princess leia once upon a time Audiobooks

Many soon-to-be graduates are worried about their future. They stress about whether they’ll find a job, if it will be fulfilling, whether they will earn enough to pay off their student loans, and whether they will fail and disappoint their families. Young people need to learn many things that colleges don’t teach, including how to behave professionally, how to collaborate, how to be life-long learners, and how to be resourceful, resilient, and ethical. This book will teach students the things they need to succeed in the real world, such as how to organize a job search, how to ace job interviews, how to manage time effectively, how to manage and reduce stress, how to be an effective leader, how to run a meeting well, how to survive a bad performance review, how to become a powerful speaker, how to network, and many other skills that are the keys to success and fulfillment. New topics in this 2nd edition include the habits of successful people; eliminating bad habits; dealing with criticism; email etiquette; making a good first impression; the importance of gratitude; how to listen; job hunting mistakes; managing conflict; how to overcome obstacles; the importance of professionalism, punctuality, and thank you letters; creating a powerful online presence; how to crowdfund; necessary life skills; and sample cover letters.

Welcome to my story. This book is a mere collection of nightmares, without any pretensions but to let you enter the intricate folds of my mind. I think everyone has experienced nightmares in their life, whether asleep or awake; I can well say I am an impressive expert on sleeping terrors. Close-eyed nightmares are my personal curse: I have been having them since I was a child, and I could never explain the reason why. My childhood was always related to the fear that something catastrophic was about to happen, either to me or to the people I loved. I usually felt something akin to a cold breath on my neck that made my hair stand on end; that icy, slimy hand touching your back which makes you startle, aghast. Oftentimes my vision went completely dark, so that I had to go and lie down on my bed in order to feel more at ease; yet, even entering my bedroom I dreaded what would happen when I finally closed my eyes. Things did not improve at all in my teen years: every time, soon after a dream I woke up in a sweat, shivering. After such nights I obviously had to face life again like everyone else, though still doubtful about my future; but it was whenever I had personal choices to make, that the nightmares worsened. At those times my life easily became hell; I closed myself off entirely and always wondered what I had achieved so far and what I wanted next from my life. Over time I have come to write my dreams down in order to understand them, alongside my wishes, to see if they come true. This has helped me shed some light more than once. But back to nightmares. I then thought to myself that I would tell you all about my terrors, embellishing each one and including them in a collection of every spine-chilling thrill I have ever experienced. I apologise for this chilly gift on my part, but my mind likewise is as cold and messy a place. It is the mind of a woman, of a fighter who openly faced evil, and chose to talk about it. Though my words could sometimes wound the more susceptible souls, I do not mean to claim the moral high ground over any of you. Everyone has their own worldview; we feel and shape everything around us accordingly. And after all the ordeals I have endured through life, I now strive to use my inner eye in order to create a more fruitful vision of the future. I would like to see a future full of dreams, studies, travels: dreams are basically wishes our hearts make. As to nightmares, though... Close-eyed nightmares have always been my speciality, and there are several reasons behind this phenomenon, but the main one is probably that I am a tolerant person, yet emotional and sensitive; over the course of my life I have in fact experienced both thorns in my side and many a rainy day. But I have always sought light to illustrate this part of me, so I will tell you of my favourite poem: Mother to Son, by Langston Hughes.

Born in 1960, Olivier Aymar has a PhD in history, specialising in the history of the Kurds and Zazas. In this book, he presents eight traditional folk tales of kindness, goodness, courage, compassion and other such qualities. Eight short initiatory stories in which the various characters outdo themselves, revealing their courage and bravery and acting like true heroes of ancient mythical days.

