A few common themes echo throughout forthcoming self-help titles: attention is a limited resource, there’s value in a curious mindset, and kindness toward oneself can be as crucial as kindness toward others. PW spoke with authors whose books aim to help readers shut out the noise and key into what’s really important.
Tuning in and tuning out
Like many in the wellness space, artist Carissa Potter believes the world’s reliance on technology has led to an unhealthy disconnection from those around us and from ourselves. In Breathe Through It (Tarcher, June), Potter reunites with Vera Kachouh, her How to Heal from Heartbreak coauthor, to illuminate the breathing and meditation exercises that helped Potter reconnect with herself.
The illustrated guide, she says, is the type of book she would like to have had when she was learning to manage her panic attacks and racing thoughts. It walks readers through exercises like box breathing and the cat-cow stretch, which Potter does daily. “I didn’t have these skills and I needed them,” she says. Amid what she calls a prevailing “keep moving” culture, she hopes the book will help others take a step inward and notice what’s going on in their own bodies and minds.
Hrund Gunnsteinsdóttir, a sustainability leader from Iceland, offers readers her take on reconnecting with oneself in InnSaei (HarperOne, May). The title is an Icelandic word for intuition that has three meanings, she writes: “the sea within; to see within; and to see from the inside out.” Gunnsteinsdóttir uses those definitions to frame the book, encouraging readers to examine what they pay attention to and why. “Attention is a scarce resource being hijacked all the time,” she says. “We need to gain ownership of our attention because it’s our gateway to intuition.”
She says she began honing her own intuition after working for the United Nations in war-torn Kosovo, where she’d struggled to set boundaries and maintain her well-being. “My only way out of all that,” Gunnsteinsdóttir recalls,“was to connect within.”
Outside distractions hamper one’s ability to truly listen to others, says longtime BBC media executive Emily Kasriel. In Deep Listening (Morrow, June), she draws on personal experience, research, and philosophy to lay out an eight-step framework for readers looking to become more engaged listeners. It’s an increasingly important skill, she explains, in a world where screens have helped create a “crisis of connection.” Her book teaches readers how to be present and curious in conversations, let go of judgment, and “feel optimistic” about interacting with people who hold differing viewpoints.
PW’s review called Deep Listening a “valuable guide” and an “encouraging resource for fostering more productive interactions in a polarized world.”
Restful resets
It may seem intuitive, but the science is clear: nature is good for us.
Marc Berman, author of Nature and the Mind (Simon Element, Aug.), runs the Environmental Neuroscience Lab at the University of Chicago and studies how the physical environment affects the brain and behavior. His book delves into how and why interacting with nature can help boost energy, improve mood, and sharpen focus. One finding: people don’t even have to like nature to get the cognitive benefits of being out in it.
Berman says the book could help readers looking to counteract the negative aspects of our built environment, including the attention problems caused by too much screen time. Spending time in green spaces sharpens focus, which in turn allows people to be more reflective and tone down impulses, maintain self-control, think through hard problems, and cooperate in tough situations. “I don’t think the solution is to throw away our devices,” he says. “The solution is to start engaging more with the natural environment and make that a priority.”
Website strategist Richard Simon, author of Unplug (Workman, June), turned off his cell phone for an entire year after a sobering realization: “I was just sinking, like so many of us,” he recalls. “Spending hours a day on my phone, constantly distracted, not being with myself and my family the way I wanted to.” In the book, he shares insights from his experience and those of others who have broken up, temporarily or permanently, with their phones, offering a step-by-step detox plan.
Without his cell phone constantly at hand, Simon saw improvements not just in his personal relationships but in his work productivity and in the amount of time he had to invest in hobbies. PW’s review described it as a “commonsense manual,” noting that readers would benefit from Simon’s straightforward style and helpful explanations on topics including why so-called hacks, such as deleting social media apps, are mostly ineffective.
Karen Walrond, a leadership and activism coach whose previous books include The Lightmaker’s Manifesto, highlights the importance of leisure for leisure’s sake with In Defense of Dabbling (Broadleaf, Sept.). Ask Walrond about pottery, one of her favorite hobbies, and she’ll say two things: “I cannot tell you how truly awful these pots are that I am making,” and, “I’m so into it.” She makes the case that by resisting hustle culture and instead “being a total amateur” at a chosen pastime, people can tap into their spirituality and lift their souls. “Society says you must excel; if you’re going to do something, do it perfectly,” Walrond says,“What is this weird idea that says we all have to produce?”
Her new book outlines seven essential attributes of what she calls “intentional amateurism,” including self-compassion, playfulness, and wonder. Walrond sees it as an act of self-care to dare to be just okay, or even bad, at something and enjoy it anyway. “You’re worthy of rest and joy,” she says. “They’re essential to make it through life.”
You first
Constant worry, anxiety, and overthinking lead many to set their own comfort aside in favor of pleasing someone else, says Meg Josephson, a licensed psychotherapist and wellness content creator. In Are You Mad at Me? (Gallery, Aug.), she explains that people-
pleasing is a form of the trauma response known as fawning: becoming more appealing to a threat in order to stay safe.
Josephson’s goal is to help readers become aware enough to ask, Do I need to be fawning right now? and give them the tools they need to break the habit. “It’s not about shutting out reality as a way to cope,” she says. “We can’t control the noise, but we can control how we’re responding to it.”
Christine Platt, author of more than two dozen books for adults and children, says she hadn’t realized how attached she’d become to her own people-pleasing, workaholic identity until a stress-induced high blood pressure diagnosis from her doctor forced her to rethink her personal situation and her forthcoming title, Less Is Liberation (Balance, Oct.). The diagnosis helped her understand that she’d been feeling overwhelmed because she was unwell and had become “out of alignment” with herself and her values.
With that realization, Platt reconceived the book, a sequel to 2021’s The Afrominimalist’s Guide to Living with Less that originally focused on letting go of what she calls “limiting beliefs and behaviors.” Her new emphasis is on helping people recognize where, how, and why they’ve gone astray, and to accept where they are, grieve, and move on. She encourages readers to consider the necessity of selfishness, using the definition “chiefly concerned with one’s own pleasure or profit.” The key phrase, she notes, is “chiefly concerned,” leaving room to think of others after taking care of one’s own well-being.
As with other authors PW spoke with, Platt says her book is informed by her experience, which she sees as an essential component of her work. “You cannot be writing about personal transformation and not be going through personal transformation
yourself.”
Erin Ailworth is a New York–based writer who is rarely without her phone.
Read more from out Self-Help & Wellness Books feature.
