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Meditations for Mortals

A Four Week Guide to Doing What Counts

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Meditations for Mortals

By: Oliver Burkeman
Narrated by: Oliver Burkeman
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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

Stop trying to sort your life out. Start living.

Our lives can feel defined by the struggle with overwhelm, endless decisions and striving to be productive. Wouldn’t it be good to stop doing all that? What if we could find freedom – and get more of the important things done – by embracing our limitations, and by letting things happen instead of forcing them?

Meditations for Mortals begins with the reality in which we actually find ourselves, not with fantasies of an ideal existence. Reflecting on ideas from philosophy, religion, psychology and self-help, it offers us a powerful and practical new way to do what counts: a guiding outlook Oliver Burkeman calls ‘imperfectionism’.

This book is a profound and liberating crash course in living more fully. It overturns much familiar advice and opens a gateway to a saner, freer and more enchantment-filled life.

‘Full of wisdom and comfort' CHRIS VAN TULLEKEN

‘A practical path toward personal transformation… A must-read' CAL NEWPORT

'If there are two people who have changed my life...then one of them is Oliver Burkeman' PANDORA SYKES

'Oliver Burkeman has a way of giving you the most unexpected productivity advice exactly when you need it’ MARK MANSON
© Oliver Burkeman 2024 (P) Penguin Audio 2024

 Alternative & Complementary Medicine Best of 2024 Buddhism Meditation Personal Development Personal Success Philosophy Psychology Psychology & Mental Health Spirituality

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Critic reviews

Thoughtful, level-headed and useful ... a book to meditate upon
I'm sceptical about self-help - but a four-week 'mind retreat' changed me ... [Meditations for Mortals] teems with good sense, sensibly dispensed
A bracing read ... I'd bet that his audience will finish it in one sitting ... uplifting
Illuminating ... Burkeman's insight [is] always clear-eyed and jargon-free ... reassuring and constructive
Full of wise advice on not getting overburdened by work
Life-changing
Oliver Burkeman has a way of giving you the most unexpected productivity advice exactly when you need it (Mark Manson, author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck)
Full of wisdom and comfort. I enjoyed every page and read it in a single sitting. This is a really important book about embracing truth and reality (Chris van Tulleken, author of Ultra-Processed People)
A very special book. We should all read this - for the sake of our aching world as well as the state of our souls (Krista Tippett, author of Becoming Wise)
A practical path towards personal transformation. A must-read (Cal Newport, author of Slow Productivity)
All stars
Most relevant
A brilliant listen, 28 often simple yet profound ways to look at life from a different perspective. This is one for those who like to think deeply about life and living with meaning. Once you realise you're free you have to figure out what to do with that freedom, the personal development wisdom contained in this book will help.

Sorry Oliver, I didn't follow the 28-week structure, more imperfectionism. Based on his words alone, I'll risk a judgement that Oliver lives from the perspective of a defensive pessimist compared to my more realistic optimist view. However, just as with his earlier book The Antidote it really doesn't matter where you start you're almost certain to encounter these timeless ideas on any personal development journey. Somehow we've been on a similar journey despite the different departure point.

Of the meditations I found 'dailyish', 'what if it were easy' and 'scruffy hospitality' some of the most immediately useful. The deeper thinking on 'giving it a go' (because we'll never be fully ready) feeling like we belong and finding the life task made me think most deeply of all. The need for self-compassion and stopping being your own worst enemy made me smile, I've been on that journey too. It's much better on the other side. The ideas here could well trigger a few interesting reactions for those starting out on their personal growth adventure.

The meditations span so many fields of personal development from stoicism and 'the obstacle is the way' to Jack Kornfield's self-compassion along with the timeless wisdom of Alan Watts.

The only way this audiobook could have been better is if there was more of it. I hope there will be a second set of mediations.

Oliver, thanks for sharing your journey with us and admitting that you wrote this for yourself, we often teach what we seek.

A modern Alan Watts retreat in a book

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I needed this sort of talk. I try to do too much and toke live and work too seriously. So I welcome the ideas and inside of the writer. We sometimes know some of these advise intuitively but try to ignore it. Good to hear it from someone else.

Meditations for mortal

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I could listen to this book over and over as the messages and insights are so important to daily life. I would highly recommend.

Wonderful insights

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To start, Oliver Burkeman delivers his book as if you are listening to a friend in a conversation. I’m tears of content, he doesn’t claim to change your life with what you hear or even to suggest you need to do anything with the 4 weeks of meditations to ponder upon. Thankfully, there are no protocols to ‘optimise’ being alive. It’s an easy listen but with deep themes. If your brain has had enough of being battered into submission to achieve in more traditional ways, always trudging forward, meditations for mortals gives permission for us to be human and imperfect.

Refreshingly non-striving

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I’ve never listened to an audible book in one go - but well done me - I started and finished it one go 😊

Wonderful insight into life which we all really know at heart!

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