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Making Good: Finding Meaning, Money, and Community in a Changing World
What Color Is Your Parachute for the Facebook generation.
As we emerge from the recession, a generation is searching for practical ways to succeed financially while also making positive changes in the world. From energy to food to education, Making Good outlines how to do this. These opportunities are not just for entrepreneurs and Fortune 500 companies: Making Good outlines step by step how anyone can achieve financial autonomy, capitalize on global changes to infrastructure, and learn from everyday success stories—providing the skills and insight this generation needs to succeed.
Charismatic, young, and passionate, Dev Aujla and Billy Parish have been recognized in media outlets such as The Globe and Mail, Vanity Fair, and Rolling Stone as voices of their generation. They are at the vanguard of figuring out how the next generation will rethink, reimagine, and rebuild the world. Making Good culls the knowledge and practical advice that has allowed Aujla and Parish to build thriving, meaningful careers.
304 pages, Paperback
First published February 28, 2012
23 people are currently reading
466 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
October 8, 2012
Making good had some interesting activities to try, and I liked their chapters on using design thinking and community organizing to create social change. They focus on the questions, "How will I make money? What does doing good mean to me? How do I want to spend my time?" Sometimes it felt a little too much like "self help" for my taste.
1. Reflect on important question
2. Adapt to a changing world
3. Connect deeply with the right people
4. Design work that's smarter
5. Launch soon, expect some failure
6. Organize power from the bottom
1. Reflect on important question
2. Adapt to a changing world
3. Connect deeply with the right people
4. Design work that's smarter
5. Launch soon, expect some failure
6. Organize power from the bottom
August 25, 2020
Although it’s marginally useful to get a sense of what leaders from the heart of liberal social change and woo-woo thoughts and prayers land are thinking, it’s also just maddening to see what gets a rubber stamp for analysis and advice on how to do movement building.
“Banding together with fellow Rebuilders working in banks, on farms, in tech start-ups, and everywhere in between, the movement is transforming the global economy from the bottom up and ensuring that opportunities for good work are the easiest and most accessible for all.
“Banding together with fellow Rebuilders working in banks, on farms, in tech start-ups, and everywhere in between, the movement is transforming the global economy from the bottom up and ensuring that opportunities for good work are the easiest and most accessible for all.
May 21, 2012
This book is fantastic. Totally encouraging for the growing numbers of do-gooders and people wanting to work to benefit more than just themselves, trying to figure out how to do that in the real working world.
The stories of what other people are doing and the introspective exercises are energizing. The overall sense of encouragement the book gives—that you're not alone and you can do it—is probably the most valuable part. It's hard feeling like you need to be a good, positive influence on the world around you instead of just resigning to do things like everyone else and only look out for yourself. You feel in your soul that it's right and necessary and more people need to think that way, but it's easy to feel alone or that you might just be wrong. This book is really good support, just like encouragement from friends, family and groups of like-minded people, to let you know you're onto something, you're fine and you can keep going.
Thanks Dev and Billy for a great book and so many more reassuring voices.
The stories of what other people are doing and the introspective exercises are energizing. The overall sense of encouragement the book gives—that you're not alone and you can do it—is probably the most valuable part. It's hard feeling like you need to be a good, positive influence on the world around you instead of just resigning to do things like everyone else and only look out for yourself. You feel in your soul that it's right and necessary and more people need to think that way, but it's easy to feel alone or that you might just be wrong. This book is really good support, just like encouragement from friends, family and groups of like-minded people, to let you know you're onto something, you're fine and you can keep going.
Thanks Dev and Billy for a great book and so many more reassuring voices.
February 28, 2012
This book is fantastic for all those who want to make change and make a living. No matter where you are on that journey -- even if you've been making good for years -- this book has practical tools, inspiring examples, and really tangible suggestions for how to make good.
May 29, 2012
It offers inspirational advice and gives you the guts to jump off the deep-end and try a new venture. It read really quickly, so I think I need a second time to absorb. Not sure how the six steps really mesh together.
