3 Books With Neil Pasricha

What was your first Tarantino experience?   I was thirteen years old in an unfinished basement watching Reservoir Dogs on VHS and can still remember how shook my friends and I were when we saw it.   Was that your first Tarantino experience? Or was it Pulp Fiction? Jackie Brown? Kill Bill? Inglourious Basterds? Django Unchained? The Hateful Eight? Once Upon a Time in Hollywood?   Well, the Tarantino Experience continues with his brand new book Once Upon A Time In Hollywood which is the propulsive, addictive, roller-coastering movie novelization of his award-winning film. I absolutely loved it.   Today we’re going to talk about: Quentin Tarantino’s favorite writer, how we thicken our skin in a thin-skinned world, how we can live confidently in a clickbait world, how one goes about writing a movie novelization, what an unlikely spinoff to Inglourious Basterds might look like, why we should avoid self censorship, what are Quentin’s thoughts on meme Quentin Quarantino, his three most formative books, and much, much, more …   I’m going to be in your left ear (from a furnace room at my family’s lake house rental!), Quentin’s going to be in your right ear (from his writing studio in Hollywood Hills!) and you will be sitting right between us.   Let’s flip the page into Chapter 82 now …   What You'll Learn: What’s the difference between releasing a movie and releasing a book? What should we make of today’s ad-driven culture? How do we build thick skin today? Why is failure so important in the creation of art? What do critics offer artists? How do you decide what to do when you can do anything you want? Why is the artistic path such a guide post? Who was the first rock and roll idol? What is the balance between progressivism and artistic freedom? What principles should be followed when turning a movie into a book? What are the artistic and relationship implications of having confidence? Why is self-censorship limiting?   You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/82    Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future chapter: 1-833-READ-A-LOT.   Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list    3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

I discovered Dave Eggers in the late 90s when the Internet was all belts and pinions and the only two comedy websites that I remember reading were The Onion and McSweeney’s. The Onion’s site was the notorious outcropping of a campus comedy newspaper from Wisconsin and McSweeney’s was founded by a publishing dynamo Whiz Kid named Dave Eggers who’d worked at places like Wired and Might Magazine, which he’d cofounded out in San Francisco. In 2000 Dave’s ‘anti-memoir’ A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius came out and, no big deal, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. I loved the book and the seemingly endless creative fireworks Dave was capable of producing. What happened in the twenty years since? Well today Dave Eggers is one of the most celebrated writers in the world — he’s written bestsellers like The Circle, A Hologram For The King, Zeitoun and won or been nominated for endless awards including the TED Prize, The Salon Book Award, Time’s 100 Most Influential People, The National Book Critics Circle Award, the International Dublin Literary Award, and the list goes on. Dave is also co-founder of 826 National which is a non-profit dedicated to tutoring and helping students age 6 - 18 with writing. (The organization helps over 100,000 students a year.) Oh, and Dave’s written screenplays like Away We Go, together with his wife Vendela Vida, and The Wild Things, the Spike Jonze-directed adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. Is that it? No! He’s also a painter. His art has been exhibited at The Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit, The Nevada Museum of Art, The Biennial of the Americas and many other art galleries around the world. More recently, his training as an artist was put to use in a fabulously quirky book called Ungrateful Mammals. His latest book The Museum of Rain is about to release. I read it and loved it and was so excited to talk to him about it. He called in from a landline for our chat because he is known for being off the grid. No wifi and no smartphone! I was nervous and, to help the interview along, I completely mismanaged my time, so the whole thing may or may not dissolve into complete disarray by the end. But we somehow still managed to discuss: spying, life without smart phones, the ethics of Alexa, how to get boys to read, cheering for the underdog, the problem with Rotten Tomatoes, the joys of old old laptops, the tradeoff between convenience and surveillance, making art in an algorithmic society, and of course the incredible Dave Eggers’ three most formative books… Let’s flip the page into Chapter 81 now … What You'll Learn: What are the trade-offs between surveillance and convenience? Why do we give away our privacy so easily? How do we figure out which companies to trust? How can we help kids find their way to books on their terms? How do we carve out mental space for ourselves? How do we make art and ignore the algorithm?  How do we consume art? What is particular about the podcast art form? How does great art shine in today’s shallow world? What is the problem with Rotten Tomatoes? And much, much, more You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/81  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

