There are several books that one can keep returning to for motivation, reassurance, perspective and the always-needed reality check.
A healthy lifestyle is much more than a workout routine or a diet. These books address it all -- attitude, humor, philosophy, culture, environment. We are what we choose to be, simple enough. That is not to say that we cannot use the occasional carrot at the end of the stick or perhaps a whip hanging over our heads.
Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart by Gordon Livingston, MD is subtitled "Thirty True Things You Need to Know Now." This author's wisdom is well-earned, from the sadness as well as the joys of life. The author is a psychiatrist and shares his observations and lessons from a lifetime of listening, helping and living. It offers a good perspective from which to begin your overview, and a very readable format.
Another de-fusing-the-hype book is Kat James' The Truth About Beauty Transform Your Looks and Your Life From the Inside Out. Directed to women, it has a great deal for any person interested in combining the best resources and natural approaches to self-transformation. It connects all the dots between factors affecting our appearance, our minds and bodies and environments. The author challenges many long-standing edicts about beauty and health. It is truly about vitality. The beauty she discusses is the real thing!
Jorge Cruise's 8 Minutes in the Morning is another realistic and doable routine-oriented book. An experienced fitness coach, Cruise includes resources and charts to facilitate your individual progress and commitment to personal changes. You will, indeed, move with this book! The practical and measured daily effort is one that most people can manage. It is unisex-oriented and upbeat.
Following along with the more physical subjects, SuperFoods HealthStyle by Steven G. Pratt, MD and Kathy Matthews is an up-to-date and futuristic book of strategies to improve lifelong health. It is both proactive and preventative, as well as scientific and earthy. This book makes you feel like you can make a difference in your entire family's health and well-being, specifically telling you how to do just that.
Last, but not least, the descriptions of current self-help books would not be complete without A Perfect Mess by Eric Abrahamson and David H. Freeman. Their creative analysis of the chaotic tendencies which we all have (not the physics Chaos Theory, which actually has some order to it) is somehow reassuring and motivating. We can celebrate who we are, our human mess, and still be productive, creative and happy. This is contrary to all of our conditioning and the current social mores, but perhaps it's a slower path back to the natural, the simpler and older ways of evolving as healthy, normal people.
