Brain food: books we love
Earlier this week, I shared my affinity for the influence and insights of Seth Godin.
Doing this got me thinking about so many other thought leaders who have helped me develop my own perspective on our world, our environmental circumstances, our consumption habits, and the need to embrace a more heart-centered, humanity-centered, and reuse-centered approach to our lives and activities.
While the first several years of getting this business started while parenting a toddler gave me very little time for reading, I’ve been working hard to play catch-up (and put some substance behind my beliefs about reuse — i.e. valuing what we have — as a crucial component for turning the tide on our current consumptive culture and the damage we’re collectively causing.)
In this spirit, I’m sharing my reading list — stuff I’ve read, and want to read, and would love to have more people digest as we figure out how to solve the problems that are bigger than any one of us…this list is part environmental context, part design theory, part sociology, and part business (someday, it’ll probably also be part fiction — but for now, I remain primarily focused on problem solving). I’ll add more as I find them (in fact, there are more just waiting on my ‘real’ bookshelf waiting to be added).
And while it goes without saying, I strongly recommend avoiding the purchase of new books when reuse options are available. Libraries are obviously a time-honored tradition — but if you find the idea of reading on a timetable stressful or want to avoid making multiple trips for a single book — and still want to read specific books on demand, I recommend selecting the ‘used’ criteria before performing an online search for future book purchases.
Powell’s Books and Better World Books are two great resources for searching specifically for used books (in fact, Better World Books will even point you toward used copies available via other resellers if they don’t have what you seek).
Locally, Magers & Quinn also has an online searchable inventory with the option to limit searches by (new vs. used) condition. And yes, you can specify/search by condition on Amazon, too.
I’d also love to learn more from you guys. What are you reading? Why is it important/helpful/useful?
-julie