This past week, ACE’s Marketing Book Club read and discussed the book Making Good: Finding Meaning, Money, and Community in a Changing World. Co-written by Oakland’s own activist, Billy Parish and Dev Aujla, founder of DreamNow, this a do-gooders self help book. (Side note in case you’re actively tracking whether or not I’m reading The Hunger Games: reading this book took priority. Sorry!).

First, a little bit about the authors. Billy Parish is a Yale dropout and cofounder of the Energy Action Coalition, which is the largest youth advocacy organization in the world. Along with founding DreamNow, Dev Aujla works with leading do-good companies.

The way Marketing Book Club works is that we all read a book that relates to nonprofit work. We then go out to lunch (yummy!) and talk about the book and which parts especially resonated with us. Making Good allowed us a chance to reflect more on our own personal journey. Read on for my personal take-aways. I hope you find something you can identify with and can apply to your own life!

1. Recognize your choices. Ask yourself questions: what are my options? How will this choice effect myself and those around me? Think about how the choices will effect the future, not the past. Have you ever had to make a really tough choice?

2. Grab the opportunity to be a leader. See a place where you can step up in your school, home or community? Grab that chance. Whether it be stepping up to lead  your Action Team or organizing a school waste audit, you have it in you to be a leader. Have you ever stepped in to a be a leader?

3. Identify what’s holding you back and say it out loud. While it can be hard admitting to yourself what’s holding you back, it’s the first step is acknowledging it. Maybe you’re scared of rejection, so you haven’t run for Student Government even though you know you’ll make a great leader. Once you’ve identified why you’re scared, you can start taking small steps to get over this fear. It could be as easy as sharing your fears with your parents or best friend and working together to use that fear to fuel the fire.

4. Develop a personal mission and repeat to yourself everyday. The more you tell yourself something, the more you’ll believe it. Develop your very own personal mantra and remind yourself of it. Whether it’s something simple like “you can do it” or something more  complex, it’s totally for you. Mine’s “You are where you should be.” What’s yours?

5. Do what you love. I’ve made it a goal to do something that I love every single day. What do you love to do?

Have you read Making Good? Post your comments and thoughts below, we’d love to hear what you think!