Two years ago (yikes! already?) I wrote a blog post in praise of Tara Schuster’s Buy Yourself the F*cking Lilies. (In case you missed it, click here to read that blog post.)

This week’s blog post is in praise of Ms. Schuster’s second book, Glow in the F*cking Dark: Simple Practices to Heal Your Soul from Someone Who Learned the Hard Way. 

Once again, I found so many statements that caused me to pause my reading. Sometimes I re-read those statements. Other times, I sat and thought about what I had read and thought about how that applied to my life or why that statement resonated with me. 

This week, I’m sharing some of those statements with you:

“We are stars. I mean that quite literally. Most of the elements that make up our bodies came from the Big Bang, from the very things that make up stars. I think you’ve probably heard that before and it isn’t a fable, it’s true. Isn’t that just about the most enchanting thing to think about? That you are made of stars?”

“I know you have the power to glow because you already do. The human body is bioluminescent. It glows on its own. Ultrasensitive cameras can photograph our natural radiance. So, you glow already, whether you like it or not. Now is the time to clear off the dirt, the cobwebs, and the ghosts that are obscuring the shine within you and set that glow free.”

This book, Ms. Shuster writes, is “… for anyone who is tired, hurting, and feeling like their shine is gone.”

This statement is listed as one of Ms. Schuster’s life truths:  “When we try to fight reality, we lose. The more we reject how we actually feel, and the real circumstances of our lives, the more pain we put ourselves in. I’ve come to realize that the distance between how things are and how I want them to be is the exact measure of my suffering.” 

“My life is boring and predictable and because of that it’s easier to be creative and content. BEING BORING IS AMAZING! I spend almost no time thinking about how I will structure the ‘free’ blocks in my day because the rituals I have created have taken the heavy lifting out of the mundane.” 

“One of my favorite quotes in the whole wide world comes from the author Annie Dillard — she wrote, ‘How we spend out days is, of course, how we spend our lives.’ Spend your days living what you care about and feel yourself light up with life. Your life.” 

And since I find it way too easy to find fault with my body (how it looks, how it does and doesn’t function), I loved this: “… now I see my body for what it is — a living, breathing, moving sculpture, one of a kind and priceless, worthy of my absolute care and adoration.”
“What about body gratitude? What about the fact that if you have a body, even if it comes with complications and pain, you can ultimately be glad to be on earth?”

“I think this fear of making ‘bad’ choices is why we very often end up on our ‘Good Enough Plateaus,’ where it’s safe and comfy and there’s a Starbucks around the corner and we know exactly what we can get.”
“… but we get into real trouble when we start believing that’s it, when we stop expanding, growing, and shoving off on new adventures. Then we deprive ourselves of the opportunity not only to mature and taste a richer life but also to deepen our experience by knowing what it means to come up short.”

“… if you truly appreciate the unbelievably precious gift of your being, you will do everything to live it to its very fullest. That’s how we show gratitude for our existence, damn it!”  

My dear readers, have any of you read Ms. Schuster’s book(s)? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Please note: I am including a link to buy the book that I’m highlighting this week. If you use my link, I do make a small commission on your purchase at no additional cost to you. I am working with Bookshop.org which also sends a portion of the profit to support local, independent bookstores.