I'm not hardly nervous, but a tad bit maybe. If I have anything to be nervous about it would be others looking to me to lead, which I DO NOT WANT TO DO! Yet I started this group, I must be something of a lead at least at first until others step up to share that with me. IF that ever happens. I'd like to consider myself more a facilitator than a leader in this situation.
Why am I doing this if I super don't want to lead? Honestly I feel like I don't have much of a choice here. Even though I know it is clearly, obviously a choice. I miss the community of religion where most people there loved each other and wanted to be better. But after years of in depth study I am convinced religion is not only false but is damaging to mental well-being. I've searched and searched for so many years for meaningful community. Depression support groups in person are quite difficult to come by! Hence my feeling of not having a choice here. I can't keep living so lonely like. I'm sure my depressive cycles will continue if I can't find meaningful community. I can't relate to my family and have little interactions with my parents who are the only two I even speak to.
I know I can't be the only one. Surely there's many others out there with similar feelings yes??
I used meetup.com to start up the group. In 2 days on Sunday is our first meet. It's a self-improvement/educational book club. No fiction or politics or religion is allowed.
I guess....I'm hoping that those who show up are very suggestive of the topics or specific books they'd like to first read into. I don't want it to be me picking the first topic or couple of books. Which is the main reason I'm making this thread. Looking for suggestions on what to select first if I have to do that.
Haven't had a first meet yet and already five members including myself. So I am hopeful this can become a community. I intend to implement social meets as well. If things go well I may make flyers and drop them at therapist offices. If you live in the Michiana area and this interests you, please do let me know or just find us on meetup.com. The spoiler thing below is the description I used to attract members.
I am open to any and all suggestions about how you would like such a group to operate if you were to attend.
Thanks for reading this.
Why am I doing this if I super don't want to lead? Honestly I feel like I don't have much of a choice here. Even though I know it is clearly, obviously a choice. I miss the community of religion where most people there loved each other and wanted to be better. But after years of in depth study I am convinced religion is not only false but is damaging to mental well-being. I've searched and searched for so many years for meaningful community. Depression support groups in person are quite difficult to come by! Hence my feeling of not having a choice here. I can't keep living so lonely like. I'm sure my depressive cycles will continue if I can't find meaningful community. I can't relate to my family and have little interactions with my parents who are the only two I even speak to.
I know I can't be the only one. Surely there's many others out there with similar feelings yes??
I used meetup.com to start up the group. In 2 days on Sunday is our first meet. It's a self-improvement/educational book club. No fiction or politics or religion is allowed.
I guess....I'm hoping that those who show up are very suggestive of the topics or specific books they'd like to first read into. I don't want it to be me picking the first topic or couple of books. Which is the main reason I'm making this thread. Looking for suggestions on what to select first if I have to do that.
Haven't had a first meet yet and already five members including myself. So I am hopeful this can become a community. I intend to implement social meets as well. If things go well I may make flyers and drop them at therapist offices. If you live in the Michiana area and this interests you, please do let me know or just find us on meetup.com. The spoiler thing below is the description I used to attract members.
I am open to any and all suggestions about how you would like such a group to operate if you were to attend.
Thanks for reading this.
Seeking founding members!
Are you tired of therapists just telling you to develop healthy habits instead of getting to the root of your actual issues and improving your perspective? Tired of knowing few or no other people who actively wish to self reflect and put themselves in the shoes of others for the benifit of us all? I know I sure am! Hello there. My name is Jared.
I seek to build a group (community even?) of people who wish to do better, feel better. People who intend to not just read the entire book but also apply it to their lives. I feel it could even be benificial for us to even have group social outings, events outside of the meets for book discussion.
A few examples of books I've appreciated are How to Win Friends and Influence People,Dopamine Nation, Good Energy, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents (currently reading myself), No Mr Nice Guy, Eat This and Live, The Depression Cure.
Not all self-help books are good. So I'd like to emphasize that when the group chooses books we ought to consider reviews of the book from regular folk and professionals alike. I feel that not every book we read needs to be about mental health or relations with others. Could be topics such as healthy eating or practical skills (like crochet or vehicle maintence lol) if the group did so choose. Perhaps founding members could nominate books for the group to vote on for the next read. Or perhaps any member with a certain amount of time in membership could nominate a book.
I'm open to ideas of how the group could be run. I do NOT wish to run it by myself or make all the decisions myself. However I do have my non-negotiables. I will have no part in a book club promoting politics or religion. To be clear that means no books focused solely on either of those topics. I'm kinda thinking we could do monthly meets where we discuss the book we've read that month. I feel that resturaunts or parks would be good meeting places. Rooms can also be reserved at libraries. I'm very open to suggestion.
Please shoot me a message if you have any interest in what I've described. Please also let me know if you would like to be part of group organization as a founding member or if you would rather just attend. Thank you!
Are you tired of therapists just telling you to develop healthy habits instead of getting to the root of your actual issues and improving your perspective? Tired of knowing few or no other people who actively wish to self reflect and put themselves in the shoes of others for the benifit of us all? I know I sure am! Hello there. My name is Jared.
I seek to build a group (community even?) of people who wish to do better, feel better. People who intend to not just read the entire book but also apply it to their lives. I feel it could even be benificial for us to even have group social outings, events outside of the meets for book discussion.
A few examples of books I've appreciated are How to Win Friends and Influence People,Dopamine Nation, Good Energy, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents (currently reading myself), No Mr Nice Guy, Eat This and Live, The Depression Cure.
Not all self-help books are good. So I'd like to emphasize that when the group chooses books we ought to consider reviews of the book from regular folk and professionals alike. I feel that not every book we read needs to be about mental health or relations with others. Could be topics such as healthy eating or practical skills (like crochet or vehicle maintence lol) if the group did so choose. Perhaps founding members could nominate books for the group to vote on for the next read. Or perhaps any member with a certain amount of time in membership could nominate a book.
I'm open to ideas of how the group could be run. I do NOT wish to run it by myself or make all the decisions myself. However I do have my non-negotiables. I will have no part in a book club promoting politics or religion. To be clear that means no books focused solely on either of those topics. I'm kinda thinking we could do monthly meets where we discuss the book we've read that month. I feel that resturaunts or parks would be good meeting places. Rooms can also be reserved at libraries. I'm very open to suggestion.
Please shoot me a message if you have any interest in what I've described. Please also let me know if you would like to be part of group organization as a founding member or if you would rather just attend. Thank you!