3 Books is published on the lunar calendar. I share one new chapter of the show on the exact minute of every single full moon and every single new moon all the way up to September 1, 2031 at 5:52am. But today … I don’t have a chapter for you. I have a bookmark. On every single equinox and every single solstice I will drop a little extra of some kind … a seasonal intermezzo if you will. The first bookmark was with Nora McInerny, host of Terrible, Thanks for Asking, back on the March equinox. And now it’s the June solstice and I’m sharing my SXSW 2019 speech “Building trust in distrustful times” Why am I sharing this speech? Well you know what’s one thing I have missed during the pandemic? Giant rooms full of throngs of people. Cheering together, laughing together, learning together. There is an electric energy buzz that cannot be replicated virtually. So let’s head down to the Austin Convention Center to a ballroom with over 2500 people filling every chair and standing at the sides and at the back and talk about building trust in distrustful times… You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/bookmark2  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

Are you ready for a brain workout? Are you ready for a mind expanding conversation with the incredible Dr. Kristin Neff? Kristin received her doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley in moral development and followed it up with a post doc at the University of Denver studying self concept development and now she’s working as an Associate Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. During Kristin’s last year of graduate school she became interested in Buddhism and has been practicing meditation in the Insight Meditation tradition ever since. While doing her post-doctoral work, she decided to conduct research on self-compassion – a central construct in Buddhist psychology and one that had not yet been examined empirically. Kristin is a pioneer in the field of self-compassion research, creating a scale to measure the construct almost 20 years ago. She is the author of the book Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself, and the brand new book Fierce Self-Compassion: How Women Can Harness Kindness to Speak Up, Claim Their Power and Thrive. Together with Dr. Chris Germer she developed a training program called Mindful Self-Compassion, which is taught by thousands of teachers worldwide. They co-authored The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook as well as Teaching the Mindful Self-Compassion Program: A Guide for Professionals. She is also co-founder of the nonprofit Center for Mindful Self-Compassion. In addition to her books and training program, Kristin has written over fifty academic journal articles and chapters on the topic of Self-Compassion over the past twenty years. And this is not egghead up in the ivory tower stuff. Her work has been cited over 35,000 times! I also recommend you check out self-compassion.org to find a ton of other work like resources, instruments, practices, and of course guided meditations. My wife Leslie joined me in the basement for this conversation because it’s through her that I first discovered Kristin’s work. We sit down and discuss how you can embrace your tender and fierce sides, regrets, how to wield anger as a tool, the phrase “is this being used in the sense of harm or preventing harm?”, owning singledom, the difference between spinsters and bachelors, gender norms, and of course Dr. Kristin Neff’s 3 most formative books. Join me as we flip the page into Chapter 80 …  What You'll Learn: How can meditation help us navigate mistakes? What is tender versus fierce self compassion and how do they alleviate suffering? What do #MeToo, Black Lives Matter, and self-compassion have in common? How we can channel our anger constructively? Why is female anger perceived differently than male anger? Who is the Goddess Kali? How can anger and love co-exist? How can we teach our kids to be angry in a constructive way? How can we separate ego and anger? What are the benefits of anger? How are women socialized to view their worth through relationships? Why are social systems still so sexist? What does Buddhism teach us about love? Why is there no male word for spinster? What should men do to embrace their tender side? How is self-compassion contagious? How do we embrace our imperfections? How should we build self esteem? What are the three critical components of self-compassion? What is a self-compassion break? You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/80  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

“The Ys sounds like Js,” Yuyi Morales tells me when I ask for the correct way to pronounce her name. It’s embarrassing to ask but my detective work online resulted in a half dozen different options. Yuyi is a Mexican-American children’s book author and illustrator. She was born in Mexico and raised amongst giant grandmothers, mossy house walls, and rampaging feral gardens, fostering a strong bond with magical stories that ran in her family as a child. Today she is known for her incredible children’s books which combine powerful spare language and sumptuous complex imagery. She has written books like, Dreamers, Niño Wrestles the World, Just a Minute, Viva Frida, Little Night, Just In Case and her brand new book coming out in September called, Bright Star (I suggest you pre-order it!). It tells the story of a fawn making her way through a border landscape, teeming with flora and fauna native to the region. A gentle empowering voice encourages her to face her fears when she comes across an obstacle in the form of an insurmountable barrier. A lot of her work has these themes running through it — immigration, pilgrimage, journeying, discovery. It’s no wonder she is one of the most decorated children’s books author in the world. At last count she’s won twenty-nine awards including the Pura Belpré Medal, the Americas Award for Children and Young Adult Literature, the California Book Award, the Tomas Riviera Award and the Caldecott Honor. For those of you who know the children’s books world well, the Caldecott is the top prize! She is the first Latina to ever be a Caldecott recipient. Let’s strap in to talk about the burdens of colonialism, Mexican artistry, introducing books to book deprived communities, magic realism, community feminism, teen prostitution, dirty cops, living in books, making the world a better place, and, of course, the wonderful Yuyi Morales’s three most formative books. Let’s head down to Veracruz, Mexico. Feel that sun on your face, picture yourself on a beach, grab a drink, lay out a towel, and stare into the sea and the surf with me. Let’s flip the page into Chapter 79 … What You'll Learn: What is Xalapa like? What is the state of Mexico today? What are the burdens of colonialism? What is community feminism?  What is the cost of a book in Mexico? How can magical realism still be familiar? What motivated the student uprisings of 1968 in Mexico City? What was La Noche de Tlatelolco? Why do Mexican students feel criminalized? What must we change in our culture to allow children to  thrive? Why must we change our paternalistic views on immigration? What can we learn from children? What toxins do we absorb when we eat animals that have been slaughtered cruelly? How can we organize books by our emotional state? What is storytelling? You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/79  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

