Best Spiritual Books of All Time to Read While Travelling

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintainance By Robert M. Pirsig

Deep and complicated. Zen and and the art of motorcycle takes a lot of focus to read. However, love this book! It contains a lot of great messages and will leave you with a lot to think about. The author interlaces stories from a motorcycle trip with his sons and friends. Not only will this book give you a lot to think about, but it will leave you with a much higher knowledge with this brilliant readable philosophy novel.

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Walden By Henry David Thoreau

Originally published in 1854, Walden; or, Life in the Woods, is a vivid account of the time that Henry D. Thoreau lived alone in a secluded cabin at Walden Pond. It is one of the most influential and compelling books in American literature. This new paperback edition-introduced by noted American writer John Updike-celebrates the 150th anniversary of this classic work. Much of Walden’s material is derived from Thoreau’s journals and contains such engaging pieces as “Reading” and “The Pond in the Winter” Other famous sections involve Thoreau’s visits with a Canadian woodcutter and with an Irish family, a trip to Concord, and a description of his bean field. This is the complete and authoritative text of Walden-as close to Thoreau’s original intention as all available evidence allows. For the student and for the general reader, this is the ideal presentation of Thoreau’s great document of social criticism and dissent.

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What Makes You Not a Buddhist by Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse

On many of your travels you are sure to hear about people who have conforted to buddihism in Bali or India or wherever their spiritual retreat was. They will be wearing hippy pants and have a om tatoo on their wrist and you wonder if there is something to all this or if it is just another fad. That is where this book comes into play…

Moving away from conventional presentations of Buddhist teachings, Khyentse challenges readers to make sure they know what they’re talking about before they claim to be Buddhist. With wit and irony, Khyentse urges readers to move beyond the superficial trappings of Buddhism beyond a romance with beads, incense, and exotic people in robes straight to the heart of what the Buddha taught.

In essence, this book explains what a Buddhist really is, namely, someone who deeply understands the truth of impermanence and how our emotions can trap us in cycles of suffering. Khyentse presents the fundamental tenets of Buddhism in simple language, using examples we can all relate to

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The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon Novel – Richard Zimler

Just a few years earlier Jews living in Portugal were dragged to the baptismal font and forced to convert to Christianity Many of these New Christians persevered in their Jewish prayers and rituals in secret and at great risk the hidden arcane practices of the kabbalists a mystical sect of Jews continued as well One such secret Jew was Berekiah Zarco an intelligent young manuscript illuminator Inflamed by love and revenge he searches in the crucible of the raging pogrom for the killer of his beloved uncle Abraham a renowned kabbalist and manuscript illuminator discovered murdered in a hidden synagogue along with a young girl in dishabille Risking his life in streets seething with mayhem Berekiah tracks down answers among Christians New Christians Jews and the fellow kabbalists of his uncle whose secret language and codes by turns light and obscure the way to the truth he seeks A marvelous story a challenging mystery and a telling tale of the evils of intolerance The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon both compels and entertains

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The Journey of Ibn Fattouma

Fattouma, a young unmarried man, upset with the death of his father and re-marriage of his mother, sets out by camel caravan to explore new lands. Each land has a different religion and living conditions, ranging from great wealth to abject poverty, but the people in each country think they are the happiest of people.

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The Andean Codex

This book is for those heading to Peru or interested in the least in the Andean culture and mysteries.

For more than thirty years Dr. J. E. Williams has risked his health and personal safety to journey among shamans in Peru, the place he calls the mystical and spiritual center of our times. In its rain forests, mountains, and environmentally attuned indigenous population, Peru’s mystical landscape fosters inner discovery.

The Andean Codex guides the reader step by step through journeys to Andean sacred places like Machu Picchu, Cuzco, and Moray, and in the process uncovers the esoteric meaning of these ruins. Williams recounts his initiation with Peruvian shamans, including shamanic ceremonies he performed at Machu Picchu and his experiences using the mind-expanding, heart-opening ayahuasca and the sacred coca plant.

Throughout these encounters, Williams weaves in practical advice that brings the wisdom of Andean shamans to life. His unforgettable account of their prayers, practices, and ceremonies offers a rare opportunity to see the world through the eyes of a shaman and experience the Andean sacred way.

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The Pilgrimage

The Pilgrimage recounts the spectacular trials of Paulo Coelho and his mysterious mentor, Petrus, as they journey across Spain in search of a miraculous sword.