"The perfect combination of sweet, sexy, and make-you-grin moments." - Lyssa Kay Adams, author of The Bromance Book Club "An ode to everything we love about rom-coms." - Alexis Daria, author of You Had Me at Hola In her trade paperback debut, Melonie Johnson brings her signature humor, sexy romance, and strong female friendships in this hilarious romantic comedy about finding perfectly imperfect love, Too Good to Be Real . She plans to prove there's a dozen reasons why life isn't like a romantic comedy, only to discover the one reason it is… While her friends wish for meet cutes worthy of their favorite rom-coms, Julia is ready to give up on love. Swiping right has replaced getting swept off your feet and good old-fashioned romance has become, well, old-fashioned. A writer for a popular website, love becomes the last thing on her mind when impending layoffs threaten her job. As Julia searches for the ultimate pitch to impress her boss, she stumbles upon a resort offering guests a chance to live out their romantic comedy dreams. Real life dating is so bleak, who wouldn't want to spend a week in a fantasy rom-com world with your best friends? At the resort, Julia literally falls into a not-quite-meet-cute involving an aggressive seagull and an adorably awkward guy named Luke who is also participating in the rom-com experience. Julia hides the fact she is there to do a story, but Luke harbors a few secrets of his own. Among further encounters with thieving seagulls, a gaggle of corgis, kisses in the rain, and even a karaoke serenade, their feelings deepen quickly. But could their love be real when they haven't been honest about their true identities? Once the fantasy is over, can they have a relationship in the real world?

Summer fiction at its page-turning best for fans of Elin Hilderbrand, Holly Chamberlin, and Nancy Thayer! Colleen French, acclaimed author of The Summer I Found Myself , brings readers to Albany Beach, Delaware, where one woman must decide whether to seek out the daughter she gave up for adoption. Each year, the start of summer brings bustle and much-needed tourist dollars to the little town of Albany Beach, Delaware. For Natalie Sullivan, this season is proving more stressful than others. It’s make-or-break time for the Irish pub her husband, Conor, recently bought with his brothers. Their two children are thriving, but she’s experiencing pangs of loss at the end of her childbearing years. When sixteen-year-old McKenzie starts gushing about Bella, the new coworker at her summer job, Natalie suddenly finds her past and present in conflict. Bella, two years older than McKenzie, looks so similar that a customer remarks that they could be sisters. And when Natalie learns that Bella was adopted, she is propelled back into a heartbreaking decision. As a college student, Natalie became pregnant and put her baby up for adoption. Now, the more McKenzie talks about Bella, the more Natalie wonders: could Bella be her daughter? Conor insists it’s a mistake to pursue the matter. Natalie’s child belongs to another family now; that was the agreement in the closed adoption. Still, Natalie can’t resist spending time with Bella. As their bond deepens, McKenzie accuses her mother of caring more for a stranger than for her, and Natalie begins imagining what it would be like to have Bella as a second daughter. What will the impact be if Bella really is her biological child? And if she isn’t, can Natalie embrace the joy and potential in her own family, without always wondering about what could have been?

Ayahuasca is a powerful tool for transformation, that more and more Westerners are flocking to drink in a quest for greater self-knowledge, healing and reconnection with the natural world. This formerly esoteric, little-known brew is now a growth industry. But why? Ayahuasca is a psychoactive tea that has a long history of ritual use among indigenous groups of the Upper Amazon. Made from the ayahuasca vine and the leaves of a shrub, ayahuasca is associated with healing in collective ceremonies and in more intimate contexts, generally under the direction of specialist – an ayahuasquero . These are experienced practitioners who guide the ceremony and the ‘drinkers’ experience. Ayahuasca has gained significant popularity these days in cities around the world. Ceremonies happen nightly and Hollywood stars, Wall Street players and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs now drink the brew. Why? What effect might ayahuasca be having on our culture? Could it be the LSD of our time? Does the brew, which seems to inspire environmental action, simplified lifestyles and more communitarian behaviour, act as an antidote to frenzied consumerist culture? In When Plants Dream , Pinchbeck and Rokhlin explore the economic, social, political, cultural and environmental impact that ayahuasca is having on society. Part 1 covers the background; what ayahuasca is, where it is found, and its cultural origins. Part 2 explores the role and practices of the ayahuasquero in both Amazonian and Western cultures. Part 3 examines the medicinal plants of the Amazon, looking particularly at the ingredients in ayahuasca and their therapeutic qualities, covering the most up-to-date biomedical research, psychedelic science and psychopharmacology. Part 4 looks more closely at how ayahuasca is perceived and used today, covering law, the drug wars, media and money. Lastly in Part 5 Pinchbeck and Rokhlin question the future of ayahuasca. When Plants Dream is the first book of its kind to look at the science and expanding culture of ayahuasca, from its historical use to its appropriation by the West and the impact it is having on cultures beyond the Amazon.

