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Question What book changed your life?

AmorRoark

AmorRoark

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What book changed your personal perspective on life?


Me: The Fountianhead. It re-enforced what I already felt all along.. I just realized I wasn't alone anymore. I live my life for ME not for the U.S., the government, the people of my city, my family, my friends or even you.. I live for me. My soul is all I will ever truely know.
 
one of the books that changed my life was One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. this book deals alot with time, politics, truth, and love.

another book that had a great impact on me was The Famished Road by Ben Okri. this book contains some of the most stunning images ive ever read.

what both of these books have in common is the sense that past, present and future, dream and reality, you and me etc, cannot be separated...
 
Can I cheat and go with poetry instead of a book?

"Howl," by Allen Ginsberg. It came at a time in my life when I had forgotten that there was art in the world, and detested anything 'pretty', but then I read the line

"who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz"

and was stuck on it. And started a new way of life and thinking and loving. It was lovely. :)
 
I don't understand what people mean when they say a book "changed their life"... I mean, a book can open your eyes to something new, it can educate you, entertain you, piss you off, or bore the hell out of you...
but how in the hell can a book CHANGE YOUR LIFE?

Am I missing something here?
 
OMG, One Hundred Years of Solitude was soo crazy!!

Quite simply, a book can change your life by introducing you to ideas or concepts you mean not have ever come to contemplate without reading it. These ideas could play some role in shaping your personality, belief system, and morals/values, as we are each capable of learning and changing each day that goes by.

I'd have to say that The Celestine Prophecy, A Cup of Trembling, The Final Battle, The Bible (and Tanakh), along with Tom Clancy's Books, 1984, and some other's changed me somewhat. I also liked some of Shakespear and other english 'canon books'. Also some books about WW2 and my history books.
 
A book can change your life if it opens your eyes to something that you may otherwise have never known. It doesn't necessarily mean it causes you to get a different job or leave for the mountains of China. But it may just influence you to think differently, which can affect your happiness or your decisions, even if in only a small way.

It's rare that a book will change my life. But I will say The God of Small Things changed my life in that it made India more knowable to me, if that makes any sense at all. It makes sense to me. It also inspired me to seek out better books than the trash I had been reading.

And The Dharma Bums has really got me thinking about what is important. It hasn't made me a Buddhist, but it's inspired me to do a lot more hiking this summer...
 
The book "The Tao of Pooh" allowed me to realize for myself how pointless all the shit that america makes important, like being busy, is and to be able to enjoy beauty wherever it is around me.
Whenever I feel stressed, this book allows me to slow down and control my life--everything I need is here for me already.
 
"She's Come Undone" by Wally Lamb.
As the name suggests, its about a girl who lives through many tragic events- and how she becomes stronger. It touched me when my life was in chaos. And i think it was the first time i realised i didnt have to exsist for anyone but me.
 
Biography of Malcolm X.

It was very hard to read about 'white devils' as I never considered myself a devil. In the end, it was very illuminating and helped me come to terms with and accept black anger.
 
This thread reminded me of what Henry Thoreau wrote in Walden; "How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book!"

I can say that two books have "changed me," or had an unusually big impact on how I percieved the world, thought, and acted.

The first one I read when I was 14 and it was Conversations with God. It was the first book that fully allowed me to move away from Christianity. I'd been feeling pangs of doubt since I was in grade school but it layed out my doubts in a way that I couldn't ignore and assured me that my doubts didn't mean I was going to hell.

The second book is one I'm reading right now. It's Carl Jung's autobiography Memories, Dreams, Reflections. It's effect on me is more subtle than the one above (more of an evolution in thought than revolution), but I've never read about or met a person in my life that I could relate to so well. I swear this guy was me 100 years ago. It's playing an important part in the maturation of my thoughts and most of all lets me know that there's been someone else who's had similar inner experiences to my own.

Man I like books :D
 
Well, it may sound corny but it was "Are You There God Its Me Margaret", by Judy Blume when i was in fifth grade.

When i first read it i learned what a period was. Except the book was rather outdated and i thought i was going to have to wear some belt for my pad.
I read the book over and over waiting for the day my mom would take me to get my first bra. And Margaret got mad at God and had lots of questions. She was Jewish and Catholic just as i.

I really identified with her.
 
Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance
by Robert Pirsig.

This book really fucked me up. Primarily b/c I read at a very unstable age (read:17). If there is one book that shaped who I am or perhaps who I am not, it is that book. It is by far my favourite book of all time ...and I've read allot of books! :)

A very distant second is an autobiography of sorts entitled Krishnamurti: Total Freeedom by Krishnamurti.

I agree with the above, Fountainhead is also a very powerful book, so is Atlas Shrugged...
 
Seat of the Soul by Gary Zucav

It really changed how I view my life, people, and relationships.
 
All the books by Dr Seuss. :D

Jokes aside, been reading for pleasure ever since, so the experience must have been good. :D
 
Prozac Nation....it was amazing to know that someone felt exactly like I did...I realized that what I was feeling (total insanity) wasn't just me breaking down, it had happened to someone else....


It also made me realize that she is a whiney brat, and I should just take my meds and shut up, no one wants to hear about it.
 
Ronin - that book changed my life too, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance really rocks - and I read it at 17 or 18 also. When he gets to Poincare and the whole "gumption" thing, it just really comes together. Another book along the same lines is Godel Escher Bach - An Eternal Golden Braid. I got almost done with it a long time ago, and I'll be starting again soon. It's pretty cool.
 
The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley..... just kind of made me think about oh, i don't know, the entire universe all at once... kind of like those questions that are meant to clear your mind... "what is the sound of one hand clapping" etc.... or maybe it was being 17 and finding out what life is? timing, i guess.... it was pretty pivitol for me though... i remember sitting in a coffee shop on my lunch break reading that book, and feeling like my own personal reducing valve opened to twice it's size.

aj the femme
 
Dune By Frank Herbert

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
 
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