I was a tiny and skinny kid with thick glasses at my public school in the suburbs of Toronto in the early 80s. I was pretty lonely and definitely hadn’t found my way. One day my librarian Ms. Ferrell handed me a book called Sideways Stories from Wayside School by Louis Sachar. The book single-handedly turned me into a reader. I had never read a book that was funny, absurd, choppy that just kept me flipping, flipping, flipping. I loved the book. I fell into the book. I read it again and again and again and still have multiple copies on my bookshelf today. (A small count towards the nine million copies sold.) In 2010 when The Book of Awesome came out I wrote in the Acknowledgements: “To Louis Sachar, for writing Sideways Stories from Wayside School and teaching a nerdy kid to to fall in love with reading.” Louis Sacher was born in East Meadow, New York in 1954 and moved to California when he was 9. He liked school but was not much of a reader until he fell into the works of J.D.Salinger and Kurt Vonnegut. He started studying at Ohio University but left to go move back with his mom after his father sadly passed away in his first semester. Later on he enrolled at Berkeley majoring in Economics. One day, on campus, he caught sight of a young girl passing out flyers. The flyers read: “Help - Teachers Aides Wanted at Hillside Elementary - Earn 3 course credits.” It struck him as a sweet deal. No homework, no term papers, no tests. He signed up. He soon found himself both in the classroom and on the school playground, known to the kids as “Louis the Yard Teacher”. He loved it. And it ended up changing his life. His time at the local public school inspired him to write Sideway Stories from Wayside School. He even named the kids in the book after real kids he taught. It published in 1978 though did not make a loud splash. No fanfare. So Louis went on to Law School and practiced law for 10 years — all the while writing children’s books on the side. His writing finally took off in 1989. He quit law to write full time and is now one of the best known children’s authors in the world. (Although I’m a Sideways junkie he’s probably sold even more copies of Holes which won him both the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature and the Newbery Medal and — no biggie — was made into a giant blockbuster film, too.) I was delighted to sit down with a childhood idol. He called us up from the suburbs of Austin, Texas and we talked about absurdity, wooing readers, drinking urine, literary heroes, celebrity culture, writing structure, The Shawshank Redemption, wrestling with doubt, and how to live a quiet life. Let’s flip the page into Chapter 78 now… What You'll Learn: What kind of reader do writers think about as they write? Are writers still heroes today? What made the 1960s such a special time of upheaval? How do we live a quiet life in today’s world? How can writers maintain humility? How does one separate commercial success from what you do next?  How do authors use their craft to skip time smartly in their work? How do you make a good movie from a book? How do some authors cultivate friendship with their readers? You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/78  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