March 6, 2012
Many young people coming of age today face a confounding puzzle with pieces that, at first glance, do not seem all that easy to fit together for a picture of a clear and hopeful future. On the one hand, we belong to “the most progressive generation in American history” and exhibit record levels of commitment to positive social change. Yet, on the other hand, we are the generation currently experiencing the highest unemployment rate in America. Even among those who do have jobs, many are making less than did those who were our age thirty years ago (25-34 year old men today make 10% less today than did those of that age group in 1980). Meanwhile, to pursue our dreams, we have had to accrue obscene levels of debt - especially of the educational and predatory credit card varieties - because costs of living have outpaced inflation (average college tuition, for instance, has more than tripled since 1980). A particularly confounding part of this puzzle lies in the fact that work that advances the social good is frequently pursued and accomplished through sectors - non-profit, public, or social-enterprise - that are often even less stable and lower-paying than their traditional private counterpart (which itself is not all that secure at the moment). Given all of this, many of us wonder: how can we pursue and achieve our deeply held pro-social goals while still attaining some semblance of personal economic security?
Making this puzzle seem more solvable is what motivated Billy Parish and Dev Aujla to co-author their incredibly timely, illuminating, and useful book, Making Good: Finding Meaning, Money, and Community in a Changing World (February 28th 2012, Rodale). Now if you are dubious about the title, let me say up front that initially, I found the emphasis the book places on “making money and changing the world” to be not only a bit backwards, but possibly willfully optimistic. After all, how many people create real, positive change in the world from the primary starting point of wanting to make money? And conventional wisdom would have it that, in an economy like this, having your cake and eating it too - or doing good while making good – is even more of an illusory dream now than it was before the recession hit. So if you read the title and fear that buying it will leave you with little but well-worn platitudes and that the only ones “making good” will be its authors, I understand your skepticism. But how so thankfully wrong you would be.
First off, the authors are deeply credible messengers who intimately know the topics about which they write - especially that of having a commitment to doing good. I was a colleague of Billy’s in the youth climate movement over four years, much of that time co-chairing the Energy Action Coalition while Billy was the coordinator of the coalition. We collaborated in developing the Campus Climate Challenge campaign and in designing the first Powershift conference in 2007, among other efforts. From those experiences and more, I know Billy to be an incredibly committed, authentic, and motivated individual. He takes risks and makes leaps when others are stuck doing more research or complaining. He is passionate and serious about life and work in the best of ways. Most of all, he knows how to bring people together in ways that increase their power to create real change and he has been a leader who has delivered impressive results in nearly every effort he has ever been involved in. While I do not know Dev as personally, his professional convictions and achievements are consistent with Billy’s.
Notwithstanding the authors’ successes, they refreshingly explore the timely (and timeless) questions they pose - What is the right path for me? How can I find or create it? - from within their own minds and hearts rather than from above as detached “experts,” as other authors might do. By this, we come to understand their own struggles and vulnerability and thus their deep sincerity. As readers then, we also come to open up and trust them to help guide us on our own personal journey of reflection and envisioning. This deep contrast between Making Good and its authors versus many other either unqualified or insincere guides out there - you’ve seen them in bookstores and on TV - who instead signpost the way forward for you and your career with hackneyed, naïve, or outdated advice, is hugely welcome and reassuring.
To qualify my praise a bit, let me say before getting too far along that Making Good does have moments where the default style of the self-help genre (i.e. simplistic) that their book is positioned in versus the authors’ more complex and nuanced experience and beliefs, are forced into, if not tension, a delicate balance. At one point the authors seem to come close to elevating the goal of making money too highly (“We want to make money, to have the things that our televisions promise will deliver happiness with a money-back guarantee, but we don’t want to sell out. We want to feel resilient through recessions and upswings, we want financial security in the face of record personal debt, to consume and indulge according to our moods in a time when we are reaching peak levels of resource availability”) but it is shortly followed by a section on simplifying your life in ways that remind me of the wise Quaker saying, “A simple life freely chosen is a source of strength.”
