14 Wellbeing Books from 2020 (2 of them downloadable) for a common good & good life
“We read books to find out who we are. What other people, real or imaginary, do and think and feel… is an essential guide to our understanding of what we ourselves are and may become.” Ursula K. Le Guin
“…Books are only of value when they lead us towards life and serve and benefit the living. Every hour spent reading is wasted if the reader does not experience a spark of energy, a presentiment of rejuvenation, and idea of new life” Herman Hesse, Herman Hesse: Life and Art —
“There is always an open book for all eyes: Nature.” Jean Jacques Rousseau
At the end of the year, lists and reflections are usually made about what happened. This year, perhaps one of the most atypical in the last decades due to the emergence of COVID-19 is even more necessary and it will be my first time in English since I have curated books published in Spanish for the last 5 years.
The purpose of this article is not just to make one more list, in this case, my subjective one, but to build a communicative bridge to hear from you, your list, or some other input. Besides, there is also the possibility of creating a small source of knowledge through some books that explore and deepen the meaning of the buzzword “wellbeing”.
From my point of view, this concept of “wellbeing” is dynamic, it’s always in construction because it involves human beings (individually as a subjective entity that experiences it), the local and global society where we all live together (social and culturally) and the Earth, this pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known, as Carl Sagan mentioned.
Some articles about COVID-19 that I have read during this year emphasized the possibility of a systemic transformation and mentioned the symbolic pattern AC (After COVID) or BC (Before COVID) for a new start. This is a sign of attention on the wrong path we are choosing because of the many personal, social, and environmental crises we are living continuously. A cartoon appeared in a Spanish newspaper featuring a prophet raising his hand and saying:
- I found the vaccine!
- What is it? — they asked him.
- Another way of living. — he replied.
… but they thought he was mad…
Another way of living is an open statement whatever the path, so I wonder, who are the crazy ones who don’t want a transformation? Joaquin Sabina, a Spanish singer-songwriter points out in a verse of a song: “a los quince los “cuerdos de atar” me cortaron las alas” (a possible translation: in my fifteen, “mad rationality” or “insane sanity” cut my wings.) This reminds me of Greta Thunberg and millions of young people who don’t want their wings to be cut off about what is possible or not about the future of our planet.
Anyway, COVID-19 is a reality, and we don’t know yet if it will transform us for the better or the worse. One of the paradoxes that the epidemic has brought us is to make visible the compass that leads us or as a society, we would like to lead us; the economic one (mainly through GDP) or the one relating to health and wellbeing. Right now, I’m writing a book on Wellbeing Economy and I show that it is relational instead of some linearity that, for example, GDP wants to indicate to us.
I’d like to frame the comments on these 14 books with the framework I developed to try to describe what “wellbeing” (Living well, Good Life) is. The concept or this dynamic idea of wellbeing is polyhedral and perhaps the metaphor or analogy that can most approximate a definition of wellbeing is the one that emerges from the old parable of the elephant and the six blind men. Because no one knew anything about elephants, each of them approximated a part of it and then they begin to describe what an elephant is from what they touched and what they know about the world. He who touches the trunk says it is like a snake. He who touches the ear says it is like a fan. He who touches the tail says it is like a rope and so on… How can we resolve these polarizations? A solution is to listen to one another (relationships). They are all partially correct as each of them is touching different parts. Therefore, dogmatism or disaster occurs when we cling to our idea and on the contrary, the solution arises when we open up and listen to others.
In this diagram, you can see the relationships among the 8 wellbeing nodes in 3 circles: Individual (Health & Personal development); Social (Family, Work, Community, Economics); Planetary (Environment & Food). The blue circles (Education + Ethics) surrounding the individual and social parts are like a formula of consciousness or unconsciousness (if it does not carry certain ethics throughout the whole) so that these people or those institutions move towards healthier and more vital dynamics, that is, towards wellbeing. The key element of this dynamic wellbeing is to know what are the values (ethics as a compass) by which we are guided.
The 14 books I mention in this article (in no special order) are difficult to analyse in a paragraph or two as it would not do justice to the experience of their comprehensive reading. The novelist and essayist André Maurois already told us:
“The reading of a fine book is an uninterrupted dialogue in which the book speaks and our soul replies.”
