Spiritual Snacks

This guidebook on secular spirituality will appeal to both religious and nonreligious people. Basing its premises in values—and everyone has values—it offers broad avenues and private paths to achieve sustained, empowering, exalted, and expanding “Soul Celebration” experiences singular for every individual because each person’s value system is exclusively theirs alone. It also offers shorter, simpler “Spiritual Snacks” to provide instantly available, delectable bits of spiritual nourishment for spur-of-the-moment joyful experiences of being uniquely alive in today’s impersonal world. Our essential value center defines our distinctive personhood. This interior core can be activated by external stimuli into experiences of sustained secular spiritual bliss that celebrate our one-and-only inimitable personhood. How? By connecting to and uniting—becoming “One”—with three “other” here-on-earth entities that can stimulate our value center both emotionally and physically: nature, art, and romantically beloved humans. These three alone can open gateways that lead to the highest renewal of the essence—the soul—of Selfhood in a secular manner. By learning to approach the wonders of the physical universe selectively, we can experience a “merging” with chosen aspects of nature and come away with a glorious sense of having participated in eternity. A museum stroll, a novel, and music may turn into exhilarating experiences because art at its best expresses ideas that make manifest—in external, material form—the artists’ values. If they match our own, we may feel elevated to the point of experiencing the art aesthetically and spiritually. Romantic love with its sexual component is the ultimate secular spiritual experience because the most desirable and cherished human being is a living embodiment of our supreme values making this mind-body union the most sacred of all. Plus, happily, along with the three primaries, families and friends are rewarding subcategories for sharing marvelous spiritual-like experiences.

The secret to clarity (spiritual, emotional, physical, and financial) is about more than clearing out closets, drawers, and boxes of receipts. From Clutter to Clarity will help you clean house—inside and out. Questions for personal reflection or group discussion included.

Spiritual Muffins is tasty Bible Study with a difference! It is a fresh approach with a carefully developed guide for Bible Discussions called Muffin Breaks. These “spiritual muffins” can also be tasted privately by any individual. The primary strength lies in their universal appeal because of a totally ecumenical focus. The chapters, built around Moses’ faith journey, hold the reader’s attention, and the short Muffin Break discussions are ideal for the busy worker. Together they bring alive the daily faith journey. The path is well marked using a spiral model, and the simple presentation makes it user friendly for every reader.

The "spritual snacks" in this book are a result of my discovery that spiritual eating habits are similar to physical eating: (1) you read the menu, (2) you order in your own words, (3) you chew, and (4) you digest. This book is set up the same way: (1) read the scripture, (2) in other words, (3) take small bites, and (4) questions and thoughts to aid digestion (understanding). I trust that these snacks will be a springboard to your own spiritual growth, as well as those with whom you come in contact. Some of you will be looking at this book for different reasons. For whatever reason, Spiritual Snacks is in your possession. May the words on these pages bring you to a more meaningful understanding of the joy and victory that comes from a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

A lifestyle plan that integrates nutrition, exercise, and spiritual practices into the proven method of twelve-step recovery Personal trainer and sports nutritionist Tom Shanahan outlines a program of action to energize, reboot, and strengthen one’s recovery, especially those who feel they may have hit a wall in their program. Spiritual Adrenaline imparts the importance of a holistic approach to fitness, good eating habits, and connection to a personal higher power. Shanahan delivers engaging, instructive, and thoughtful meditations that provide positive coping mechanisms to help readers optimize the guiding principles of the Twelve Steps and reinforce relapse prevention.

Timeless Bible wisdom from renowned pastor and teacher Chuck Swindoll. Do you long for daily encouragement and inspiration? Do you wish your quiet times were filled with power and purpose? Discover the joy and ease of meeting with God each day in a meaningful way with this year-long devotional by the world's premiere Bible teacher. Filled with daily insights from Chuck Swindoll, Good Morning, Lord . . . Can We Talk? will give you a glimpse of the living power of God in your own life--and connect you to the restorative promises God speaks in his Scriptures.

The three self-contained works in this compilation are: No Urgency: or How We Fiddle with Eternity Complete, Not Completed Why This Ignorance? These works build on the earlier books in Volume I, and they are more challenging. They provoke--at least I hope they do--a more energetic pursuit of soul depth for the sake of spiritual depth. Like all my books, they openly rely on the spiritual technology of the Buddha. However, they can be on confrontationally read. Because they are non sectarian in the sense that they don’t require or promote a “conversion” to a religious viewpoint, they can be practically incorporated by anyone practicing a sectarian or non sectarian path. That’s the nature of this “spiritual technology”--Tibetan Buddhism doesn’t even have a word for “religion” in its lexicon! The reader is cautioned to take their time and read these books slowly, not hesitating to “stay where there’s fruit.” In fact, if one reads more than one chapter a day, that pace will miss much. As the pithy Latin expression (“non multa sed multum”) has it: “It’s not knowing many things that satisfies the soul, but knowing a few quality things deeply.”