We’re constantly getting asked for book recommendations by our listeners, so from business books to self-help to fiction to podcasts to TV shows, here’s what we’re currently consuming for both work and life.
Kathleen Shannon 0:02
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Emily Thompson 0:29
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Kathleen Shannon 1:17
All right, what are we talking about in today's minisode?
Caitlin Brehm 1:20
Well, we've done this one a while ago, but it's time for an update. So let's talk about what you're currently reading, listening to consuming right now.
Emily Thompson 1:31
Go Kathleen,
Kathleen Shannon 1:32
all the things. Okay. So I am big into reading memoirs. I love just reading about other people's lives and other people's stories. So I'm currently reading I'm fine and other lies by Whitney Cummings, which is funny because I feel like the thing I always want to talk to people about is what they're talking to the therapist about. And she shares like a lot of stories about what she talked to her therapists about. So perfect book for me. I just finished the misadventures of awkward Black Girl by Isa Ray who does insecure on HBO. Okay, I'm also reading the art of memoir by Mary Carr. And this book is so interesting. So here's the deal, I kind of want to write a memoir, or to or at least get better at telling stories through my own personal experience. So for example, like I have this idea of writing a book about being a mom or I have an idea about writing a book about personal branding, but through the lens of like how my personal brand has shown up throughout my life. And so I have all these ideas of the kinds of books I want to write. But this book is really interesting because it talks a lot about storytelling through experience and how we remember our experiences and how no two people remember the same experience the same. So there is this art of crafting the story whenever it comes to memoir. And in fact, this is actually released me a lot from some of the pressure or paralysis I have around writing stuff like this, because sometimes I think like, Oh, well, I can't remember it properly, or do I really have something to say? And this book really digs into that? Then I also have so many books you guys helped my toddler won't sleep. I also just read Rachel Dratch. She's Debbie Downer from SNL. If you remember her, I just read her memoir, which is girl walks into a bar, which was okay, it was good. I'd have her on the show. Anyway, so just lots of memoirs is what I'm reading. What about you, Emily, what are you reading right now?
Emily Thompson 3:34
Well, yeah, I am reading sparsely these days. Earlier this summer, I went through a pretty legit fiction phase. But then I picked up a business book. And that sort of brought me back to reality. rocket fuel by Gino wickman is one that I fell, or one that I read recently that I really loved. It was a super quick and easy read. It was one of those things where multiple people told me about it within like a week of time, like completely disconnected. And I was like, All right, I'll take it as a sign and read it. So anyone who's trying to build a company, especially a company and a team, it's a really great one to dive into. So when I saw business book for you, I also have been reading some stuff about living seasonally, which is something I'm super interested in doing at the moment or doing always but I'm looking to learn more about it both from sort of the the physiological standpoint, but also how you mentally move through the seasons or creatively move through the seasons. So I've been going back and reading, reading some sort of beginner pieces, one of which is the seasons of life by Jim Rohn, which isn't my favorite book of the world, but it's sort of set a good set a good foundation for for some seasonal understandings. But what I'm diving into right now is staying healthy with the seasons by Dr. Elson hos, which has been a really good one. And I always think of our friend, Amy Gretzky when I'm reading it, because it's based on the five Chinese elements, and how you move through each of those seasons and how they affect your body and how you can eat in order to, to optimize those times, and the effects they have on your body. So I'm reading that one. And then I have another one coming up that I will be reading soon. That is also about the seasons, and it is called hold is called a year of living mindfully seasonal practices to nourish a body, mind and spirit. So I've been reading a whole bunch of things about living seasonally, including some articles and just sort of things that I found on the internet and a couple of books as well. David surprised me recently with like, buying all the books that I had on my Amazon wishlist because I had been just sort of collecting them in there. And so I'm diving into all this seasonal stuff. And then I'm not listening too much these days, because
Kathleen Shannon 5:57
Wait I have a quick recommendation for you on season.
Emily Thompson 5:59
Yes,
Kathleen Shannon 6:00
and it involves a podcast. Love it. So there's a podcast called the living experiment by Dallas Hartwig and Pilar Gerasimo. And Dallas really gets into living seasonally and so he kind of comes from the Paleo world and but there's so many aspects to it from sleep to mindset to what you're eating, and they have episodes on winter, autumn, spring and summer and really defining the characteristics of those different seasons from an angle that I haven't really heard it in before. So you should totally check that out. I know that you don't listen to a lot of podcasts, but it might be worth checking out
Emily Thompson 6:40
love it looking at now and I totally will. What else? Are you listening?
