I’ve benefitted a lot from Seth Godin’s insights, especially when it comes to culture, change, and creativity. So I decided to go on a mini-rally of reading a trio of his books. I appreciate how a lot of his ideas around influencing culture and building a movement can apply just as readily to activism as it does to business as it does to art.
THE PRACTICE
BY SETH GODIN
Of these three, The Practice probably stood out to me most. I loved one of the questions it made me think about: “If we failed, would it be worth the journey?”
One of the key ideas there is that our industrial world is literally engineered towards outputs and productivity. But that orientation is easily soul-numbing, and leads us towards making choices that are bad for our souls, communities, and planet in the long term. Most of this book is about meaningfully engaging the process, not listening to the voices that make you want to hold back your big ideas, and doing the work.
That effectively built off of two key ideas found in some of Seth’s earlier books:
THIS IS MARKETING
BY SETH GODIN
Culture is the declaration that “people like us do things like this.” Creating change revolves around telling stories that resonate with the smallest viable number of people your message resonates with in order to make your effort worth it. (This Is Marketing)
TRIBES
BY SETH GODIN
Leaders create movements by creating a culture and creating communication around a shared goal. (Tribes)
