NOTE: This newsletter might be cut short by your email program. View it in full.   If a friend forwarded it to you and you'd like your very own newsletter, subscribe here — it's free.   Need to modify your subscription? You can change your email address or unsubscribe. Hello Blog! This is the annual recap of The Marginalian by Maria Popova. The weekly newsletter remains on its regular pulse-beat and will be with you at the usual time. If you missed them, here are my favorite books of the year. And if my labor of love enriched your life in any way this year — its 18th year — please consider supporting its endurance with a donation. If you already donate: I appreciate you more than you know. Birds, Loves, and Obscure Sorrows: The Best of The Marginalian 2024 Hindsight is how we connect the dots that figure our lives. To look back on even a single year is to see clearly the contour of who we are in its points of attention and priority. "How we spend our days," Annie Dillard wrote, "is how we spend our lives." How we spend our minds is our primary purchase on our days. In the annual hindsight ritual of distilling the "best" of The Marginalian, here is a Venn diagram of the most read pieces and those I most loved writing, which never perfectly coincide — a lovely reminder that we read the same way we love: with ideas about what is best as different as the minds that carry them. * * * An Almanac of Birds: Divinations for Uncertain Days Read it here. * * * 18 Life-Learnings from 18 Years of The Marginalian Read it here. * * * Love Anyway Read it here. * * * The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows: Uncommonly Lovely Invented Words for What We Feel but Cannot Name Read it here. * * * But We Had Music Read it here. * * * Thank You, Everything: An Illustrated Love Letter to the World Read it here. * * * The Universe in Verse Book Read it here. * * * Polyvagal Theory and the Neurobiology of Connection: The Science of Rupture, Repair, and Reciprocity Read it here. * * * A Parliament of Owls and a Murder of Crows: How Groups of Birds Got Their Names, with Wondrous Vintage Illustrations by Brian Wildsmith Read it here. * * * Hermann Hesse on Discovering the Soul Beneath the Self and the Key to Finding Peace Read it here. * * * The Great Blue Heron, Signs vs. Omens, and Our Search for Meaning Read it here. * * * A Lighthouse for Dark Times Read it here. * * * Thich Nhat Hanh on True Love and the Five Rivers of Self-Knowledge Read it here. * * * The Pleasure of Being Left Alone Read it here. * * * Leonard Cohen on the Antidote to Anger and the Meaning of Resistance Read it here. * * * Winnicott on the Qualities of a Healthy Mind and a Healthy Relationship Read it here. * * * Kafka's Creative Block and the Four Psychological Hindrances That Keep the Talented from Manifesting Their Talent Read it here. * * * How to Live a Miraculous Life: Brian Doyle on Love, Humility, and the Quiet Grace of the Possible Read it here. * * * Albert Camus on How to Live Whole in a Broken World Read it here. * * * Let the Last Thing Be Song Read it here. * * * A Spell Against Stagnation: John O'Donohue on Beginnings Read it here. Forward to a friend/Read Online/ donating=loving Every month, I spend hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars keeping The Marginalian going. For eighteen years, it has remained free and ad-free and alive thanks to patronage from readers. I have no staff, no interns, not even an assistant — a thoroughly one-woman labor of love that is also my life and my livelihood. If this labor makes your own life more livable in any way, please consider aiding its sustenance with a one-time or loyal donation. Your support makes all the difference. monthly donation You can become a Sustaining Patron with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a Brooklyn lunch.   one-time donation Or you can become a Spontaneous Supporter with a one-time donation in any amount. Partial to Bitcoin? You can beam some bit-love my way: 197usDS6AsL9wDKxtGM6xaWjmR5ejgqem7 Need to cancel an existing donation? (It's okay — life changes course. I treasure your kindness and appreciate your support for as long as it lasted.) You can do so on this page. You're receiving this email because you subscribed on TheMarginalian.org (formerly BrainPickings.org). This weekly newsletter comes out on Sunday mornings and synthesizes what I publish on the site throughout the week. The Marginalian NOT RECEIVING MAIL 47 Bergen Street, 3rd Floor Brooklyn, NY 11201 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list   update subscription preferences