There are also a few instances that remind us this is a trade book and its authors are not overly concerned with academic convention (when, for instance, they write, “overall, global demand for culture is stronger than ever. Aesthetics, stories, music, reflection, imagination that brilliantly transforms the facts of our reality—our desire for these things has never been greater”, they present this generalization without any sources and, later when they write, “Study after study shows that preventive care is the most cost-efficient kind of health intervention,” they do not cite even one of those studies), but these instances too are relatively few and far between and, on the whole, the book is exhaustively researched and well sourced.
Lastly, it should be said that the book seems less aimed at an entire generation – as its promotional language claims - and more at a self-selecting group of self-starters and high achievers within what their publisher calls the “Facebook generation.” But that is only natural and the authors themselves don’t really claim otherwise.
All of that said, these are all minimal issues and little more than unimportant distractions from the main focus and immense value of this book. Making Good manages to combine lofty inspiration with hard-nosed motivation for a powerful outcome. On the one hand, the book is infused with an infectious can-do, no-excuses, let’s go attitude with uplifting lines such as,
“The world needs your best self. You need your best self right now. Let’s get started.”
And
“Sketches around the world are waiting in the margins of notebooks, ready for their star moment.”
Out of context, those lines may ring a bit hollow. But, on the other hand, within the frameworks the authors provide, their words develop real content and meaning. Specifically, on the macro level, their chapter outline follows six well-organized steps (Reflect, Adapt, Connect, Design, Launch, Organize) and on the more micro level they identify and dig into the “four major paths Rebuilders are taking: Entrepreneur, Job Seeker, Intrapreneur, and Freelancer”. Taken as a whole, this results in perhaps the greatest gift the book offers: assisting in a powerful mental shift away from thinking about one’s path in the context of “what’s available” (picking from a set list of options) to “what do I want to do and how can I make that happen” (potentially making something new) and then providing effective next steps towards doing just that. Their overall approach of not only seeing opportunity in crisis, but of offering very helpful ideas, practices, and resources to pursue those opportunities helps you feel not only more awake and alive but also empowered and ready to move forward with tangible actions.
The book’s positive inspirational tone is also, thankfully, balanced not only by some deep wisdom (one example: “Inner knowing is about a smaller, more quiet voice than just your initial gut reactions. Often, we bury our true understanding in rationalizations, secondary points of view, the pros and cons, and over-analysis. We actually know the answers to the questions we struggle with. All too often, we either fail to consult our inner understanding or we disregard it because we feel like we don’t have a choice”) and some flashes of humor (I particularly like the story that ends with Billy being told by a doctor to wash his hair), but also by some real straight talk. To give a taste, the authors write:
“But first, a caution. This book is not a quick fix. Today there is a cultural promise that is echoed everywhere: Anything is possible if you believe (or if you buy). The promise comes packaged in trendy books or aspirational shows on TV. It’s the American dream refreshed for today’s audience. But there are cracks in this cultural promise. Real change— for your life and for the world—doesn’t happen in the form of a 20-minute episode (or in the 10 minutes of commercials on most cable shows). A generation swept up into a movement built on Hope ran headlong into the overwhelming complexity of making Change. How can we build a clean-tech company that competes with Big Oil’s billions in annual subsidies by “just doing it”? How can you start a business while trying to manage $60,000 or $100,000 in student loans?”
And
“For every inspiring story we could tell you about someone overcoming oppression and a lack of opportunity, there are 10 stories of people who didn’t make it through, couldn’t launch the project they dreamed up.”
To give you a better chance of ending up on the desirable side of that statistic, the authors take a comprehensive approach that is, in the end, what makes this book so unique and valuable. Specifically, Making Good seamlessly weaves together 1) raw, honest, heartfelt storytelling from the authors own lives; 2) inspiring and eclectic stories of those they term “Rebuilders”, who are also finding innovative ways to do good and make money; 3) practical and very helpful exercises for finding your own way in that direction (developed throughout the career of the amazing leadership coach Robert Gass, and included in the book with his permission); and 4) incredibly well-researched and diverse lists of resources to engage in this process beyond the book.
I read Making Good soon after finishing another book that deals with similar topics– Parker Palmer’s Let Your Life Speak – and found each to be even more useful when read in combination with the other. Palmer’s book reads in a more personal/ deeply philosophical and spiritual way while Making Good is more diverse, comprehensive, and practical. Together, they offer a powerful and dynamic combination of books for reflecting on your life as it is and as you want it to be - and for beginning to identify the missing pieces that can piece that puzzle together.