That is why my objective has been primarily to select these notable books of 2020 that I have read that can fit into that idea of “wellbeing”. Secondly, it is to mention those books relating them to that broader and relational worldview among those three axes (personal, social, planetary) and their different nodes. Finally, if the reader feels any special value or interest in a book, I have linked them to the authors’ page or pages with book reviews.
Sitopia: How food can save the world by Carolyn Steel
Carolyn Steel starts from the last chapter of her previous book “Hungry city” where she mentioned what sitopia is, so she deepens this idea in this new book. It’s a great book with easy reading stories and she relates “food” with all the elements of that “elephant of wellbeing” that I mention in the graphic above. I do not doubt that Steel has been able to listen to each of the other elements and wisely relate them to her food theme. Without the environment, there is no food and there is no life. Any threat to the environmental balance due to its destruction or pollution affects the other social systems (economy-community-family-work) and the personal one (health-personal development). The message of the book is clear, food is central to any relationship: with family, with friends in our community, with the amount of work that must be done to get money and buy it or the work of growing it, with the economic model that nourishes some practices or others, with the health of our body and the planet and even with personal development as she experienced focusing her architecture studies on food. I found the book very educational and ethical so we should not take food for granted.
More: Sitopia
Transcend: the new science of self-actualization by Scott Barry Kaufman
Based on Maslow’s needs that were established in the middle of the 20th century, Scott Barry Kaufman ventures into exploring the world of Maslow and redesigns those needs for the 21st century. From a personal development point of view, the book is full of links and surveys to know oneself. If we started from an outer circle, the planetary one, in the previous book, this parts from the innermost circle, the personal one. In systems, where everything is connected, it doesn’t matter where we start. From our personal development we can influence our health, that of our family and community, find our vocation for work, and even be aware of the functioning of the economic and environmental systems. This is one of the best psychology books I have read in recent years. It works as an educational guide to get to know ourselves better and as an ethical guide for responsible wellbeing.
More: Transcend
Less is More: how degrowth will save the world by Jason Hickel
The arrows on the cover of this book reflect the bidirectionality between the relationships, even though they seem paradoxical. Jason Hickel’s book is in the middle circle of the graphic above, the social and institutional (WE) and takes the point of view of the economics — politics to live healthily on this planet so that everyone can flourish. In my opinion, this is the main book published in 2020 about economics that everyone should read. It is an appeal for “another way of living”. Curiously, there is a parallel, both in the name of this book and in its philosophy, with the board game“Less is Max” that Belén and Carmen created based on the ideas about the needs of the economist Manfred Max-Need and to which I wrote an article entitled “Less is Max, probably the best educational game in the world for the wellbeing of society and the planet”. I find very interesting the bidirectionality between reading Hickel’s book and the experimental fun of the previous game: both try to transform our economic system through “Less is More”.
More: Less is More
Humankind: a hopeful history by Rutger Bregman
Some years ago, it was said that the press and news media were the fourth power but now I don’t know how many positions they have advanced. We are what we read and now most newspapers have economic powers behind them that shape our minds. Rutger Bregman, a journalist with a vocation to serve the common good, questions the lack of journalistic ethics and, like what psychologist Martin Seligman began through positive psychology, proposes in this book that you not only look at the darkest and most catastrophic parts of the news that are the ones that sell the most and the ones that attract the most attention to our brain (surviving) but also those that make progress. Bregman, chapter by chapter and with a deeper journalistic investigation, dismantles myths and news that focus on the dark side of humans. He offers instead storytelling that does not fit in with that news, which we have always believed to be true. This is a book that re-educates us to think critically in the face of competition and see the other side of the coin of humanity, cooperation.
