
Phosphorescence
A Memoir of Finding Joy When Your World Goes Dark
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Narrated by:
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Julia Baird
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By:
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Julia Baird
About this listen
“Both timeless and timely, this is a book of wisdom and wonder.” (Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of March)
A deeply personal exploration of what can sustain us through our darkest moments.
“What has fascinated and sustained me over these last few years has been the notion that we have the ability to find, nurture, and carry our own inner, living light - a light to ward off the darkness. This is not about burning brightly; it’s about yielding a more simple phosphorescence - being luminous, having stored light for later use. Staying alive, remaining upright, even when lashed by doubt.”
After surviving a difficult heartbreak and battle with cancer, acclaimed author and columnist Julia Baird began thinking deeply about how we, as people, persevere through the most challenging circumstances. She started to wonder, when we are overwhelmed by illness, loss or pain, or a tragedy outside our control: How can we keep putting one foot in front of the other? Baird went in search of the magic that fuels the light within - our own phosphorescence. In this stunning book, she reflects on the things that lit her way through the darkness, especially the surprising strength found in connecting with nature and not just experiencing awe and wonder about the world around her, but deliberately hunting it, daily.
Baird also writes about crossbeams of resilience: nurturing friendships and a quiet faith, pursuing silence, fighting for what she believes in, the importance of feeling small, learning from her mother's example of stoic grace. She also explores how others nurture their inner light, interviewing the founder of the modern forest therapy movement in Tokyo, a jellyfish scientist in Tasmania, and a tattooed priest from Colorado, among others.
Weaving together candid and moving memoir with deep research and reflections on nature and the world around her, Baird inspires listeners to embrace new habits and to adopt a phosphorescent outlook on life, to illuminate ourselves and our days - even in the darkest times.
©2021 Julia Baird (P)2021 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
“Julia Baird is an alchemist, turning the dross of her life’s harshest blows into shimmering prose. Ravaged by a broken heart and debilitating cancer, she undertakes a careful examination of what might yet sustain her. Both timeless and timely, this is a book of wisdom and wonder.” (Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of March and Caleb’s Crossing)
“Julia Baird’s glorious and gorgeous memoir glows with wisdom and glitters with merriment. This beautiful book is a light in the darkness.” (Sy Montgomery, author of How to Be a Good Creature)
“This book is a love letter to the world by a brilliant writer who nearly left it. Julia Baird has gone into the depths of human experience - her own, and others’ - and come back with this luminous and profound celebration of people and the planet. Phosphorescence is a treasure to read and re-read your whole life.” (Anna Funder, author of All That I Am and Stasiland)
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- Escaping the Past and Embracing the Possible
- By: Dr. Edith Eva Eger
- Narrated by: Tovah Feldshuh
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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A powerful, moving memoir - and a practical guide to healing - written by Dr. Edith Eva Eger, an eminent psychologist whose own experiences as a Holocaust survivor help her treat patients and allow them to escape the prisons of their own minds. The Choice weaves Eger's personal story with case studies from her work as a psychologist. Her patients and their stories illustrate different phases of healing and show how people can choose to escape the prisons they construct in their minds and find freedom, regardless of circumstance.
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One Of The Most Powerful Books I Have Read in My Lifetime!
- By R. F. Wood on 05-11-18
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Papyrus
- The Invention of Books in the Ancient World
- By: Irene Vallejo, Charlotte Whittle - translator
- Narrated by: Sophie Roberts
- Length: 17 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Long before books were mass-produced, hand-copied scrolls made from Nile River reeds were the treasures of the ancient world. Emperors and pharaohs, determined to possess them, dispatched emissaries to the edges of the known world to bring them back. Exploring the deep and fascinating history of the written word, from the oral tradition to scrolls to codices, internationally bestselling author Irene Vallejo shows that books have always been a precious and precarious vehicle for civilization.
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Great read
- By Hunter Pechin on 12-15-22
By: Irene Vallejo, and others
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Do Hard Things
- Why We Get Resilience Wrong and the Surprising Science of Real Toughness
- By: Steve Magness
- Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
- Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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From beloved performance expert, executive coach, and coauthor of Peak Performance Steve Magness comes a radical rethinking of how we perceive toughness and what it means to achieve our high ambitions in the face of hard things.
