Wednesday, March 18, 2009

True Work

One of a series of posts about the Virginia Festival of the Book:

True Work
was written a decade ago by Michael Toms and Justine Willis Toms, the co-founders of New Dimensions Radio, and is about following your bliss as it pertains to your working life. I was going to write a really short review of this book, saying that I love any book with a sentence like this in it:
A regrettable case of degenerative curmudgeonliness befell a small office we knew.
Is that not a perfect sentence? I think it is. The rest of the book is warm, encouraging, and quotes lots of excellent teachers on the subject of work and life. If you're in a rut, or have a dream you've been wanting to follow, you would do well to read this book. My work life has been in a bit of upheaval lately, my time being doled out to several divisions, and I liked hearing about "walking through the valley" of bad times and how we can learn important things there. The Toms also encourage readers to set up their own True Work Circles in order to give and get support. There's a lot to like about this book. It's spiritually sensible in a kind of new-agey way.

Michael Toms had to cancel, but Justine Willis Toms will be at the Book Fest on Thursday night (see below). I'm looking forward to hearing her speak, and hope to see a lot of people there.

__________________________________________________

New Dimensions: True Work

Justine Willis Toms, co-host of the award-winning New Dimensions radio show, joins success coach Michelle Prosser to talk about doing what you love and loving what you do.

Thu. March 19th, 2009 8:00 PM

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I attended her talk but didn't read nor buy her book. I found the talk dispiriting although she is personable and seems like a nice person. The admonition to women to do household chores and knit and men to build things along with the idea that if you just make an effort you will succeed, or if you don't succeed you must not be doing it right seemed pre-feminist and non-reality based to me. She also got her facts wrong. Suicide is more common in rural areas in the U.S. than in cities, women in Chinese rural areas are killing themselves at distressing rates, and there is no evidence that women "ruminate" more than men. I felt as if she almost "blamed the victim" of depression for not trying hard enough. Also the idea that grieving a death should only last 3weeks to be "normal" was just ridiculous and not based on any research on grieving. I think she should stick to rats and neuroscience and not ad lib about people's real lives. And I can't knit, my hands don't work well, can't run, bum knee plus doctor's advice due to pulse, I walk a lot but really, most of her suggestions were useless to me. Vacuuming depresses me more than most things. Good for her if it worked for her but really.