Happy Pink Moon, everybody! Way back in 2017, I came across a feature article in The New York Times Magazine called “A Whimsical Wordsmith Charts a Course Beyond Twitter.” The article was about MIT PhD student Jonny Sun’s online personality — as a sentimental alien — attracting a huge following online.   I was like “Okay, this is about the latest viral Instagram influencer and their particular brand of attention seeking behavior.” But as I read the piece, and went deeper into the bio of Jonny Sun, I found myself fascinated. Jonny Sun is a PhD student at MIT looking to understand, in more objective ways, how social media fosters community. His research focuses on how social media content influences the broader world. How meaning is made. How it spreads. How it changes news and culture. As one comedian put it, “He’s like Jane Goodall and we’re the apes.” I found myself falling deeper and deeper into the Jonny Sun rabbit hole. There’s a lot there! Jonny is an architect, designer, engineer, artist, playwright, and comedy writer who has written for BoJack Horseman. In fact, we recorded this chapter with him in L.A. currently writing another screen play. Jonny’s work is across multiple disciplines which broadly addresses the narrative of human experience. His plays have been performed at the Yale School of Drama, Hart House Theatre in Toronto, the Toronto Theatre Lab First Sight Festival and the University of Toronto Drama Festival. His art has been exhibited at Yale University and the University of Toronto. And, he is the author of a brand new and highly anticipated book called Goodbye, Again: Essays, Reflections & Illustrations. It is a truly wonderful book. Looks simple on the surface but then roller coasters up and down and sideways with obsessive mental insights like Jenny Lawson or David Foster Wallace. Jonny’s work has appeared in The New Yorker, McSweeneys, NPR, The New York Times and Late Night with Seth Myers. He’s also been named by Times as one of the 25 most influential people on the internet, Forbes has named him one of their 30 under 30 and his TED Talk has nearly four million views. Are you ready to talk about the culture of productivity, about being on all the time, about therapy and anxiety, about the provocative nature of humor, about succulents and aloe plants, about Dadaism, about competition, about algorithms, and of course about the wonderful Jonny Sun’s 3 most formative books?  Let’s turn the page into Chapter 77 now… What You'll Learn: What is a toxic culture of productivity? How do you juggle competing pursuits? What are the additional pressures marginalized people face? How do drama and humor interplay in comedy? How do we stand out in today’s mass media dominated world? What are the tensions between professional and personal ambition? How do social media algorithms work? What is instructional art? What is behavioural simulation? How do you convey deep thought and emotion in short form? You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/77  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

Do you suffer from anxiety disorder? Depression? Intrusive thoughts? Obsessive compulsive disorder? Voluntary hair pulling? Avoidant personality disorder? Any of the above? Well, Jenny Lawson suffers from all of the above. Tuberculosis too, according to her wonderful new book. It’s an overwhelming way to live and only partly cured by being a global community leader for mental health through her wonderful blog (TheBloggess.com), her millions of followers, and her indie bookshop Nowhere Bookshop down in San Antonio, Texas. Does Jenny Lawson do podcasts? Interviews? No, not really. She tells us at the beginning of the chat that she loves 3 Books so much that she wanted to come — lucky us, as 3 Bookers have been asking for this interview for years! — and she made herself cozy by calling me up from under her desk, in cozy clothes, post-beta-blockers, and with Hunter S. Tomcat providing animal therapy throughout. Jenny is funny, crass, smart, and openhearted. She’s struck a deep chord with her books Let’s Pretend This Never Happened, Furiously Happy, You Are Here, and Broken. (All, I should mention, with the wonderful Amy Einhorn who’s edited four of my books, too!) Jenny and I talk about what a good editor does, reading in the freezer, stealing Stephen King, dollhouse therapy, mental health toolkits, LSD, what your kids will actually remember about you as a parent, and of course, Jenny’s 3 most formative books. Jenny is gracious and disarmingly truthful and she doesn't want her pain to go to waste. She is a beaming voice the world needs more of and today I am just so privileged to help her do just that. Let’s flip the page into Chapter 76 … What You'll Learn: What does an editor do? How do you read horror books when you have anxiety? How do you open a bookshop? What is reading guilt? How can ketamine treat depression? How can we cultivate self care and self awareness if we have anxiety? What are intrusive thoughts? How does depression lie? What is a mental health toolkit? What is dollhouse therapy? How can we talk to our kids about mental illness? You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/76  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list  3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co