Making this puzzle seem more solvable is what motivated Billy Parish and Dev Aujla to co-author their incredibly timely, illuminating, and useful book, Making Good: Finding Meaning, Money, and Community in a Changing World (February 28th 2012, Rodale). Now if you are dubious about the title, let me say up front that initially, I found the emphasis the book places on “making money and changing the world” to be not only a bit backwards, but possibly willfully optimistic. After all, how many people create real, positive change in the world from the primary starting point of wanting to make money? And conventional wisdom would have it that, in an economy like this, having your cake and eating it too - or doing good while making good – is even more of an illusory dream now than it was before the recession hit. So if you read the title and fear that buying it will leave you with little but well-worn platitudes and that the only ones “making good” will be its authors, I understand your skepticism. But how so thankfully wrong you would be.
First off, the authors are deeply credible messengers who intimately know the topics about which they write - especially that of having a commitment to doing good. I was a colleague of Billy’s in the youth climate movement over four years, much of that time co-chairing the Energy Action Coalition while Billy was the coordinator of the coalition. We collaborated in developing the Campus Climate Challenge campaign and in designing the first Powershift conference in 2007, among other efforts. From those experiences and more, I know Billy to be an incredibly committed, authentic, and motivated individual. He takes risks and makes leaps when others are stuck doing more research or complaining. He is passionate and serious about life and work in the best of ways. Most of all, he knows how to bring people together in ways that increase their power to create real change and he has been a leader who has delivered impressive results in nearly every effort he has ever been involved in. While I do not know Dev as personally, his professional convictions and achievements are consistent with Billy’s.
Notwithstanding the authors’ successes, they refreshingly explore the timely (and timeless) questions they pose - What is the right path for me? How can I find or create it? - from within their own minds and hearts rather than from above as detached “experts,” as other authors might do. By this, we come to understand their own struggles and vulnerability and thus their deep sincerity. As readers then, we also come to open up and trust them to help guide us on our own personal journey of reflection and envisioning. This deep contrast between Making Good and its authors versus many other either unqualified or insincere guides out there - you’ve seen them in bookstores and on TV - who instead signpost the way forward for you and your career with hackneyed, naïve, or outdated advice, is hugely welcome and reassuring.
To qualify my praise a bit, let me say before getting too far along that Making Good does have moments where the default style of the self-help genre (i.e. simplistic) that their book is positioned in versus the authors’ more complex and nuanced experience and beliefs, are forced into, if not tension, a delicate balance. At one point the authors seem to come close to elevating the goal of making money too highly (“We want to make money, to have the things that our televisions promise will deliver happiness with a money-back guarantee, but we don’t want to sell out. We want to feel resilient through recessions and upswings, we want financial security in the face of record personal debt, to consume and indulge according to our moods in a time when we are reaching peak levels of resource availability”) but it is shortly followed by a section on simplifying your life in ways that remind me of the wise Quaker saying, “A simple life freely chosen is a source of strength.”
There are also a few instances that remind us this is a trade book and its authors are not overly concerned with academic convention (when, for instance, they write, “overall, global demand for culture is stronger than ever. Aesthetics, stories, music, reflection, imagination that brilliantly transforms the facts of our reality—our desire for these things has never been greater”, they present this generalization without any sources and, later when they write, “Study after study shows that preventive care is the most cost-efficient kind of health intervention,” they do not cite even one of those studies), but these instances too are relatively few and far between and, on the whole, the book is exhaustively researched and well sourced.
Lastly, it should be said that the book seems less aimed at an entire generation – as its promotional language claims - and more at a self-selecting group of self-starters and high achievers within what their publisher calls the “Facebook generation.” But that is only natural and the authors themselves don’t really claim otherwise.
All of that said, these are all minimal issues and little more than unimportant distractions from the main focus and immense value of this book. Making Good manages to combine lofty inspiration with hard-nosed motivation for a powerful outcome. On the one hand, the book is infused with an infectious can-do, no-excuses, let’s go attitude with uplifting lines such as,
“The world needs your best self. You need your best self right now. Let’s get started.”
