You’re invited. . .

Our first cyber book club was such a hit that I'm super excited for round 2.

Why Stretch? Well, in an age when we have a television show called "Tiny House, Big Living" a movie called "Downsizing," and an essay by renowned memoirist Beth Kephart entitled, "Dreams of a Tiny House," I'm intrigued with the idea of doing more with less. And the start of a new year seems like the perfect time to explore what it might mean personally, professionally, and spiritually to approach the resources in life from the point of view of "stretching," not "chasing." I don't know exactly what that means yet, but I'm looking forward to learning.

Here are the basics: 

1. We will begin reading Stretch during the second week of January 2018. 

2. We will read one chapter per week.

3. Each week, I intend there to be a different person who spearheads writing about the chapter. What I mean by spearhead is this:  Each week it will be a different person's job to write the primary post relative to the chapter. I will develop more guidelines to this, but I want our bookclub to be interactive and figured the best way to achieve that goal was for a different person to be "in charge" of writing each week about each chapter. I will take Chapter One, and we will rotate one participant per week every week thereafter until we finish. There are 9 chapters in the book. Ideally, we'll have at least 9 participants. If not, we'll figure it out. If we have too many participants (wouldn't that be a great problem to have!), I will make random selections or a reader can opt out of spearheading. (Readers may not opt out of commenting, see below.)

4. Please note: YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE A WRITER TO PARTICIPATE. This book club is intended to generate conversation among people who have shared common experiences and dare I say struggles. The intent is not to debate semantics or grammar or to comment in any way on writing ability. Comments do not need to be any particular length, although I hope each person will write enough to generate a lively community discussion and not too much that we feel like we're reading a second book. The writing is not "the thing." Conversation and connection and learning are driving my desire for this project.

5. My email newsletter gets generated every Thursday morning. Therefore, the person spearheading that week's chapter will get their written comments to me via email the day prior, on Wednesday. I will create that week's post here on the site. Once the newsletter goes out Thursday morning, the rest of the readers will then have access to the comment section under the post to share ideas, insights, and wisdom. Every reader who is not spearheading the chapter will commit to writing at least one comment on the primary post. I hope we'll choose to also respond to many.

6. To participate simply write a comment in the comment section below this post indicating that you are interested or message me directly on Facebook or email me at traceyyokas@gmail.com or use the Contact tab to reach me. I'll take you any way I can get you! I'll communicate with each of you directly before we start.

I understand this will be a commitment, and an investment of time and energy. I hope it will be worth our while. The last one was. That being said, if you don’t want to commit to participating for the duration of the project, you’ll have the option to chime in each week when I post the blogs to Facebook. In other words, you don’t have to sign up officially if you’d rather dabble. Dabbling is great, too!

I know this might sound a little confusing, but I promise it will be clearer before we begin. What's important to know right now is that I very much hope you'll join us on this journey. 

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Here's more about the book:

A groundbreaking approach to succeeding in business and life, using the science of resourcefulness.

We often think the key to success and satisfaction is to get more: more money, time, and possessions; bigger budgets, job titles, and teams; and additional resources for our professional and personal goals. It turns out we’re wrong.

Using captivating stories to illustrate research in psychology and management, Rice University professor Scott Sonenshein examines why some people and organizations succeed with so little, while others fail with so much.

People and organizations approach resources in two different ways: “chasing” and “stretching.” When chasing, we exhaust ourselves in the pursuit of more. When stretching, we embrace the resources we already have. This frees us to find creative and productive ways to solve problems, innovate, and engage our work and lives more fully.

Stretch shows why everyone—from executives to entrepreneurs, professionals to parents, athletes to artists—performs better with constraints; why seeking too many resources undermines our work and well-being; and why even those with a lot benefit from making the most out of a little.

Drawing from examples in business, education, sports, medicine, and history, Scott Sonenshein advocates a powerful framework of resourcefulness that allows anybody to work and live better.

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Click here to find the book on Amazon.

 

If you'd like to see some examples from the first book club, when we read Rising Strong, click here, here, and here.

 

To see the basic guidelines about how book club worked last time, click here. There will be more on this edition's guidelines in the near future. I look forward to hearing from you.