3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 15-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of one of the world's most inspiring people. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, Angie Thomas, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, and Judy Blume. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single new moon and every single full moon all the way up to 5:21 am on September 1, 2031. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted live and in-person at the guest's preferred location by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Awesome, The Happiness Equation, Two-Minute Mornings, etc. For more info check out: https://www.3books.co “An astoundingly tuned voice, telling just the kind of stories we need to get us through these times.” Thomas Pynchon “Not since Mark Twain has America produced a satirist this funny.” Zadie Smith “George Saunders makes you feel as if you are reading fiction for the first time.” Khaled Hosseini I could keep going and going with other literary all-stars lining up to praise George Saunders but my favorite quote about George’s writing comes from Ben Marcus in The Believer back in 2004: “The Suits call his writing ‘stories,’ but they are really soft bodies to wear for a larger experience of life, hollowcore person-shapes that one can slip on in order to attain amazement. Saunders writes bodies, and his readers wear them.” Yes! That’s how I feel, too. Which is what made it such an immense pleasure to sit down with the humble genius that is George Saunders. Don’t take the genius label from me! He’s won a MacArthur Genius Grant, Guggenheim Fellowship, PEN/Malamud Prize and been named to Time’s 100 Most Influential People. He won the Man Booker for the mesmerizing otherworldly masterpiece Lincoln in the Bardo, and every time I read his short story collections Pastoralia and Tenth of December they just crack my heart wide open. And, just to extend the literary resume here, his most recent book A Swim in the Pond in the Rain is simply the best book on writing I have ever read. I highly recommend it to all writers. George Saunders has also been a Professor in Creative Writing at Syracuse University since 1997. Cheryl Strayed, our guest in Chapter 69, is one of hundreds who had George as a teacher and calls him a mentor today. Please enjoy this wide-ranging conversation discussing the computer we are all trapped inside, reading as a life project, how we process reality, practicing Buddhism, the world as a corrective force, delivering payoff, staying grounded, cultivating a love of literature in children, harnessing our shadow selves, quieting mental rumination, aiming our spigots, and much, much more … . The wisdom of George Saunders offers a true masterclass on writing, on living, on life. Let’s flip the page into Chapter 75 … What You'll Learn: How does our brain process reality? How do writers justify the non normative and guarantee pay off? What is a reading project? How does death amplify life? What is the self? What is efficiency in writing? How should we stay grounded despite success? When should writers compare themselves to the masters? How should we think about kindness? What can we learn from Buddhism? What is an innate tendency of mind? How can parents cultivate a love of literature in their kids? How can we channel our different mental states to be creative? How does exploring one’s dark side or subconscious impact one’s writing? How can the minutiae of editing save a writer? How can we learn to live more freely?   You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.3books.co/chapters/75  Leave us a voicemail. Your message may be included in a future episode: 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Sign up to receive podcast updates here: https://www.3books.co/email-list 

I love you, 3 Bookers. The deepening connection and trust in this community constantly blows me away. It picks me up when I’m down, it’s a barrel of nerdy laughs, it helps me scratch a lot of itches in my brain. And it’s been truly great friendship through the pandemic. I mean, End of the Podcast Club, Cover to Cover Club, and Secret Club? Where you have to find a hidden password? And then send cash in the mail to a secret address? I didn’t think anyone would join these ridiculous things! You leave so many voicemails at 1-833-READ-A-LOT, you mail letters we read on the show, and you leave the hundreds of reviews that I try really, really hard not to care about and yet still shamefully, biologically kind of do. We get the joyful pleasure of going on an adventure and of braiding together our invisible reading lives. I have so many ideas for deepening this connection over the years and I want to introduce one today. For the last ten years of 3 Books, I plan to release a special Bookmark on the exact minute of every single solstice and equinox. That's today! The sun is right over the equator and day and night are just about equal lengths. We will play the theme song backwards and explore a different side-trail on our shared path. It might be a speech, a reflection, or some alternate type of ... other. The first Bookmark drops today. And it’s a conversation between me and my friend Nora McInerny on her wonderful, wonderful podcast Terrible, Thanks for Asking.  I hope you’ll check it out and let me know what you think. Would love your feedback and thoughts! Neil   3 Books is a completely insane and totally epic 22-year-long quest to uncover and discuss the 1000 most formative books in the world. Each chapter discusses the 3 most formative books of an inspiring person. Sample guests include: Brené Brown, David Sedaris, Malcolm Gladwell, George Saunders, Angie Thomas, Daniels, Cheryl Strayed, Rich Roll, Soyoung the Variety Store Owner, Derek the Hype Man, Kevin the Bookseller, Vishwas the Uber Driver, Roxane Gay, David Mitchell, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Mark Manson, Seth Godin, Judy Blume, and Quentin Tarantino. 3 Books is published on the lunar calendar with each of the 333 chapters dropped on the exact minute of every single full moon all the way up to April 26, 2040. 3 Books is an Apple "Best Of" award-winning show and is 100% non-profit with no ads, no sponsors, no commercials, and no interruptions. 3 Books has 3 clubs including the End of the Podcast Club, the Cover to Cover Club, and the Secret Club, which operates entirely through the mail and is only accessible by calling 1-833-READ-A-LOT. Each chapter is hosted by Neil Pasricha, New York Times bestselling author of 'The Happiness Equation', 'Two-Minute Mornings', and 'The Book of Awesome.' For more info check out: https://www.3books.co