And
“Sketches around the world are waiting in the margins of notebooks, ready for their star moment.”
Out of context, those lines may ring a bit hollow. But, on the other hand, within the frameworks the authors provide, their words develop real content and meaning. Specifically, on the macro level, their chapter outline follows six well-organized steps (Reflect, Adapt, Connect, Design, Launch, Organize) and on the more micro level they identify and dig into the “four major paths Rebuilders are taking: Entrepreneur, Job Seeker, Intrapreneur, and Freelancer”. Taken as a whole, this results in perhaps the greatest gift the book offers: assisting in a powerful mental shift away from thinking about one’s path in the context of “what’s available” (picking from a set list of options) to “what do I want to do and how can I make that happen” (potentially making something new) and then providing effective next steps towards doing just that. Their overall approach of not only seeing opportunity in crisis, but of offering very helpful ideas, practices, and resources to pursue those opportunities helps you feel not only more awake and alive but also empowered and ready to move forward with tangible actions.
The book’s positive inspirational tone is also, thankfully, balanced not only by some deep wisdom (one example: “Inner knowing is about a smaller, more quiet voice than just your initial gut reactions. Often, we bury our true understanding in rationalizations, secondary points of view, the pros and cons, and over-analysis. We actually know the answers to the questions we struggle with. All too often, we either fail to consult our inner understanding or we disregard it because we feel like we don’t have a choice”) and some flashes of humor (I particularly like the story that ends with Billy being told by a doctor to wash his hair), but also by some real straight talk. To give a taste, the authors write:
“But first, a caution. This book is not a quick fix. Today there is a cultural promise that is echoed everywhere: Anything is possible if you believe (or if you buy). The promise comes packaged in trendy books or aspirational shows on TV. It’s the American dream refreshed for today’s audience. But there are cracks in this cultural promise. Real change— for your life and for the world—doesn’t happen in the form of a 20-minute episode (or in the 10 minutes of commercials on most cable shows). A generation swept up into a movement built on Hope ran headlong into the overwhelming complexity of making Change. How can we build a clean-tech company that competes with Big Oil’s billions in annual subsidies by “just doing it”? How can you start a business while trying to manage $60,000 or $100,000 in student loans?”
And
“For every inspiring story we could tell you about someone overcoming oppression and a lack of opportunity, there are 10 stories of people who didn’t make it through, couldn’t launch the project they dreamed up.”
To give you a better chance of ending up on the desirable side of that statistic, the authors take a comprehensive approach that is, in the end, what makes this book so unique and valuable. Specifically, Making Good seamlessly weaves together 1) raw, honest, heartfelt storytelling from the authors own lives; 2) inspiring and eclectic stories of those they term “Rebuilders”, who are also finding innovative ways to do good and make money; 3) practical and very helpful exercises for finding your own way in that direction (developed throughout the career of the amazing leadership coach Robert Gass, and included in the book with his permission); and 4) incredibly well-researched and diverse lists of resources to engage in this process beyond the book.
I read Making Good soon after finishing another book that deals with similar topics– Parker Palmer’s Let Your Life Speak – and found each to be even more useful when read in combination with the other. Palmer’s book reads in a more personal/ deeply philosophical and spiritual way while Making Good is more diverse, comprehensive, and practical. Together, they offer a powerful and dynamic combination of books for reflecting on your life as it is and as you want it to be - and for beginning to identify the missing pieces that can piece that puzzle together.
February 18, 2012
I received an ARC of this book through Goodreads First Reads.
2 stars
Ok, I've given it a shot and well over a month after starting this book, I simply cannot finish it. I've picked it up about three times in the past couple weeks and have progressed maybe 3 paragraphs. I've accepted the fact that I will not finish reading this book, having made it halfway through.