Kathleen Shannon 6:45
Are you listening, you're listening anything. So I am a podcast junkie, I am always listening to two dope queens. I'm always listening to how I built this. I've started picking up girlboss radio with Sophia amoruso. Again and listening to some of her interviews. I'm listening to a new podcast called spooked. And so I started to get into my favorite murder, but I was just too scared. I was convinced that my husband or my child were going to kill me in the middle of the night. So I really like spooked because it's more like ghost stories instead of murder stories. Um, so those are the ones that I'm really listening to right now. Oh, my friend, Sarah James, who writes a blog called world or she goes by World anyway. And she just started a podcast called selfie, which is all about self care. And so that one is kind of like a little lighter and more indulgent, though they get pretty deep into topics. So those are some of my favorite ones right now, whenever it comes to business, ie once I've started listening to Donald Miller's building a story brand. That's one that I'm getting into. Anyway, I have, like 100 podcasts on my phone. Those are the ones that just stand out
Emily Thompson 8:02
that makes my brain went to explode. Absolutely.
Kathleen Shannon 8:06
Why do you feel like you're more of a, like a reading learner, you're not like an audio, I think I'm an odd like, I like
Emily Thompson 8:14
I like silence too much. For sure, like, high end. And I guess part of it's because my kids at home, and I'm at home with my kid all day, like I there's always sound going on. And so the few moments that I get silence, which is usually when I go to the grocery store, I just want to enjoy silence. And occasionally I will pop in a podcast. But I have a really hard time getting through those first few minutes of most podcasts where I'd rather listen to silence.
Kathleen Shannon 8:42
And I will say listening to podcasts and reading books is really interesting being on the flip side of it. So we're podcasters so I really like being able to listen to podcasts to listen to different transitions. So our sound engineer has talked about wanting to like do more editing to our podcast. So I've been thinking about ideas for him like how he could use music to transition, or I've definitely Emily, like you said, listening that first five minutes. A couple years ago, I was like okay, we need to get our intro down to less than 15 seconds every single time because it used to be kind of longer and I can't sit through that and I don't expect you guys to sit through that. So let's dive in and just really figuring out new things to try and then as an author now whenever I'm reading books, I'm really looking at story structure a little bit more I do love reading fiction, though to kind of get out of that because I don't plan on ever writing a fictional book so that's where I do
Emily Thompson 9:36
so here's a fun thing and something I haven't talked about talked about to anyone ever is I dove back into fiction early this summer and I think I got the fiction bug a little bit Okay, so what book did you read? Oh, man, it's been ridiculous. Yeah, hold on. Let me tell you guys this and nobody judged me or do I don't care. Um, it
Kathleen Shannon 9:58
has really good fiction recommendation. Tara Gentile we should get her on the show.
Emily Thompson 10:03
Elisha. Autumn Witt Boyd. She always is always reading some fiction something. So it is the so funny. Hold on. I don't even remember how I stumbled upon this. So it's a series of three books. And apparently she's writing a fourth and God knows how many more. But Sarah J Maas, A Court of Thorns and Roses, a quart of Mist and Fury and a quart of wings and ruin.
Kathleen Shannon 10:31
So are they fantasy novels,
Emily Thompson 10:33
they are.
Kathleen Shannon 10:34
I like a fantasy novel
Emily Thompson 10:36
they were really good. And so this also came from, so I never really read nonfiction until after I had Lily, I remember going through a memoir season for sure. I really loved them. Those are some of the first like nonfiction books that I read, I went back to fiction. And then literally for like the past five years, I've only read business, only read business books and had a really hard time picking up any kind of fiction, I would get through get through the first half of the first chapter and not be able to do it. So these were the first fiction books that I've been able to get through in years. And not to say they're that fantastic, because they are just like some fantasy fiction books. But reading them, I got the fiction bug, I think
Kathleen Shannon 11:25
and so now you want to write
Emily Thompson 11:26
maybe, maybe we'll see I'm waiting for it to come to me. I'm not trying to push it. I'm waiting for my big magic moments and just sort of letting things flow. We'll see how it goes. No promises, but they moved me in a way that maybe I want to write some fiction.