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Starts alright, but ends up going nowhere
- By Joseph G. Chernowski on 08-11-22
By: Steve Magness
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Slow Productivity
- The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout
- By: Cal Newport
- Narrated by: Cal Newport
- Length: 6 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Our current definition of “productivity” is broken. It pushes us to treat busyness as a proxy for useful effort, leading to impossibly lengthy task lists and ceaseless meetings. We’re overwhelmed by all we have to do and on the edge of burnout, left to decide between giving into soul-sapping hustle culture or rejecting ambition altogether. But are these really our only choices?
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Cal Needs Narration Training
- By T. S. Tatum on 04-25-24
By: Cal Newport
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Parting the Waters
- America in the King Years 1954-63
- By: Taylor Branch
- Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi, Janina Edwards
- Length: 45 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Hailed as the most masterful story ever told of the American civil rights movement, Parting the Waters is destined to endure for generations. Moving from the fiery political baptism of Martin Luther King, Jr., to the corridors of Camelot where the Kennedy brothers weighed demands for justice against the deceptions of J. Edgar Hoover, here is a vivid tapestry of America, torn and finally transformed by a revolutionary struggle unequaled since the Civil War.
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Excellent
- By Judith Princz on 05-15-19
By: Taylor Branch
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The Tiger
- A True Story of Vengeance and Survival
- By: John Vaillant
- Narrated by: John Vaillant
- Length: 12 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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It’s December 1997, and a man-eating tiger is on the prowl outside a remote village in Russia’s Far East. The tiger isn’t just killing people, it’s annihilating them, and a team of men and their dogs must hunt it on foot through the forest in the brutal cold. As the trackers sift through the gruesome remains of the victims, they discover that these attacks aren’t random: The tiger is apparently engaged in a vendetta. Injured, starving, and extremely dangerous, the tiger must be found before it strikes again.
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Thy Fearful Symmetry
- By Mel on 02-16-13
By: John Vaillant
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Wisdom of Leo Tolstoy
- By: Leo Tolstoy
- Narrated by: Mark Turetsky
- Length: 4 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Leo Tolstoy was born to an aristocratic Russian family, became a world-famous influential novelist, and then chose to lead the simple life of a peasant. Dating from this last part of his life, Tolstoy’s influential book What I Believe takes readers along on the path to a life modeled literally on Jesus Christ’s "Sermon on the Mount" and the teachings of the Gospels. In revealing and frank essays he reimagines a faith without dogma, centered solely on Jesus’ doctrine of love, humility, and self-denial.
By: Leo Tolstoy
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It Can't Happen Here
- By: Sinclair Lewis
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 14 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Doremus Jessup, a newspaper editor, is dismayed to find that many of the people he knows support presidential candidate Berzelius Windrip. The suspiciously fascist Windrip is offering to save the nation from sex, crime, welfare cheats, and a liberal press. But after Windrip wins the election, dissent soon becomes dangerous for Jessup. Windrip forcibly gains control of Congress and the Supreme Court and, with the aid of his personal paramilitary storm troopers, turns the United States into a totalitarian state.
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The Rise of American Authoritarianism
- By David S. Mathew on 11-21-16
By: Sinclair Lewis
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The Notebook
- A History of Thinking on Paper
- By: Roland Allen
- Narrated by: Mark Elstob
- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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We see notebooks everywhere we go. But where did these indispensable implements come from? How did they revolutionize our lives? And how can using a notebook help change the way you think? In this wide-ranging history, Roland Allen reveals how the notebook became our most dependable and versatile tool for creative thinking.
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A fascinating look at an often overlooked powerful tool.
- By Andrew Darlow on 12-28-24
By: Roland Allen
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Of Boys and Men
- Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do About It
- By: Richard V. Reeves
- Narrated by: Richard V. Reeves
- Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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The father of three sons, a journalist, and a Brookings Institution scholar, Richard V. Reeves has spent twenty-five years worrying about boys both at home and work. His new book, Of Boys and Men, tackles the complex and urgent crisis of boyhood and manhood. Reeves looks at the structural challenges that face boys and men and offers fresh and innovative solutions that turn the page on the corrosive narrative that plagues this issue. Of Boys and Men argues that helping the other half of society does not mean giving up on the ideal of gender equality.