Chapter 4 is really what killed it for me, specifically the "How Will You Make Money?" section, which is really more like "How will you save money?". They suggest that you not take out loans for school (probably too late for that advice for at least half your readers) and give what amounts to an adolescent-level lesson in budgeting. I'm well aware of where I can cut corners, and those corners are lookin' pretty round already. The whole "make sure you aren't spending tons of money on useless monthly services!" lecture was, frankly, stupid. Maybe worthwhile advice if you actually have enough money to not be aware of how much is going down the drain on stupid things, in which case I guess you don't have much to worry about. Couch surfing is presented as an option for saving money (!?) along with other things that will really only work if you are already engaged in a certain lifestyle, or willing to drop everything. That said, I thought that the whole "conscious relationship with money" thing was good, and liked the ideas they picked from The Soul of Money (added to my to-read list).
I thought many of the ideas in this book were inspiring, although it seems to be geared toward business-minded people/entrepreneurs (the authors are specifically engaged in clean-energy initiatives so there is a lot of info related to that). The authors clearly have connections with some very successful young people, and relate their stories throughout. You'll either feel inspired by their stories or totally intimidated--I felt a little of both (I mean, I don't think I'm doing too bad, but damn). There is also a lot about just being open to experiences, willing to engage with new people, and having the guts to introduce yourself to those who are already "in the business". Leave the door open for collaboration, look for opportunities to provide products/services that are unavailable but desirable, be environmentally conscious and forward-thinking, etc. Maybe I'm getting old (AHHH) but I felt like this was the kind of book I would've (should've?) read my freshman year of college.
At the end of each chapter there are "Daily Practice" activities, which I found really interesting. I will probably try to do all of those, even though I'm not going to finish reading the book.
For the right kind of person with the right kind of interests, I'm sure this book is incredibly helpful and inspiring. I found some inspiration here, but I'm not sure how "helpful" I found it, seeing as a lot of the info just reminded me of career prep/networking advice that was drilled into my head all through college.
I should probably add that the website (http://makinggood.org/) has some really great content, which I'm sure will be updated more frequently as the book's launch goes into full swing. Worth checking out.
2 stars
Ok, I've given it a shot and well over a month after starting this book, I simply cannot finish it. I've picked it up about three times in the past couple weeks and have progressed maybe 3 paragraphs. I've accepted the fact that I will not finish reading this book, having made it halfway through.
Chapter 4 is really what killed it for me, specifically the "How Will You Make Money?" section, which is really more like "How will you save money?". They suggest that you not take out loans for school (probably too late for that advice for at least half your readers) and give what amounts to an adolescent-level lesson in budgeting. I'm well aware of where I can cut corners, and those corners are lookin' pretty round already. The whole "make sure you aren't spending tons of money on useless monthly services!" lecture was, frankly, stupid. Maybe worthwhile advice if you actually have enough money to not be aware of how much is going down the drain on stupid things, in which case I guess you don't have much to worry about. Couch surfing is presented as an option for saving money (!?) along with other things that will really only work if you are already engaged in a certain lifestyle, or willing to drop everything. That said, I thought that the whole "conscious relationship with money" thing was good, and liked the ideas they picked from The Soul of Money (added to my to-read list).
I thought many of the ideas in this book were inspiring, although it seems to be geared toward business-minded people/entrepreneurs (the authors are specifically engaged in clean-energy initiatives so there is a lot of info related to that). The authors clearly have connections with some very successful young people, and relate their stories throughout. You'll either feel inspired by their stories or totally intimidated--I felt a little of both (I mean, I don't think I'm doing too bad, but damn). There is also a lot about just being open to experiences, willing to engage with new people, and having the guts to introduce yourself to those who are already "in the business". Leave the door open for collaboration, look for opportunities to provide products/services that are unavailable but desirable, be environmentally conscious and forward-thinking, etc. Maybe I'm getting old (AHHH) but I felt like this was the kind of book I would've (should've?) read my freshman year of college.
At the end of each chapter there are "Daily Practice" activities, which I found really interesting. I will probably try to do all of those, even though I'm not going to finish reading the book.
For the right kind of person with the right kind of interests, I'm sure this book is incredibly helpful and inspiring. I found some inspiration here, but I'm not sure how "helpful" I found it, seeing as a lot of the info just reminded me of career prep/networking advice that was drilled into my head all through college.
