Pull up to 2026 with a new book, or something in your headphones. Recommendations from our community.

Dear Rosies,

Maybe now, as the holiday peak settles, there’s a little space to drop in—with some reading, learning, or listening, or just plain fun. We asked people what they loved this year, and here are some to consider tucking into your media pack. Send us your favorites back, we love to share beautiful work.

Sending you wishes for an inspired midwinter.

Love,

Christine

Reading

True Human: Reimagining Ourselves at the End of Our World by Samantha Sweetwater is written for those of us who feel that “normal” is dissolving and suspect that our personal healing and our collective future are inseparable. She braids deep ecology, indigenous wisdom, somatics, and psychedelics into a kind of map for becoming more whole in a time of collapse. You can hear a preview in our podcast from earlier this month.

If you are in a season of pilgrimage — inner or outer — Mystic Nomad: A Woman’s Wild Journey to True Connection by Annette Knopp is a luminous 2025 memoir. A longtime meditation teacher, she traces her path across continents, relationships, and trauma, showing how a life can become a continuous practice of listening and returning. It’s been described as “raw and revelatory… a must-read for anyone on the path of awakening.” 

What We Owe the Future Thank you to Michelle Berry Koert for this nomination, saying it was her most influential book of the year. William MacAskill makes the case for “longtermism”:  that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time. “The fate of the world is in our hands. Humanity’s written history spans only five thousand years. Our yet-unwritten future could last for millions more — or it could end tomorrow. Astonishing numbers of people could lead lives of great happiness or unimaginable suffering, or never live at all, depending on what we choose to do today.” 

For the science-and-spirit geeks, Pure Human: The Hidden Truth of Our Divinity, Power, and Destiny by Gregg Braden is a good bridge. Out January 28, 2025, it blends emerging biology and physics with ancient wisdom to argue that we carry extraordinary capacities for intuition, resilience, and deep empathy that no AI can replace.

Many of us in the Rosebud community are walking through perimenopause, menopause and beyond.  2025 brought several new works to this threshold:

• The Nine Lives of Woman, Christine Marie Mason, our founder’s opus tracing sensual, sexual and reproductive lives through all of these cycles and more. The award winning book contextualizes a woman’s journey with science, story and inquiry.

• Dare I Say It: Everything I Wish I’d Known About Menopause by Naomi Watts is funny, frank, and celebrity-sparkly, weaving her own stories with physicians’ perspectives and up-to-date research. It aims to de-stigmatize the whole transition and bring the conversation out of the shadows.

• From Red Moon to Dark Moon: The Spiritual Journey of Menopause by Miranda Gray speaks in the language of archetype. She describes menopause not as decline, but as a sacred metamorphosis — a deep beginning in which new psychic and spiritual gifts emerge.

If you prefer gorgeous prose and story, consider Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood A woman nearing the end of her life reflects on exhaustion, ecological grief, and the desire for home, using the quiet presence of apocalypse as a lens for meditations on forgiveness, regret, and how to live and die with minimal harm. We’re in good company here, as this was a Top 10 book of 2025 on many channels.

And for the seasonally attuned: Wisdom of the Earth, Wisdom of the Body: A Seasonal Guide to Chinese Medicine and Yoga for Balance and Vitality  by Jennifer Raye weaves Chinese medicine, Ayurveda, and embodied practice into a year-round guide. It’s a reminder that our bodies are not separate from the elements and cycles of the Earth, and offers specific practices for harmonizing with each season.

Music

Morning Queen Energy and all the other affirmation songs on the Shift to Abundance album (Thank you Galit for the nomination).

For those who love long, immersive sound journeys, East Forest’s Lovingly: A Soundtrack For The Psychedelic Practitioner, vol. III  arrived in February 2025. It’s more than six hours of live, improvised music recorded inside ceremonies between 2020 and 2024 — an ambient, gentle, non-linear score for inner work. 

If you prefer your music drenched in brass and choir, Max Ribner’s Resilient Beings (with the track “Thank You for This Day”) offers a communal, prayerful sound. It feels like a big exhale with other humans.

And then there is Drenched in Place: A Compilation Album for Hurricane Helene Relief, curated by Rising Appalachia and released in early 2025. Thirty-nine tracks from Western North Carolina artists, all proceeds going to Appalachian relief and ecological restoration. You’re not just gifting songs — you’re contributing to rebuilding after climate disaster. 

And even an App

Here’s an offering from within our extended circle that lands more on the playful and magical side: Yasmeen’s Vastu Feng Shui App for crystals and objects. A Vastu Feng-Shui gives you highly personalized guidance from your horoscope (natal birth chart). Discover auspicious directions and practical remedies for questions about Love, Happiness, Abundance, Work, Well-being, and Life Purpose. A  light, intuitive way to play with placement, intention, and energetic hygiene in your home and life.