Autumn Willow is a grad student at MIT. In her spare time, she co-pilots her grandfather’s B-17, a restored WWII bomber. Sasha Brezhnev is a pilot for the Russian Air Force flying the SU-57 fighter jet. She’s assigned seek-and-destroy missions over the Safandel Desert in central Anddor Shallau, where terrorists are covertly working to destroy the country’s democratic government. Rigger Entime is an engineer working on a CIA project to develop a tiny drone aircraft to be used in surveillance and possibly carry out assassinations of terrorist leaders.

Personality is the Key to Professional Success Personal relationships are key to success: In a time when workplaces are becoming more digital and more automated every day, our mindsets and our personal relationships will determine whether we succeed in tomorrow’s markets. We all have one shot to make a lasting impact. Innovators with the changemaker mindset know how to see that opportunity when it comes and make it matter. The human success factor: In the coming years, the human success factor will determine who is among the winners and who is among the losers. All business adventures start with a focus on the self. When you know who you are and develop a deep sense of confidence in yourself, you’ll have the flexibility to roll with the punches. Change comes from within: Whether your goal is to lead a self-determined life, position your company for the future, or be a successful part of a team, external change starts with internal transformation. With The Changemaker Mindset , you’ll master the three Ps of personal development: Purpose. Reconsider what motivates you and find your non-negotiable core principles. People. Build a strong inner circle of peers, because nobody wins alone. Persistence. Develop the confidence to take action, navigate setbacks, and implement change. Readers who liked The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey, Leading Change by John Kotter, and The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail by Clayton Christensen will love this new approach to effective business management from personal development.

Earth is overpopulated. Human beings are now too many. Years of technological progress across the board have decreed their almost exponential increase decade after decade. Any attempt made to curb growth has been in vain. Expansion into space has not delivered the desired results. Earth is exhausted and humanity on the verge of a near extinction. Thousands of hypotheses are made, thousands of solutions examined, thousands of researches are conducted and subsidized. Nothing is left out. Everything is examined. Even the most abstruse ideas and most imaginative conjectures are studied thoroughly. So, in this mess of ideas, in this swamp of thoughts the solution arises. The solution is as simple as absurd and yet apparently possible: shrinking the whole of humanity. An unknown path that once undertaken cannot be reversed but, although everyone keeps saying yes, are we sure that all the dangers have been taken into consideration?

This thrilling, unpredictable, yet sometimes hilarious quest, takes you from the fashionable London restaurant scene to the wild untamed jungles of the Cardamom Mountains, where an English baker and a Cambodian refugee search for a missing family and try to find a mythical plant, source of an incredible and unique spice.<br><br>Ben Bakewell is the Master Pâtissier at one of London’s most prestigious restaurants. Better known as Cake, he befriends Ravuth, a refugee from the killing fields of Cambodia who fled to England in the 1970’s as the Khmer Rouge ravished his country. As a youngster, Ravuth stumbled across an unknown plant, the source of an incredible and unique spice. Separated from his family by the Khmer Rouge, and having spent the majority of his life trying to trace them, Ravuth returns to Cambodia with Cake to seek the rare plant and find his missing loved ones. Arriving in Cambodia, they team up with a disgraced ex-DEA agent bent on revenge and needs to find the plant for purposes that are far more sinister. They furrow into the deepest parts of the untamed, unforgiving, Cardamom jungle where they barely come out alive. Will they find Ravuth’s family and the amazing Spice