Kathleen Shannon 11:42
Interesting.
Caitlin Brehm 11:43
I think that's so important, though, for creatives to read fiction. And we get like so caught up in this idea, like, Oh, I need to be reading business books, I need to be reading self help like something that's productive because fiction feels like a guilty pleasure. But it's so important for feeding your creativity, even if you don't necessarily write because it gives you different perspectives. It gives you more colorful language that you might not be consuming on a regular basis. So I've heard from multiple people that if you want to be a writer, especially, but just a creative in general, you need to be consuming fiction. Oh,
Emily Thompson 12:19
I love that. I'll take
Kathleen Shannon 12:21
I'm on it. Because I'm so burned out on business books and self help. And I've been burned out on it for maybe a year now.
Emily Thompson 12:27
Yeah, it's it's hard. And saying where you love memoir. I write I do love a good memoir as well. I wish Chelsea Handler would keep putting them out though. I don't think I can listen to her, like read any more of them, really. But I think I've read them all. So
Kathleen Shannon 12:41
I heard that she's quitting her show. Chelsea is one of my favorite shows to watch. And I heard that she's quitting after this season.
Emily Thompson 12:48
Oh, she's been at it for a long time, though, right?
Kathleen Shannon 12:51
Well, no. So she was on a show for a long time, like on he and then quit. And then she's only had two seasons on Netflix. Oh, we're like she's doing it her way. Right. And okay, let's talk about a boss. We need to get Chelsea Handler on the show. But I think that she's really fascinating to watch because the first season she was putting out like three or four episodes a week and then the second season, she was putting out one episode a week and I was like, Yeah, she got tired. Yeah. Like it has to be someone else's creative process happen that way. And like, I can tell that she's experimenting with different things on the show and just seeing what works and what doesn't and isn't afraid to do it in front of people.
Emily Thompson 13:28
Yeah, I get. She's one of my favorite watching
Kathleen Shannon 13:31
any TV shows right now or
Emily Thompson 13:33
David and I just finished watching Elementary, which is like a Sherlock Holmes variation. I feel like we've spent years catching up on it because I'm not a binge eater. Usually, like, I can't sit and just watch TV. We did spend the summer watching all of the Game of Thrones like again, which was the darkest period of my entire life before the new season started. We did just start I think it's a Hulu series chance it has. Oh my god, what's his name from house? The like British doctor is all snarky and mean something. Hugh Lowry did it. So we just started watching chance like two nights ago and still on the fence as to whether or not we'll finish it. It's kind of heavy. Whenever I watch TV, except obviously Game of Thrones. I like for my shit to be pretty light. And this is pretty good.
Kathleen Shannon 14:26
I'm obsessed with shits Creek.
Emily Thompson 14:28
You were telling me about this?
Kathleen Shannon 14:30
It's a Canadian show on Netflix. And it has the mom from Beetlejuice. Yep. Catherine O'Hara. O'Hara. Catherine Oh, yeah. And then Dan levy who is Eugene Levy son and they co produce it together. So that's Eugene Levy is the dad from American Pie with the big bushy eyebrows. And then his son is Dan lovey, and the style of that show is so good. I mean, I'm talking personal style, like I want everybody's outfits on that show. And it's just really Super cute. I Oh no, I want I'm about to watch the whole thing again. There's three seasons out on Netflix. I'm about to rewatch all of them. Good. And it's 20 minutes, which is perfect. Like that's about all the time I have right now to watch TV in a day. So
Emily Thompson 15:16
I get there we go. There you go. That's what we're consuming.
Caitlin Brehm 15:19
And all of these will be linked www.beingboss.club
Kathleen Shannon 15:26
Yeah, yeah. Hey, high five saying
Kathleen Shannon 15:33
this minisode was brought to you by Twenty20. Check them out at twenty20.com/beingboss. That's t w e n t y 20 as in the number.com slash being boss.
Emily Thompson 15:48
Did you like this minisode Be sure to check us out on our website at beingboss.club. There you can find more from being boss including our full episodes, minisodes and blog posts. And while you're there, be sure to sign up for our mailing list so that you can get access to behind the scenes and exclusive content from Kathleen and myself to help you be more boss in your work and life. Do the work be boss
