Oliver Burkeman

Join us to celebrate the paperback release of New York Times bestselling author Oliver Burkeman’s new title, Meditations for Mortals: Four Weeks to Embrace Your Limitations and Make Time for What Counts. Described as being “full of wisdom and comfort,” Meditations for Mortals offers a map for a liberating journey toward a more meaningful life: a journey that begins where we actually find ourselves, not with a fantasy of where we’d like to be.

Addressing the fundamental questions about how to live, Meditations for Mortals offers a powerful new way to take action on what counts: a guiding philosophy of life that Oliver Burkeman calls “imperfectionism.” It helps us tackle challenges as they crop up in our daily lives: our finite time, the lure of distraction, the impossibility of doing anything perfectly. How can we embrace our nonnegotiable limitations? Or make good decisions when there’s always too much to do? How do we shed the illusion that life will really begin as soon as we can “get on top of everything”?

Reflecting on quotations drawn from philosophy, religion, literature, psychology, and self-help, Burkeman explores a combination of practical tools and daily shifts in perspective. The result is a life-enhancing and surprising challenge to much familiar advice—and a profound yet entertaining crash course in living more fully.

To be listened to either as a four-week “retreat of the mind” or devoured in one or two sittings, Meditations for Mortals will be a source of solace and inspiration, and an aid to a saner, freer, and more enchantment-filled life. In anxiety-inducing times, it is rich in truths we have never needed more.

About the Author

Oliver Burkeman worked for many years at The Guardian, where he wrote a popular weekly column on psychology, “This Column Will Change Your Life.” His books include the New York Times bestseller Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals and The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking.

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Host or Publisher Kepler's Literary Foundation