I should probably add that the website (http://makinggood.org/) has some really great content, which I'm sure will be updated more frequently as the book's launch goes into full swing. Worth checking out.
December 29, 2015
This is exactly the book I needed at this moment in my life, and I would recommend it to every one of my peers who wants to make a positive difference with their life's work yet isn't sure how to do that.
The argument is that it is possible to do good and make a good living doing it. This book addresses our fears and worries about following a nonlinear career path, abundant opportunities for rebuilding and transforming industries, key questions to reflect upon, identifying skills to learn, different models for supporting oneself by doing good, and much more. The two chapters which resonated the most with me were "Stepping Up" and "Reflect." The "Stepping Up" chapter is about understanding a life path "that doesn't always impart a consistent job title, where meaning can become a method to achieve financial stability, where our instinctive emotional response to the injustices in our world lays the foundation for a long-term career. We build this path ourselves, our purpose evolving as we go, and we are carried through by our consistent commitment to doing good." The "Reflect" chapter is about digging in deeply to assumptions and habits, to what doing good means to us, and to how we want to spend our time, directing the energy in our life to what we really want to accomplish. While other chapters contained valuable insights as well, those two were the most meaningful to me at my current position.
The book isn't perfect. The organization is a bit scattered, mixing first-person accounts from the authors with third-person elsewhere, and different practices and exercises sometimes seem placed haphazardly. However, it's good all the way through, and there are moments when it really shines.
Making Good doesn't give you all the answers, it doesn't tell you what you should do -- that's what our own questing for insights, introspection, and further learning must do*. However, by introducing valuable ideas and asking the right questions to give me a push in a positive, generative direction, I really do think this book has changed my life. I feel like I have a framework and some ideas to start with now. If "Finding meaning, money, and community in a changing world" resonates with you, read Making Good.
*For further concrete direction based in the ideas of this book, I highly recommend the site http://50waystogetajob.com/ which the authors created afterwards.
The argument is that it is possible to do good and make a good living doing it. This book addresses our fears and worries about following a nonlinear career path, abundant opportunities for rebuilding and transforming industries, key questions to reflect upon, identifying skills to learn, different models for supporting oneself by doing good, and much more. The two chapters which resonated the most with me were "Stepping Up" and "Reflect." The "Stepping Up" chapter is about understanding a life path "that doesn't always impart a consistent job title, where meaning can become a method to achieve financial stability, where our instinctive emotional response to the injustices in our world lays the foundation for a long-term career. We build this path ourselves, our purpose evolving as we go, and we are carried through by our consistent commitment to doing good." The "Reflect" chapter is about digging in deeply to assumptions and habits, to what doing good means to us, and to how we want to spend our time, directing the energy in our life to what we really want to accomplish. While other chapters contained valuable insights as well, those two were the most meaningful to me at my current position.
The book isn't perfect. The organization is a bit scattered, mixing first-person accounts from the authors with third-person elsewhere, and different practices and exercises sometimes seem placed haphazardly. However, it's good all the way through, and there are moments when it really shines.
Making Good doesn't give you all the answers, it doesn't tell you what you should do -- that's what our own questing for insights, introspection, and further learning must do*. However, by introducing valuable ideas and asking the right questions to give me a push in a positive, generative direction, I really do think this book has changed my life. I feel like I have a framework and some ideas to start with now. If "Finding meaning, money, and community in a changing world" resonates with you, read Making Good.
*For further concrete direction based in the ideas of this book, I highly recommend the site http://50waystogetajob.com/ which the authors created afterwards.
August 1, 2012
While this book primarily targets recent college grads, it can serve as a primer for do-gooders of all ages. All that's required to make the most of this practical guide is a big heart and equally big vision for changing the way we work. Are you worried about your financial future? Don't. Making Good will inspire you to create work that is meaningful as well as rewarding.
These choice quotes speak volumes:
"If you choose to be a change maker, most of the time it will feel like you are up against the world. That is because you are on the leading edge of a new generation. If you have a great idea (or even a little seed of one) inside you, you are trying to plant it in the asphalt to grow." Van Jones, in the Introduction
"It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?" Henry David Thoreau.