More: Humankind
The Good Ancestor: how to think long term in a short-term world by Roman Krznaric
Roman Krznaric has written a very practical book to show us a necessary value, “long-term thinking”, for any human transition that ensures our survival as a species. The short-termism that we very often use in any of the wellbeing nodes (environment, economy, work, health, community…) affects the entire system and leads us toward a collapse. This is a book that gives wings to the hope of young people, children, and those who has not been born to live on a healthy planet and society. If on the one hand, Sabina sang in his song that “mad rationality” or “insane sanity” cut off his wings when he was fifteen, on the other hand, Krzanaric and his partner Kate Raworth (Doughnut Economics) in a long-term thinking exercise (wise irrationality or sane insanity) gave their electoral votes to their teenage children. In this way, their children, who are supposed to live longer and cannot vote for the political parties that will affect their future, can choose the ones that fit their expectations. This is intergenerational justice. In summary, I think that this book is a primer for long-term thinking and will be a classic in a few decades.
The future we choose: surviving the climate crisis by Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac
If COVID-19 has led to short-term thinking because is shaking our society, the climate crisis, not taken seriously into account since the first warnings in the 70s, appears to be the most important short-term event (the critical decade) for the future. This could lead us to regenerative, abundant, and optimistic well-being (personal, social, and planetary), or on the contrary, it could continue deteriorating our well-being into ill-being. That’s what this book is mostly about, connecting the dots between the ongoing destruction of our natural habitat and our future ability to create the conditions so that the above does not happen. The book proposes to co-create a healthy future and for this, the authors explain some mindsets or tools for us to develop them. Both authors, Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac were in the Paris Agreement on climate change so they are certainly great experts on this subject. This is a great book that inspires, serves as a guide, and proposes a story for hope.
More: The future we choose
Work: a history of how we spend our time by James Suzman
I love books that make a historical development (Where do we come from?, What is the path dependency?…) because one appreciates the nuances, the dynamics of change, and the values that prevailed in each of the corresponding stages. This is having a big picture of that specific theme. In this case, this book is outstanding since it shows us the concept of “work” from different points of view, anthropological, philosophical, sociological economic…If James Suzman has perfectly described the “Work” part of the “elephant of wellbeing”, he has also carried out an educational and excellent communication to intertwine the different parts (food, health, family, community, environment…). This is a must-read book that offers a big picture about work and wellbeing.
More: Work
The tyranny of merit: what’s become of the common good? by Michael J. Sandel
Michael J. Sandel in this book does an exercise in what I call “responsible thinking”. Firstly, like any philosopher, he starts with critical thinking. In this case, he selects a topic, “meritocracy”, which involves us in our social (work, community, economy…) and personal system (health, personal development). He analyses its pros and cons from the point of view of philosophy and ethics. Secondly, it goes further and reveals most of the parts that come together in that meritocracy system through a systemic analysis. Finally, he shows us numerous paradoxes and contradictions that arise in that analysis. In my opinion, we need this paradoxical thinking that makes us stop and reflect to change or move toward other values that we are not considering (the common Good?). This is a book for thinking and re-thinking our personal and social systems.
More: The tyranny of merit
Wellbeing, resilience and sustainability: the new trinity of governance by Jonathan Joseph and J. Allister McGregor
Jonathan Joseph and J. Allister McGregor have chosen this new trinity that in my opinion encompasses those three circles and their many interactions, proposing a new governance compass to guide us. This compass combines the personal characteristic of wellbeing (hedonic & eudaimonic), the social character of resilience, and the planetary characteristic of sustainability. This is a thorough book for those who want to examine these carefully and academically these subjects. You will find analysed various models and frames and a large bibliography to further explore the wellbeing — resilience — sustainability dynamic.
More: Wellbeing, Resilience and Sustainability
Growing young: how friendship, optimism and kindness can help you live to 100 by Marta Zaraska
Marta Zaraska shows us the world of health, personal development, and social relationships (family, friends, or our community) through scientific journalism. She has analysed numerous meta-analytical papers and has reached the conclusion that to live longer, the most important thing is not our diet or exercise (both are also important) but that the social aspect (friendship, kindness, empathy…) increases our possibility of living more years. If one of our goals is to live longer or to have a better quality of life (perhaps referring to the resilience factor from the previous book) this is an interesting book to read. For example, the relationship with your partner (if it is good) is the most important factor in increasing our life. This is an excellent book that in my opinion collects those five ways to wellbeing (connect, be active, take notice, keep learning and give) that NEF (New economics foundation) proposed as the 5 daily “fruits or vegetables” that we should all incorporate into our lives.
