Bari Studio

I love to read. Always have, always will. Recently, my nerd-a-likes at Bari started a “Fitness Geek” series on our blog, rounding up our team’s favorite health and fitness reads of the week. Aside from being mildly obsessed with it (literally it makes me warm inside to know that I have a team of smart bookworms), the series inspired me to share my recent non-fitness reads with all of you.

If you know me - or even if we’ve just rubbed elbows - you probably know that I’m obsessed with setting goals. So, naturally I have monthly bookworm goals. Obviously these don’t happen like clockwork. (I’m told this is actually a good thing with goals. If you’re constantly achieving goals you set, it means you’re setting the bar too low. Or you’re just awesome.)

I shoot for four books each month - two “business/self growth” books and two fiction books. Usually I’m craving the fiction while I’m reading the non-fiction, but I honestly believe we all need to read the sometimes drier, informative books to in order to grow, learn and become the best versions of ourselves.

Also worth mentioning is that whatever I’m reading completely absorbs me. This past month my non-fiction books had a “habit” theme, and that’s all I could think about or talk about. (Doesn’t that just make you want to invite me to your next cocktail party? I could talk to everyone about forming habits!) When we go on family vacations, my sister Daniella tries to hide my books because once I start reading one I can’t put it down.

Here are this past month’s reads:

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do and How to Change It
By Charles Duhigg
This read goes by so quickly that you’re left wanting more. In a series of case studies, Duhigg exhibits habit in different scenarios and circumstances - from CEOs, to consumer product advertising, to psychotherapy patients, alcoholics, and even murderers. It gives you insight into your own habits, but more importantly teaches you that habits are malleable and in your power to construct – or destruct. Want to trick yourself into exercising every day? Yes, you actually can.

(Side note: This book actually inspired September’s inspiration of the month. You guessed it, habit. In an effort to get the whole Tribe back in the swing of things and en route to establishing healthy habits for the long haul, we’re holding a September Sweat Challenge. We’ll roll out more details in a separate post - but basically if you commit to making Bari a habit - we’ll reward you for your hard work and dedication.)

Gone Girl
By Gillian Flynn
This is my first Gillian Flynn novel, and I cannot wait to read everything she has ever written. The Chicago Tribune proclaimed that her work “draws you in and keeps you reading with the force of a pure but nasty addiction.” I would like to proclaim, “Holy shit, this book is awesome.” This thriller takes you through a marriage gone terribly, terribly wrong (very apt read for the month before I get married, I think.) Don’t ever think you’ve figured out what is going on in this book, because you haven’t. Ever. The prose is brilliant, and the plot twists keep you turning pages. If you don’t have kids and can ignore whoever is next to you in bed for a few nights in a row, grab this book.

7 Habits of Highly Effective People
By Stephen Covey
Dr. Seuss, The Little Prince, and this book: life essentials. Not exactly a “page turner,” and you will get through life if you don’t read it, but you will do everything better if you do. First published in 1990, it’s packed with such powerful lessons that it’s sold over 15 million copies. Apply the lessons to your personal life, to certain relationships, to your professional career; wherever you are, the simplicity of the habits make it easy to include them in your everyday life. And its effects are so transformatively positive, they’re worth whatever effort it takes.

Queen’s Lover
By Francine du Plessix Gray
I really have a terrible memory for historical facts. Unless Jorge makes any kind of mistake, in which case it’s engraved in every filing cabinet in my memory so it’s easily accessible at all times. But I do love history, and true stories are my favorite. The Queen’s Lover is a novel that starts around 1760 and goes into the 1810s. Written from the perspective of Marie Antoinette’s lover, Count Axel von Fersen, it extracts most of its facts from real letters written between Fersen and Marie Antoinette. They meet when she is around 16 years old, and their relationship lasts through the French Revolution to Marie Antoinette’s death. It’s a beautiful novel where fact and fiction marry gracefully, and the love story takes you through decades of amazing history.

Tell us, Tribe, what are your favorite reads of late?