"We have two ears and one mouth so we can listen twice as much as we speak." Epictetus
Bonus: each chapter closes with a list of super books and other useful resources.
These choice quotes speak volumes:
"If you choose to be a change maker, most of the time it will feel like you are up against the world. That is because you are on the leading edge of a new generation. If you have a great idea (or even a little seed of one) inside you, you are trying to plant it in the asphalt to grow." Van Jones, in the Introduction
"It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?" Henry David Thoreau.
"We have two ears and one mouth so we can listen twice as much as we speak." Epictetus
Bonus: each chapter closes with a list of super books and other useful resources.
March 20, 2012
I really connected to everything discussed in this book - I'm a late-20-something who wants to do something meaningful but has only run into roadblocks and frustration. I loved the quote on p.39: "Your vocation is where your greatest passion meets the world's greatest need." The reader really embarks on a journey of self-exploration in these pages, and this is a good read for any aspiring social entrepreneur. It's also a great reference, and one that I personally will refer back to again!
August 23, 2012
Fantastic guide for anyone looking to deviate from the known and linear and probe the more non-traditional routes of looking inwards to see how it is you can create meaning for your self outwards. Packed with great tips, tools, exercises, and resources, making it a very hands-on action oriented guide to doing just the cover advertises, find meaning, money, and community in a changing world.
December 16, 2012
This was a good book for me to read. I was inspired, received guidance on what my next steps should be, and now have a great list of resources and other books to read that will help me prepare for Outlet making good in this world. Overall a good read, especially if you are interested in the environment.
May 27, 2015
The perfect book for the (slightly) lost soul who wants to do some good in the world but doesn't know where to start. The best part? It's not a bunch of inspirational phrases (thigh those are in there) but a practical guidebook to getting started. Can't wait to take action from this and make some positive changes.
Read
March 1, 2016Good - not great - there was one bit in the middle about why we all loved gong to university is the fact that we lived in close quarters with like-minded people however the ultimate goal of graduating university was to move into a big house and be separated from people and be lonely and bored ... very thought-provoking ...
June 6, 2012
I had such high expectations for this book and was sorely disappointed. Instead of focusing on several entrepreneurs who combine success with doing "good", it presented a dumbed down version of how the two authors moved through their lives. What a disappointment!
Want to read
June 27, 2012his manifesto was awesome. Why not read the book too?
Billy was a boss. Everyone who talked to him said that he was able to understand their businesses almost instantly and give great, important feedback.
Billy was a boss. Everyone who talked to him said that he was able to understand their businesses almost instantly and give great, important feedback.
July 9, 2012
I so wanted to like this book. The writing is accessible, and three topic it's interesting, but the total package isn't delivered. I snm not sure what is missing, but the book felt too pedestrian. Too much like a pulled together project.
October 17, 2012
So far, cant put it down, as other books that I have read concerning this topic of manifesting your goals it remains to be quite meaty and I find myself having to re-read certain paragraphs! 2am reads n tea for the win! =D
September 1, 2014
Making Good is both uplifting and inspirational as it is informative and practical. An easy read that found me taking notes as if it were a textbook. Thank you Billy and Dev for showing me that there are a whole lot of people just like me.
February 6, 2013
There's good advice here on current generation new age careers, a view of this generations aspirational voice, and some over-reaching philosophy. I think it's worthy reading with good resources but not quite a seminal work of this generation. Important input and influence for sure.
August 4, 2014
Great resource for anybody thinking of going into a career involving social impact or wanting to make social impact in general. Highlights a lot of organizations and people doing great things and gives step-by-step tips in how to start something yourself.
March 5, 2012
This book is a game changer, and a must read for anyone, young or old, who hold themselves to a higher moral standard and want to make a difference in the world--and get paid doing it.
July 3, 2012
Lots of "green" examples due to their areas of expertise, but the overall advice was good and gave me some ideas and motivation.
Read
April 8, 2016ended on 112 - needs to go back to the library...
February 5, 2013
Good overview and inspiration to make an idea happen.
Read
February 9, 2013Loved it!
Read
December 31, 2013Great book. Plenty of useful information and profiles on successful companies in the world of social innovation.
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