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    How to Be Alive: A Guide to the Kind of Happiness That Helps the World
    Unavailable
    How to Be Alive: A Guide to the Kind of Happiness That Helps the World
    Unavailable
    How to Be Alive: A Guide to the Kind of Happiness That Helps the World
    Ebook498 pages8 hours

    How to Be Alive: A Guide to the Kind of Happiness That Helps the World

    By Colin Beavan

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    “This is the book where self-help turns into helping the world—and then turns back into helping yourself find a better life. Fascinating and timely!”—Bill McKibben, author of Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet

    What does it take to achieve a successful and satisfying life? Not long ago, the answer seemed as simple as following a straightforward path: college, career, house, marriage, kids, and a secure retirement. Not anymore. Staggering student loan debt, sweeping job shortages, a chronically ailing economy—plus the larger issues of global unrest, poverty, and our imperiled environment—make the search for fulfillment more challenging. And, as Colin Beavan, activist and author of No Impact Man, proclaims, more exciting.

    In this breakthrough book, Beavan extends a hand to those seeking more meaning and joy in life even as they engage in addressing our various world crises. How to Be Alive nudges the unfulfilled toward creating their own version of the Good Life—a life where feeling good and doing good intersect. He urges readers to reexamine the “standard life approaches” to pretty much everything and to experiment with life choices that are truer to their values, passions, and concerns.

    How do you stop placing limits on your potential impact? How do you make your choices really matter in everything from your clothing purchases to your career? How do you find the people who will most support you in your quest for a good life? To answer these questions and more, Beavan draws on classic literature and philosophy; surprising new scientific findings; and the uplifting personal stories of real-life “lifequesters”—people who are breaking away from those old broken paths, blazing fresh trails, and reveling in every step along the way.

    “There is a movement afoot for a better life and Colin Beavan is its prophet, with a new book as powerful as his already classic No Impact Man.”—John de Graaf, coauthor of Affluenza

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateJan 5, 2016
    ISBN9780062236722
    Author

    Colin Beavan

    Writer and social change activist Colin Beavan attracted international attention for his year-long lifestyle-redesign project and the wildly popular book, No Impact Man, and the Sundance-selected documentary film that it inspired. He has appeared on Nightline, Good Morning America, The Colbert Report, The Montel Williams Show, and NPR, and his story has been featured in news outlets from Time magazine to the New York Times. A sought-after speaker by wide-ranging audiences, he also consults with businesses on improving eco-friendly and human-centered practices. Beavan is the author of two other books, Operation Jedburgh: D-Day and America’s First Shadow War and Fingerprints: The Origins of Crime Detection and the Murder Case That Launched Forensic Science, and his writing has appeared in Esquire, the Atlantic, and the New York Times. He is the founder of the No Impact Project and a dharma teacher in the Kwan Um School of Zen. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

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    Reviews for How to Be Alive

    4/5

    23 ratings9 reviews

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    • 4/5
      A very inspiring book overall. I already recycle, use public transport, try to eat organic, etc., but Beavan's book shows how you have to try to do even more. He has lots of ideas on how to achieve that, and talks about the difference it makes in the quality of one's life (apart from helping the environment at large).

      The problem I have with this book is that some parts of it are quite vague, and Beavan sometimes tends to focus in detail on things that are already well known to people of an environmentalist bent. So the content is great, but I wish the focus were a little different.
    • 5/5
      Debates about individual v. collective action, is this a self-promotion vehicle for the author or no, aside.... this book was awesome to me because it inspired me to think about what I am doing and think about some changes I can make, as well as ways I can get involved. Also, being part of the knitting world, I agree on his answer to the individual v. collective action debate - when a few individuals start acting, they can inspire others and then it _becomes_ collective - I have seen it before.
      A must read, if only for the list of resources/great variety of ways to take action included in the back.
    • 3/5
      I had to read this book for work as I am a college instructor. So, I expected that I would have to slog through it as I normally do with the "freshman common book." I was pleasantly surprised to find Beavan to be relatable, talented, and far from pedantic. Beavan's narration is witty and funny, and, best of all, he acknowledges the extreme nature of his experiment. He's not advocating that we all adopt his temporary lifestyle. He's advocating that we all think about our choices and their effects on us and on others.

