writes. “We have to become as simple and as wordless as the growing corn or the falling rain. We must just be.”

What struck me most, as I read, was how much she sounded like a Stoic—specifically, Marcus Aurelius. And yet, there’s no evidence she ever studied Stoicism. One of the many parallels I found was this reminder they both wrote to themselves: Uncomplicate yourself. Be free of calculation and pretension.

Then I thought: no calculations. Have no calculations.

I’ve been repeating this to myself for the past month, and it’s been freeing. Not that I think of myself as “calculated” in the usual sense, but I can be calculated with myself. Sometimes I do things that are irrational, either out of superstition or as a way to relieve anxiety and feel in control. I’ll go back and forth in my mind, debating what something means or doesn’t mean, what will happen or won’t.

But now, when those thoughts creep in, I remind myself: no calculations. And I move on.

Isn’t it wild how much power our thoughts have over our life? If you think your life is crappy…it’s only because you think your life is crappy! Our stories are reality.

The other day, Courtney went to the dentist and told me how uncomfortable she felt for the first fifteen minutes. While the dentist was poking and scraping, Courtney was saying to herself, “It will be over in twenty minutes, and then you can feel relief.”

But then she thought: or I can just feel relief now.

She repeated it—I can feel relief now—and little by little, she relaxed.

That shift—changing the story we tell ourselves—reminds me of something Billy Oppenheimer recently shared:

After finishing college, Ezra Koenig took a job teaching middle school in Brooklyn. Outside school hours, he poured his energy into Vampire Weekend, the band he started with friends from college, where he served as the lead singer and guitarist.

“At that phase of my life,” Koenig said, “I was pretty unhappy. I enjoyed parts of being a teacher, but I stressed constantly, thinking, ‘Oh, I didn’t choose this. This isn’t my dream or passion. The band has to take off. My dream has to materialize.’ Everything felt very high-stakes.”

He found himself constantly preoccupied with what would make him truly happy.

“I really wish I could go back and tell myself, ‘Being a teacher would be fine too.’ I wish I could relieve some of that stress and say to myself, ‘Being a teacher is important too. If the band makes one album and you come back to teaching, that can be a really rewarding life as well.’”

Vampire Weekend did go on to become a huge success, and Ezra is genuinely grateful for where he ended up. But looking back, he sees how unnecessary all that pressure was. He could have found happiness on either path—whether as a musician or as a teacher who plays music on the side.

“There’s the belief that happiness only comes from achieving your dreams. The concept of dream achievement is such a double-edged sword. Because the paradox is that most people’s dream, including mine, is really just to be happy. When you strip away all the specifics, the dream is to be happy.

I’ve now met so many people in my life. I’ve met people who are infinitely more successful than me, who are some of the most stressed-out, miserable people you can imagine. And I’ve also met people who’ve watched opportunities come and go but are deeply happy.”

He learned that the state of his mind shapes the state of his life.

“I think that’s why I now have that impulse to go back and tell myself, Vampire Weekend or teacher in Brooklyn—on both paths, it’s about your attitude.”

It’s about the story you tell yourself.

“Obviously, both could be rewarding because you see that being a musician and a teacher are both incredibly fulfilling jobs for many people.”

Whether it’s getting a handle on OCD, or feeling okay at the dentist, or finding satisfaction right now, in this moment…the thing holding you back might be the story you’re telling yourself.

Books Read This Month

Favorite Books, Reading / /

Etty Hillesum: A Life Transformed by Patrick Woodhouse
The more I read about Etty Hillesum, the more in awe I am of her. This book deepened my understanding of what shaped her spiritual awakening—and I still don’t have the words to do it justice. There’s so much I want to say about it, and about Etty, but at the moment it would just come out as word vomit. (Case in point: the other day I asked Courtney to come to my office and she assumed I wanted to read her another Etty passage.) So for now, I’m holding back until I can write about it properly. Suffice it to say: this book is brilliant. (Also, the section on Etty in Enduring Lives: Living Portraits of Women and Faith in Action by Carol Lee Flinders is worth the price of the whole book.)

So Gay For You by Leisha Hailey and Kate Moennig
I love a good memoir, and after reading a sample of this one on Amazon, and laughing out loud, I bought it on the spot. It opens with Leisha Hailey recalling the moment she first heard about a new TV show that would eventually become The L Word:

“I was at a barbecue in the Hollywood Hills talking to an ex of one of my exes (in keeping with gay tradition) when she mentioned the lesbian pilot. “Oh, did they finally find Amelia Earhart?” I asked. She chuckled, which made no sense to me, since I was genuinely invested in the aviator’s whereabouts.”

I really enjoyed this book. It reminded me of one of my all-time favorite memoirs, High School.

On Solitude by Montaigne
I love the way Montaigne writes. (He is the inventor of the modern essay, after all.) He follows his curiosity wherever it leads, flowing from one thought to the next like he’s having a conversation with himself. But what really makes this worth reading is the wisdom inside. It’s like eavesdropping on someone who’s thinking things through in real time—and stumbling on truths that still hold up centuries later.

Still Writing by Dani Shapiro
I loved this book. It’s full of writing wisdom, yes, but more importantly, it’s full of encouragement. One idea that especially stuck with me was about lowering the stakes: a writer friend of Shapiro’s set out to write a short, bad book. That was the goal. No pressure, no perfection. Just a short, bad book. It ended up winning a Pulitzer Prize.

The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman & A Calendar of Wisdom by Leo Tolstoy
No matter how many times I read these books—at this point, it’s probably five or six times each—I always discover something new. When I first read The Daily Stoic in 2016, it felt like a launching pad for the rest of my life. Nine years later, I’m still learning from it. It’s written in a page-a-day format, and this year Courtney and I have been reading a page aloud together each night after dinner. A Calendar of Wisdom has been life-changing, too. I picked it up for the first time in 2019, and now I read a page each night before bed. Somehow, the insights still land as if I’m hearing them for the first time.

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