September is the New January: Books to Inspire and Accelerate Your "New" Year
Maybe it’s because I have spent the better part of my life in or around school, but my mind just visualizes September as the start of the calendar year. And after months and months of staying inside and working from home, I’m feeling the need for a “re-set” even more than ever!
If you feel the same, here are 10 books – some new releases and some classics - to inspire and accelerate you in this “new” year!
With three children at home and three hit television shows, it was easy for Shonda to say she was simply too busy. But in truth, she was also afraid. And then, over Thanksgiving dinner, her sister muttered something that was both a wake up and a call to arms: You never say yes to anything. Shonda knew she had to embrace the challenge: for one year, she would say YES to everything that scared her.
This poignant, intimate, and hilarious memoir explores Shonda’s life before her Year of Yes—from her nerdy, book-loving childhood to her devotion to creating television characters who reflected the world she saw around her. The book chronicles her life after her Year of Yes had begun—when Shonda forced herself out of the house and onto the stage; when she learned to explore, empower, applaud, and love her truest self. Yes.
If you’re having trouble connecting with those around you, know that you’re not the only one. Adult friendships are tricky!!! Part manifesto, part guide, The Art of Showing Up is soul medicine for our modern, tech-mediated age. Rachel Wilkerson Miller charts a course to kinder, more thoughtful, and more fulfilling relationships—and, crucially, she reminds us that “you can’t show up for others if you aren’t showing up for yourself first.”
With her popular website Career Contessa, Lauren McGoodwin built an audience of ambitious, professional, millennial women who thought they did everything right―they got the degree, the internship, and even the promotion―but still wondered why they felt stuck and unfulfilled. The first site of its kind to focus on the unique, complex aspects of women's careers, Career Contessa offers women the smart advice they deserve, in a voice that resonates.
Drawing on the insights and lessons developed from Career Contessa, Power Moves is the essential handbook that helps professional women truly feel understood so they can bypass perfection and planning and head straight to evolving.
Power Moves is filled with the information, guidance, advice, and essential tools, (including helpful graphics) that can help women take decisive, bold steps without self-doubt and fear, Power Moves shows women how to build a successful career on their own terms.
Once the poster girl for doing it all, after she had her first child, Tiffany Dufu struggled to accomplish everything she thought she needed to in order to succeed. Like so many driven and talented women who have been brought up to believe that to have it all, they must do it all, Dufu began to feel that achieving her career and personal goals was an impossibility. Eventually, she discovered the solution: letting go. In Drop the Ball, Dufu recounts how she learned to reevaluate expectations, shrink her to-do list, and meaningfully engage the assistance of others―freeing the space she needed to flourish at work and to develop deeper, more meaningful relationships at home.
Even though women are half the workforce, they still represent only eighteen per cent of the highest level leaders. The reasons are obvious: just as women reach middle management they are also starting families. Mounting responsibilities at work and home leave them with no bandwidth to do what will most lead to their success. Offering new perspective on why the women’s leadership movement has stalled, and packed with actionable advice, Tiffany Dufu’s Drop the Ball urges women to embrace imperfection, to expect less of themselves and more from others―only then can they focus on what they truly care about, devote the necessary energy to achieving their real goals, and create the type of rich, rewarding life we all desire.
Does talking about your accomplishments feel scary or icky because you're worried people will think you're "obnoxious"?
Does it feel more natural to "put your head down and do the work"?
Are you tired of watching the loudest people in your industry get disproportionate praise and rewards?
If you answered "yes" to any of the above, you might be self-sabotaging. You need to learn to Brag Better. Meredith Fineman has built a career working with "The Qualified Quiet": smart people who struggle to talk about themselves and thus go underestimated or unrecognized. Now, she shares the surefire and anxiety-proof strategies that have helped her clients effectively communicate their achievements and skillsets to others.
Bragging Better doesn't require false bravado, talking over people, or pretending to be more qualified than you are. Instead, Fineman advocates finding quiet confidence in your opinions, abilities, and background, and then turning up the volume.
If you're ready to begin Bragging Better--to telling the truth about your accomplishments with grace and confidence--this book is for you.
Emma Isaacs forgot to draw up her life plan. She doesn’t have a list of five-year goals, and she doesn’t believe in work-life balance. Yet somehow she’s managed to found a multimillion-dollar global organization, become a highly sought-after speaker and media commentator, and be recognized as a prominent voice in women’s leadership―all while raising six young children.
So how does she do it all? She dives in headfirst and wings it.
Women are notorious over-preparers and underestimators when it comes to their own readiness to try something new. But as Emma teaches, what most often holds us back are our own fears, excuses, and doubts. With her revolutionary manifesto, Winging It, Emma has written a rallying cry for all women to “do the things that scare you, build your wealth, make an impact, fail lots, and get up and try again.”
Through hilarious stories, targeted prompts, and timeless advice, Emma will inspire you to get clear on what really matters and go after your dreams, one messy step at a time. Get ready to stop hiding behind the safe option or the perfect plan―and start winging it.
How do you do great work while sitting near the same spot where you watch Netflix? How can you be responsive without losing the focus necessary for getting things done? How can you maintain and grow your network when you spend less time face to face?
The key is to detach yourself from old ways of working and adopt new habits to match your new environment. Long before public health concerns pushed many of us indoors, some of the most successful people fueled their careers with carefully perfected work-from-home routines. Drawing on those profiles and her own insights, productivity expert and mother of five Laura Vanderkam reveals how to turn "being cooped up" into the ultimate career advantage.
Whether you're an introvert or an extrovert, a self-starter or someone who prefers detailed directions, you can do your clearest thinking and deepest work at home--and have more energy left over to achieve personal goals or fuel bigger professional ambitions. In fact, soon you might find it hard to imagine working any other way.
Ever find yourself stuck at the office-or even just glued to the couch-when you really want to get out (for once), get to the gym (at last), and get started on that "someday" project you're always putting off? It's time to get your sh*t together.
In The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F*ck, "anti-guru" Sarah Knight introduced readers to the joys of mental decluttering. This book takes you one step further--organizing the f*cks you want and need to give and cutting through the bullsh*t cycle of self-sabotage to get happy and stay that way.
Are you where you want to be professionally? Whether you want to advance faster at your present company, change jobs, or make the jump to a new field entirely, Reinventing You provides a step-by-step guide to help you assess your unique strengths, develop a compelling personal brand, and ensure that others recognize the powerful contribution you can make. Branding expert Dorie Clark mixes personal stories with engaging interviews and examples from Mark Zuckerberg, Al Gore, Tim Ferriss, Seth Godin, and others to show you how to think big about your professional goals, take control of your career, and finally live the life you want.
The author of the blockbuster New York Times best sellers The Happiness Project and Happier at Home tackles the critical question: How do we change?
Gretchen Rubin's answer: through habits. Habits are the invisible architecture of everyday life. It takes work to make a habit, but once that habit is set, we can harness the energy of habits to build happier, stronger, more productive lives.
So if habits are a key to change, then what we really need to know is: How do we change our habits?
Better Than Before answers that question. It presents a practical, concrete framework to allow listeners to understand their habits - and to change them for good. Infused with Rubin's compelling voice, rigorous research, and easy humor, and packed with vivid stories of lives transformed, Better Than Before explains the (sometimes counterintuitive) core principles of habit formation.
Looking for books and gifts for you and the badass women in your life? Visit our Badass Women’s Book Club Online Store! I do earn a small commission from sales made from this site (and the links above!) – so thank you in advance for your support!