      This brings me to my favorite part of the book. Colin Beavan is clearly a believer in emotional unity, which is an incredibly important life value for me. He writes that "[t]here is no my despair or your despair. There is only our despair." When we destroy the planet, we are hurting one another, and, so, we are hurting ourselves. Even if this had been the only insight I gleaned from the book (and it wasn't), the narrative would have been completely worth reading. Beavan presents environmentalism as simultaneously self-interested and generous, which is an amazing rhetorical shift from the more common depiction of recycling, etc... as a sacrifice of time and energy. The complexity of his argument, and the effectiveness that complexity generates, is fascinating to any writer. Amazing.
    • 3/5
      This book is about simple living and social ties just as much as it's about the environment. I really appreciated Beavan's humble introspection and his Meaning of Life approach to the issue of lifestyle change. I would definitely recommend this to anyone looking to start acting on their liberal guilt about the crazy wasteful American lifestyle.

      On the other hand, I would NOT hire Colin Beavan to be my science writer, but oh well. You can't expect everything.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      I have to admire Colin Beavan for his consistent attempt to make no impact on the environment. I admire his wife, daughter, and dog even more for joining him on his urban adventure (he attempts this feat while living in a 9th-floor apartment in NYC—and his self-imposed rules prohibit the use of an elevator). Beavan is a good writer; his words and his tone truly capture the concurrent folly, heartbreak, earnestness, absurdity, and exasperation engendered by his attempt to live for one year without damaging the planet. And his reflective prose clarifies for us (without being too preachy) just how dependent we are on the alleged conveniences of modern life. I’m not sure if I could even attempt one-tenth of what Beavan does to improve the planet, but his example proves that we—and by we, I mean the human race—must do something to avert the inevitable disasters that our careless stewardship of the planet will evoke. I’m not sure, however, that I share Beavan’s optimism. I suspect that most people will have to be forced to make changes that will require them to do more to save the planet.
    • 4/5
      On a whim, my husband and I stopped at a Border’s bookstore that was closing on the north side Milwaukee. I just can’t pass up a book sale. You never know what kind of treasures you may find. This was one of the gems.Colin Beavan’s No Impact Man is a wonderful book about a man who decides to make his impact on the Earth as small as possible. His family goes along for the ride albeit a bit reluctantly. Having seen the film first, I was pretty sure I knew what to expect. I enjoyed the film and I was not disappointed with the book. Over the course of a year, Beavan and his family changed their purchasing habits and their lifestyle. They changed many aspects of their lives from going without a refrigerator to using a solar panel to power a laptop. According to Beavan, one of the most frequent (and annoying) questions he got from interested followers had to do with issue of hygiene due to the lack of toilet paper. It is interesting social commentary as to what people focus on.Unlike Sleeping Naked is Green that I previously reviewed, No Impact Man seems to be a much more dedicated and serious guide to greening one’s life. Beavan gives the reader a much better idea of hard it is to try to be ‘green’ in a society that seems to work wholeheartedly against you. (This is not to say that anyone who tries to be greener is wasting their time. Every little bit helps!)For those of us who would like to be a little bit ‘greener’, a very detailed appendix is included with websites and other resources to help on that journey. The book is even printed on 100% postconsumer recycled paper using energy created from biogas for production. Now that is putting your money where your mouth is.If you’d like a little taste of the world of No Impact Man, visit the No Impact Man blog.
    • 4/5
      A world issue written from a very experiential point of view. Like the way he weaves in "the meaning of life" into environmental issues. Highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      no particular news on the environmental front but hats off to colin beavan for the internet presence he now has and the spin-off events. i enjoyed his narrative throughout but i am a hard core on these issues. i'm signed up for the april no-impact week!
    • 4/5
      With a title this long, who needs a review?!I'll just add that I loved how this man tried to be a better person. That's all I'll say.