Lena Singla, Author at LENA SINGLA

Hello New Year – hello old me! But this is not another NY resolutions post. These are the books I decided I wanted to read and so I made a reading challenge for 2021. This will also serve me as a way to keep track of the books I I’m reading. Wanna join me?

I will come back and update the status of my books for 2021 regularly. Maybe you’ll find a title that will stir up your curiosity too! If you click on it, it will take you to the Goodreads page so you can see an excerpt and check the reviews.

21 books for 2021

Tell me your favourites in the comments so I know what to read next.

1– “Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant” by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne

2– “Ogilvy on Advertising” by David Ogilvy

3–”Building A Story Brand” by Donald Miller

4 – “The Execution Factor: The One Skill That Drives Success ” by Kim Perrel

5 – “ The Art of Digital Marketing: The Definitive Guide to Creating Strategic, Targeted, and Measurable Online Campaigns ” by Ian Dodson

6 – “Effective Seo and Content Marketing: The Ultimate Guide for Maximizing Free Web Traffic” by Nicolaos Papagiannis

7 – “How to stop worrying and start living” ~ Dale Carnegie

100% COMPLETED ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ // 05/02/2021

A book to keep at reach. It gives advice and a lot of personal experiences by different people so there must be someone who has a method to worry less that will resonate with you.

#mindset #lifestyle

8 – “The courage to be disliked” ~ Ichiro Kashimi and Fumitake Koga

75% COMPLETED

9 – “The Truths We Hold :An American Journey” ~ Kamala Harris

10 – “SELL LIKE CRAZY: How to Get As Many Clients, Customers and Sales As You Can Possibly Handle ” ~ Sabry Suby

11 – “Thinking, Fast and Slow ” ~ Daniel Kahneman

12 – “The Future Is Faster Than You Think: How Converging Technologies Are Transforming Business, Industries, and Our Lives ” by Peter H. Diamandis, Steven Culture

13 – “How Not to Die : Discover the Foods Scientifically Proven to Prevent and Reverse Disease” ~ Michael Greger M.D. with Gene Stone

14 – “The tipping point: How little things can make a big difference ” ~Malcolm Gladwell

15 – “How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy ” ~ Jenny Odell

16 – “Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones ” ~ James Clear

17 – “The Laws of Human Nature ” ~ Robert Greene

18 – “Untamed” ~ Glennon Doyle

60% COMPLETED

19 – “Imagine it forward: Courage, Creativity and the Power of Change” ~ by Beth Comstock

100% COMPLETED // 24/01/21 ⭐️⭐️⭐️ ⭐️

Although it took me a long time to read and I thought I wouldn’t make it to the end it happened to be worth it (but a couple of lockdowns happened in the meantime -is that a good excuse?)

What I value the most is its relevance, the innovation mindset and the insights about Beth’s work at GE and the resilience she shows in pursuing change and how she shares it and teaches.

#innovation #tech #mkt

Books To study / continuos reading in 2021

20 – “The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations for Clarity, Effectiveness, and Serenity ” by Ryan Holiday

21– “Mastering Fashion Buying and Merchandising Management” by David Shaw

Further additions

22– “Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson

23 – “Norma Kamali: I Am Invincible ” by Norma Kamali

Unfinished Books / Pending / Older Want to Read (or even yet to start)

-1 – “The End of Fashion: How Marketing Changed the Clothing Business Forever ” by Tery Agins

100% COMPLETED // 07/02/21 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I should re-read it and I’ve just finished it. Nice dip into the fashion world and the history of the luxury / biggest name brands of today. It has a special way of interlinking the history of every fashion house, so smoothly that sometimes I forgot who we were talking about. But it’s a must I should recommend to my future self XD

-2 – “Nomad Capitalist: How to Reclaim Your Freedom with Offshore Bank Accounts, Dual Citizenship, Foreign Companies, and Overseas Investments ” by Andrew Henderson

-3 – “The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America’s Wealthy ” by Thomas J. Stanley, William D. Danko

[TL;DR] As it is an endless list really, many books will just fall into the “I’ll never finish it” category. I won’t even add them here.

Recommendations

These are the books I found good enough to share around the blog in previous times. You’ll find them on:

– IMAGINATION, THE FORGOTTEN TOOL FOR CREATIVITY

– CREATIVE BOOKS FOR THE ARTIST IN YOU (1) & CREATIVE BOOKS FOR THE ARTIST IN YOU (2)

– Firstly 5 BOOKS I WANT TO READ BEFORE CHRISTMAS, FOR GIRLBOSSES and secondly BOOKS FOR THE GIRL BOSS – UPDATE

– 7 THINGS TO UNCOVER THIS JULY (MONTHLY LINKS TO CHECKOUT)

– Many good ones here : THINGS WORTH SHARING #AUGUST2019

– 5 THINGS WORTH SHARING – THE “APRISOLATION” EDITION (EXPANDED)

– READ, LISTEN, WATCH ~ SEPTEMBER 20

Old time “favourites” (or those that most influenced my past self)

– “1984” by George Orwell

– ” The last lecture” by Randy Pausch

Even though I usually kinda like the start of the new season, with the fresh air, some showers, fewer crowds (not that I’ve seen many this year), this year, of course, it’s different. The cold weather has kicked in and I just feel like 2020 is going to be one sole memory in my mind: endless cloudy days stuck inside feeling weird, waiting for things to change. Although summer has been quite good (no more quarantine), it all feels like a grey cold week with lots of stuff to do but no fun involved. Like there’s something missing.

BUT!

A new season begins, and so we can make it better! Yes, it will be a loooong season – you see, for me it’s like 2.5 months of summer and the rest just feels like eternal winter (lucky me, I live in Southern Europe 😅 ). Now, at least we are in the good half of winter: with all the Autumn and Halloween mood first and then the preparations for Christmas – visually stimulating times around!

I never carved a pumpkin nor decorated for Halloween

But this ends this year. Can’t miss any opportunity to make days feel different right now, can we?

I haven’t painted nor drawn much during the last year (honestly, I think I can say confidently that it’s been a year since the last time I painted), so I have to start practising again. And so, I decided on one of these Sundays to simply chill by doodling on this pumpkin!

Doodling on a pumpkin

This season reminds me of…

This is Little Pumpkin. As you can see I was so original to name my cat like that. But honestly, I thought I’d be calling him “Pam”, and he’s actually sweet as a sweet potato, and orange, and fluffy and quite funny indeed. He popped up at my mother’s garden while she was away (around Halloween!) and he never left… so I had no option but to keep it!

Goodbye Summer

You’re always so good, even in a year like this… I’ll miss the early mornings while running by the beach to finish swimming in the blue sea, and the long days, and the warm weather pouring down a cool beer.

I won’t miss, though, the stress and anxiety of a summer where there were no holidays, where lockdowns happen everywhere and different social-distancing measures changed constantly. I won’t miss not-knowing when I’d be able to make actual plans to go away. COVID-19 makes live more unpredictable… and boring at the same time.

I very much need a mini-escape soon. What about you?