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Regretful of My Knee-jerk Reaction To This Title 😔
- By Hazel Winters on 10-13-22
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The Way of the Champion
- Pain, Persistence, and the Path Forward
- By: Paul Rabil, Bill Belichick
- Narrated by: Paul Rabil, David Cohen
- Length: 5 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Long before Paul Rabil had become the most acclaimed lacrosse player of all time, the sport’s first million-dollar man, and started his own professional league, he knew he wanted greatness. The problem was he lacked a manual. So, he went out and created one. He asked Bill Belichick how to prepare, Steph Curry how to practice, and Sue Bird how do be resilient in the face of adversity. The Way of The Champion is the synthesis of everything Rabil learned on his path to becoming the greatest lacrosse player of all time.
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Totally enjoyable
- By Lauren on 10-01-24
By: Paul Rabil, and others
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The Small and the Mighty
- Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed the Course of History, from the Founding to the Civil Rights Movement
- By: Sharon McMahon
- Narrated by: Sharon McMahon
- Length: 10 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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In The Small and the Mighty, Sharon McMahon proves that the most remarkable Americans are often ordinary people who didn’t make it into the textbooks. Not the presidents, but the telephone operators. Not the aristocrats, but the schoolteachers. Through meticulous research, she discovers history’s unsung characters and brings their rich, riveting stories to light for the first time.
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Conflicted
- By Sarah Over on 12-06-24
By: Sharon McMahon
What listeners say about Phosphorescence
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- S. Colfax
- 12-11-24
Not for me
I daily experience the rewards of engaging with nature. And yet not interested in listening to someone detail why experiencing nature is essential to wellbeing. I suppose this didn’t hold my attention because I didn’t believe I had anything to learn from it. But that’s me.
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- Raes2travel
- 03-16-25
Women, we need this.
Julia writes with a keen eye, a juicy heart and I fell in love with her listening deeply to the easy stream of her words.
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Overall
- Gaelyn K. Chappel
- 09-24-21
beautiful in it's simplicity
I loved this book/audio. Julie shows the simple yet important things in life with such delight.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 09-02-21
Not what I was expecting
Based on the book description, I expected a more personal and vulnerable account of her dark times and how she got through it. However most of the book was about research or accounts of others. It was still somewhat interesting and she writes beautifully but I have read enough research based books on similiar themes.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Deb
- 10-23-21
Enchanting
Don’t miss this one. It’s….shiny. Listening to this as I went to bed every night this week, again upon waking, there was no place else I wanted to be, than here, with her.
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6 people found this helpful
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- Renee Nicole
- 04-27-22
Starts strong but doesn’t meet the mark
I wanted to like this, but unfortunately it wasn't my cup of tea. It started strong, and Baird did attempt to "theme" her memoir, the phenomenon of Phosphorescence, but it did not follow through the book, seeming nodded to more than embedded.
I felt the book told more than it showed, and I wanted a greater depth of feeling and insertion into the author's life than I received here. It seemed more surface level and a bit chaotic in organization.
There were moments of light and brightness, relatability and wisdom, but not enough, on the whole, for me to be able to recommend it to others.
I'd skip this particular one, in favor of Braving the Wilderness by Brene Brown, Wintering by Katherine May, or, if you enjoy the more religious vein that Baird dives in and out of, Prayers in the Night by Tish Harrison Warren. Both provide a more grounded, real approach to these topics.
However, I must still applaud Ms. Baird for daring to tell her story-- all of our stories are unique, and telling them and sharing them is a brave act of solidarity. I will leave this book without much but this-- a new intrigue with the beauty of the Bay she loves so much.
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2 people found this helpful
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- paperbarkgraybird
- 04-04-24
the title is nice
It seems a sweet idea and has good intentions. However: long lists of quotes from other books, scientists and popular people makes this more akin to a high school senior project than a book. I did like it at first but honestly can't be bothered finishing.
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