More: Growing young
Humanocracy: creating organizations as amazing as the people inside them by Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini
The bureaucracy in organizations and institutions was a response to values of a time that now no longer fit into. We are living in new times with new challenges and therefore new values in our organizations are necessary. Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini propose to give value to the creativity of each person (now mostly extinguished by norms and customs) so that together in the organization in which they work, they develop their potential and health (in the broad sense of the WHO; physical, mental and social) towards creating value for the company and society. The authors have written this much-needed organizational book for businesses and organizations in need of change. You will find many practical examples of organizations that use some of the principles proposed in the book to inspire you.
More: Humanocracy
The gratitude project: how the science of thankfulness can rewire our brains for resilience, optimism and the greater good (edited by Jeremy Adam Smith, Kira Newman, Jason Marsh and Dacher Keltner)
When a book is written by several authors and is focused on a specific topic, the quality of the content increases as different perspectives provide a differential value that makes the whole greater than the sum of its parts. In this case, “The Gratitude Project” analyses the theory and practices on that value as necessary as gratitude. If the opposite of gratitude is an entitlement that focuses exclusively on the self, too little and too much gratitude can also be negative. On the one hand, rudeness appears in social relationships when there is not enough gratitude. On the other hand, the excess creates ingratiation. The evidence of being grateful for our health and personal development, as well as about our society and even about our planet (if it somehow makes us react to being less materialistic) gives this value that virtue of transcendence where positive psychology places it.
More: The gratitude project
Choosing Earth: humanity great transition to a mature planetary civilization by Duane Elgin
Duane Elgin, a great activist that has been working on numerous studies of the long-range future since the ’70s, is one of the people who can offer us some clarity about the future. The present book is one of those books or guidebooks that can help us to see the trends. It is also great to connect those dots in the personal and social aspects that make our communities or countries more aligned with the planet and co-create that wellbeing mindset for thriving. This is an important book to read and re-read. It’s also a realistic book for Hope and I have no doubts that it will touch you deeply.
More: Choosing Earth
The great awakening: new modes of life amidst capitalist ruins (edited by Anna Grear and David Bollier)
In a similar way to the gratitude project, this book brings together a group of researchers who, through the framework of the commons and the commoners, guide us towards that possible future or wellbeing that we desire. Elinor Ostrom, Nobel Prize winner for economics, though her work on the commons and governance opened the field for numerous researchers who expanded the concept to other fields such as “knowledge commons”, “digital commons”, “cultural and civic commons”, “global commons” … Today more than ever because this polarization between the state and the private, it is necessary to reveal the commons for their environmental and social value for our wellbeing. This great awakening is a very interesting academic book to explore new modes of life or well-being amidst the ill-being part of capitalism.
More: The Great Awakening
As you may have observed to get an idea of wellbeing, we should not only focus on a perspective (or a book) but on the relationships between different parts that clarify our dynamic image of wellbeing. The chance to discover nuances can occur when you are discovering a book on this list that opens a new perspective — or with other books either in libraries, in bookstores, on social networks, or through word of mouth. Some books that I discovered this year are not from 2020 but I would include them in the list of their corresponding years, such as “Sand Talk: how indigenous thinking can save the world” (2019) by Tyson Yunkaporta or “The listening society” (2017) by Hanzi Freinacht. I made this thread on Twitter with some great insights from the first book.
On the other hand, when I was researching for NOW (Network of Wellbeing) years ago, I wrote some articles curating some of the best free resources (mostly from the civil society) for building this idea of wellbeing (personal, social and planetary), like the graphic above. We were building a database with free resources (videos, reports, guides, toolkits, e-books) through 10 categories. Here is a link to these 10 articles curating the best resources if you want to delve into a category (node).
Those connections between the different nodes are what can also give us an idea of the wellbeing economy that could be the new compass that replaces GDP for any other Wellbeing Index that guides us towards the future. I will offer some tools (education) and an ecosystem of values (ethics) for the wellbeing economy in the book I am writing.
I thank the authors of the previous books for helping me discover new ideas and new possibilities of wellbeing that lead towards a common good and a good life. Finally, could you add any 2020 wellbeing book to this list?
More articles: Here
Twitter: @ResWellbeing @BienestarRespon