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The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches By Matsuo Basho

In later life Basho turned to Zen Buddhism, and the travel sketched in this volume relfect his attempts to cast off earthly attachments and reach out to spiritual fulfillment. The sketches are written in the “haibun” style–a linking of verse and prose. The title piece, in particular, reveals Basho striving to discover a vision of eternity in the transient world around him and his personal evocation of the mysteries of the universe.

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The Art of Travel By Alain De Botton

Any Baedeker will tell us where we ought to travel, but only Alain de Botton will tell us how and why. With the same intelligence and insouciant charm he brought to How Proust Can Save Your Life, de Botton considers the pleasures of anticipation; the allure of the exotic, and the value of noticing everything from a seascape in Barbados to the takeoffs at Heathrow.

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The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

An absoluete classic in the travel-sphere. No hostel book shelve should be without this classic. Having been promised a treasure in his dream, the shepard boy gives up everything to find this treasure and goes on a journey. This classic travel treasure by Paulo Coelho was written when he was doing the Camino and transforming his mind himself, so it is no wonder that this novel speaks to every traveller alive.

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The Haves and the Have Nots: A Brief and Idiosyncratic History of Global Inequality by Branko Milanovic

Travelling will tear you apart and break you down and one of the toughest realities to face is the inequalities of the world! Be it the racism and coruption behind money and power in the western world or the cast system in India or tribal mentalities in Afirca. It may be the racism or sexisim you face and it will haunt you and you will never be able to explain it or come to terms with this unjust and unfair world we live in.

This book by Branko Milanovic dives deep into this topic. Inequality is a surprisingly slippery issue. It involves not just straightforward comparisons of individuals, but also comparisons of price and consumption differences around the world – and over time. In The Haves and the Have-Nots, Branko Milanovic, the lead economist at the World Bank’s research division, approaches the issue in a new and innovative way; through stories. Milanovic reveals just how rich Elizabeth Bennet’s suitor Mr. Darcy really was; how wealthy ancient Romans compare to today’s super-rich (for example, Nero vs. Paris Hilton); who the richest people are today; how we should think about Marxism in a modern world; and how location factors into wealth. This bold and entertaining book teaches us not only how to think about inequality, but also why it matters and – most importantly – what we can do about it.

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Kafka on the shore, by Haruki Murakami

If you are heading to Japan I cannot recommend this fabulous and creative novel any stronger!

Kafka on the Shore, a tour de force of metaphysical reality, is powered by two remarkable characters: a teenage boy, Kafka Tamura, who runs away from home either to escape a gruesome oedipal prophecy or to search for his long-missing mother and sister; and an aging simpleton called Nakata, who never recovered from a wartime affliction and now is drawn toward Kafka for reasons that, like the most basic activities of daily life, he cannot fathom. Their odyssey, as mysterious to them as it is to us, is enriched throughout by vivid accomplices and mesmerizing events. Cats and people carry on conversations, a ghostlike pimp employs a Hegel-quoting prostitute, a forest harbors soldiers apparently unaged since World War II, and rainstorms of fish (and worse) fall from the sky. There is a brutal murder, with the identity of both victim and perpetrator a riddle—yet this, along with everything else, is eventually answered, just as the entwined destinies of Kafka and Nakata are gradually revealed, with one escaping his fate entirely and the other given a fresh start on his own

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Stranger in a Strange Land

Valentine Michael Smith is a human being raised on Mars, newly returned to Earth. Among his people for the first time, he struggles to understand the social mores and prejudices of human nature that are so alien to him, while teaching them his own fundamental beliefs in grokking, watersharing, and love.

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Nomad: A spirituality for travelling light

‘The deeper I grow in my own faith as a Christian, the greater my desire to explore. My faith whets my appetite for discovering what God is doing in and through the world each and every day. This book is a chronicle of some of the most important lessons I have learned thus far. I write to encourage my fellow nomads who, like me, so often feel alone in their wanderings yet are a part of a much larger caravan of fellow wanderers seeking to discover for ourselves the meaning and mysteries of life.’

Part-autobiography, part-Christian spirituality, Nomad offers penetrating insight into the minds of the new generations of progressive evangelical followers of Jesus in the global Church. Themes include: community, war, redemption, wonder, grace, sexuality and the Eucharist. Nomad was originally commissioned and written for Destiny Image but the publisher cancelled the contract because Brandan refused to say that he did ‘not condone, encourage or accept the homosexual lifestyle’. DLT is proud to offer Brandan’s book for all readers wishing to hear and understand his powerfully-written, graceful, whole-life spirituality.

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