It's like Christmastime!

Ok, so how excited am I to finally get these two books I requested from the library? Very!! I asked for Sophie Kinsella's Remember Me? months ago and with about 600 requests before me, I figured I'd probably suck it up and buy it before it was ever my turn. Well yesterday, I checked my holds online and lo and behold someone in library heaven smiled down on me and said, "Here Dorkys. There are still 300-something people before you, but you can get it anyway." Hollerations to that :)

Sophie is probably my fave chick-lit writer so far. Or maybe that's because I didn't read much chick-lit until my friends in grad school said I just needed to read Confessions of a Shopaholic. After that I was totally hooked. Although Becky Bloomwood is hilariously stupid at times, you can't help but cheer her on as she tries to find some way to get those sold-out super expensive shoes she just has to have, hide the bank statements written in red ink, and try to get the collectors to give her just a little more time to pay them back. She's just an awesome character and I always speed read through all of Sophie's books (I've read every book in the Shopaholic series to date as well as The Undomestic Goddess). I bought Can You Keep a Secret? a year or so ago, and it's still collecting dust on my bookshelf - I've been so busy and all these other books keep popping into my life!

One such book is The Mastery of Love by Don Miguel Ruiz. My coworker and I have been on this whole zen/being-at-peace-with-one's self trip and she recommended this book to me. I had heard of The Four Agreements before from my therapist, but hadn't gotten around to reading it. Well after my coworker lent me her copy of Mastery, I just had to read The Four Agreements soon after, so, of course, I requested it from the library and had it sent over to my branch (man I love this system). With the previous book, I learned so much about myself and how I was treating my family, friends, my now ex-boyfriend and it made me think about why other people do the things they do. Why they feel the need to protect themselves so much and in turn hurt those around them. Ruiz wasn't preaching or putting his reader down, but just presented his toltec teaching so simply and effortlessly and that I ate it all up in a matter of days. I can't wait to read what he has to say in this one.

In fact, I'm reading The Four Agreements first (even though I've been dying to dive into Sophie's book for ages). Why? Because I'll be done with it in a matter of days, the sooner I can put these lessons into practice the better, and afterwards I can just sit back and fully enjoy Remember Me? Plus, what's better than reading about personal growth and getting rid of needless suffering and then getting into another book where the main character will probably go through all sorts of craziness in turn making everything harder than need be?