Reading for Comfort

Books about brains, love, and letting go

“For the first time in history, the findings of scientists in the West strongly support, in many cases without meaning to, one of the most fundamental insights of the East: that the individual self is more akin to a fictional character than a real thing.”
~ Chris Niebauer, from No Self, No Problem

One of my go-to books when I feel the need for reassurance is Pema Chodron’s Comfortable with Uncertainty; paradoxically, the only “reassurance” she offers is that reassurance is a myth, and worse—a lie. (She doesn’t say that, but that’s one of the things I take from her teachings.) I am reassured by her consistent message that not knowing what is going to happen is simply another aspect of being alive, not a bad thing or a good thing but simply a thing. 

Since I haven’t been able to drop down into fiction, I tried some non-fiction a friend recommended, and I am fascinated. Finally, a book that grabs my attention in the midst of chaos and grief. I’m reading No Self, No Problem: How Neuropsychology Is Catching Up to Buddhism by Chris Niebauer. Fascinating title, yes? I’ve been reading the Buddhists for years and I know nothing about neuropsychology, but I hang in there with the tough parts and I allow my brain to float through lines like this:

“. . . the self is more like a verb than a noun. It only exists when we think it does, because the process of thinking creates it.” ~ Chris Niebauer

One of the  things I’ve learned from all this esoteric reading is that the brain doesn’t know everything—but it wants us to think it does. Another thing I’ve learned is that the brain lies. I find this comforting. 

What are your comfort reads?

I started the above weeks ago and then got caught up in all the little—but important—details one has to attend to after someone dies. And then I sold my house and moved to Colorado—more details plus sorting through a house and packing to eventually live in a small condo.

Aside: I did not do this alone. I was an emotional mess and could only brush my teeth every day because I had to have some routine to hang onto. I am blessed with family who would—and did—do anything for me, and in fact, they did everything. 

So I was caught up in details and then a two-day drive to Colorado. I finished reading No Self, No Problem, loved it, and am rereading it. I congratulate myself. This is the first book I’ve finished in more than two months. And more good news: I read two books of fiction: The Mystery of the Blue Train by Agatha Christie (a Poirot story), and after many years, I finally started reading another mystery author who reminds me of Christie: Elizabeth Peters. I read her first Amelia Peabody story, Crocodile on the Sandbank, and just started the second one.

I also read a wonderful book on grief called Resilient Grieving: How to Find Your Way Through a Devastating Loss (Finding Strength and Embracing Life After a Loss that Changes Everything) by Lucy Hone. She writes from her own experience of losing her daughter, her daughter’s best friend, and her own best friend in a car accident, and she writes from her training and experience as a resilience researcher. I didn’t even know there was such a thing, and now I am caught up in her story and in the science behind it, taking comfort from both.

You can check her out here.

I thought I knew a lot about who am I and how I might respond in certain circumstances, and then my wife died, and I found out I knew nothing. That’s probably not true, but that’s how it felt. Everything I thought I knew was either irrelevant or just plain wrong in the circumstances. And of course, how could I know what it would be like to lose this person, my partner and wife, my friend, my co-hort in love and life. 

“Apparently, crises do not necessarily forge character, but reveal it.” ~ Lucy Hone

 I have experienced grief over the death of others I loved deeply, but those losses didn’t prepare me. Nothing could prepare me—nothing can prepare any of us for any death. What I appreciate about Lucy Hone, besides the ability to share something so personal and so painful, is that she was also able to observe her experience as she went through it, immediately after, and forever after. It is calming to read something she wrote a few years after her devastating loss and see that she goes on, her family goes on, and we adapt to change—even devastating change.

I’m curious about what gives us comfort, what we seek out, what we land on by accident, and of course—what books we read. Tell me your story.