Make Good Art


Neil Gaiman - 2013
    He encouraged the fledgling painters, musicians, writers, and dreamers to break rules and think outside the box. Most of all, he encouraged them to make good art.The book Make Good Art, designed by renowned graphic artist Chip Kidd, contains the full text of Gaiman’s inspiring speech.

Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences


Nancy Duarte - 2010
    So why then do so many audiences leave feeling like they've wasted their time? All too often, presentations don't resonate with the audience and move them to transformative action.Just as the author's first book helped presenters become visual communicators, Resonate helps you make a strong connection with your audience and lead them to purposeful action. The author's approach is simple: building a presentation today is a bit like writing a documentary. Using this approach, you'll convey your content with passion, persuasion, and impact.Author has a proven track record, including having created the slides in Al Gore's Oscar-winning An Inconvenient TruthFocuses on content development methodologies that are not only fundamental but will move people to action Upends the usual paradigm by making the audience the hero and the presenter the mentor Shows how to use story techniques of conflict and resolution Presentations don't have to be boring ordeals. You can make them fun, exciting, and full of meaning. Leave your audiences energized and ready to take action with Resonate.

The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs


Carmine Gallo - 2009
    Communications expert Carmine Gallo has studied and analyzed the very best of Jobs's performances, offering point-by-point examples, tried-and-true techniques, and proven presentation secrets in 18 "scenes," including:Develop a messianic sense of purposeReveal the Conquering heroChannel your inner ZenStage your presentation with propsMake it look effortlessWith this revolutionary approach, you'll be surprised at how easy it is to sell your ideas, share your enthusiasm, and wow your audience the Steve Jobs way."No other leader captures an audience like Steve Jobs does and, like no other book, The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs captures the formula Steve uses to enthrall audiences."--Rob Enderle, The Enderle Group"Now you can learn from the best there is--both Jobs and Gallo. No matter whether you are a novice presenter or a professional speaker like me, you will read and reread this book with the same enthusiasm that people bring to their iPods."--David Meerman Scott, bestselling author of The New Rules of Marketing & PR and World Wide Rave

Coaching the Artist Within: Advice for Writers, Actors, Visual Artists, and Musicians from America's Foremost Creativity Coach


Eric Maisel - 2005
    Eric Maisel, a leading creativity coach, writes each lesson with a novelist's flair, as a narrative complete with examples, exercises, and questions to help readers explore and reflect on underlying issues that may be keeping them from pursuing their urge to create. Topics include committing, planning and doing, generating mental energy, achieving a centered presence, becoming an anxiety expert, upholding your dream, and maintaining a creative life. Maisel has worked extensively with creative people — poets, filmmakers, novelists, dancers — and he revisits some of them in coaching sessions in San Francisco, Paris, London, and New York. Typical are the rock musician who wants to pursue a solo career and the screenwriter anxious to become a poet. Their examples both entertain and instruct, outlining how to discover one's personal muse — and the motivation to keep creating.

So, You're A Creative Genius, Now what?


Carl King - 2011
    So, You’re A Creative Genius… Now What? is here to help you take control of your destiny, follow your own path, and open your own creative studio anywhere. Divided into two parts, YOU and THEM, this fun book teaches you how creative freelancing can bankroll your own artistic dreams. Whether you’re an artist, writer, filmmaker, or musician, So, You’re A Creative Genius… Now What? will help you conquer that Creative Genius within.

The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self and Relationship


David Whyte - 2009
    David Whyte knows there are three crucial relationships, or marriages, in our lives: the marriage or partnership with a significant other, the commitment we have to our work, and the vows, spoken or unspoken, we make to an inner, constantly developing self. In The Three Marriages, the bestselling author, poet, and speaker argues that it is not possible to sacrifice one relationship for the others without causing deep psychological damage. Too often, he says, we fracture our lives and split our energies foolishly, so that one or more of these marriages is sacrificed and may wither and die, in the process impoverishing them all. Whyte looks to a different way of seeing and connecting these relationships and prompts us to examine each marriage with a fierce but affectionate eye as he shows us the importance of cherishing all three equally. Drawing from his own struggles to achieve this goal as well as exploring the lives of some of the world's great writers and activists—from Dante to Joan of Arc, from Austen to Dickinson—Whyte reveals that our core commitments are irrevocably connected. Only by understanding the simultaneously robust and delicate nature of the three marriages and the stages of their maturation, he maintains, can we create a real portrait of what makes us tick and a real sense of finding a place in the world. In prose that's at once lyrical and inviting, Whyte investigates captivating ideas for bringing a deeper satisfaction to our lives, one that goes beyond our previously held ideas of balance.

The Art of Immersion: How the Digital Generation Is Remaking Hollywood, Madison Avenue, and the Way We Tell Stories


Frank Rose - 2011
    Now, on YouTube and blogs and Facebook and Twitter, we are media. And while we watch more television than ever before, how we watch it is changing in ways we have barely slowed down to register. No longer content in our traditional role as couch potatoes, we approach television shows, movies, even advertising as invitations to participate—as experiences to immerse ourselves in at will. Wired contributing editor Frank Rose introduces us to the people who are reshaping media for a two-way world—people like Will Wright (The Sims), James Cameron (Avatar), Damon Lindelof (Lost), and dozens of others whose ideas are changing how we play, how we chill, and even how we think. The Art of Immersion is an eye-opening look at the shifting shape of entertainment today.

Feck Perfuction: Dangerous Ideas on the Business of Life (Business Books, Graphic Design Books, Books on Success)


James Victore - 2019
    His ideas on optimizing your creativity, doing wow work, and building a life that inspires will devastate your limits. And show you how to win. Read this book fast." —Robin Sharma, bestselling author of The Monk Who Sold His FerrariBegin before you're ready and other lessons on living a happy and creative life: Renowned designer and professional hell-raiser James Victore wants to drag you off your couch and throw you headfirst into a life of bold creativity. In Feck Perfuction, Victore will guide you through all the twists, trials, and triumphs of starting your creative career, from finding your voice to picking the right moment to start a project (hint: It's now). Bring your biggest, craziest, most revolutionary ideas, and he will give you the kick in the pants you need to make them real.Filled with humor and stern advice, Feck Perfuction provides "dangerous ideas" for unearthing your authentic self, including "the things that made you weird as a kid make you great today," "the struggle is everything," and many more.No matter what industry or medium you work in, this book will help you live, work, and create freely and fearlessly.James Victore is an award-winning designer for bold believers, an advocate for creativity, a sought after teacher and speaker, and an artist whose work is exhibited around the globe.Fans of Austin Kleon's Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad and Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative will love James Victore's inspiring book on embracing authenticity and unleashing your creative self. Begin before you're ready, live dangerously, take a risk, and other lessons on living a purpose-driven lifeA perfect coffee table or bar top conversation-starting bookMakes a great gift for a new graduate or someone embarking on a personal or professional adventure

Don't Keep Your Day Job: How to Turn Your Passion Into Your Career


Cathy Heller - 2019
    We don't want to just go to work and build someone else's dream, we want to do our life's work. But how do we find out what we're supposed to contribute? What are those key ingredients that push those who succeed to launch their ideas high into the sky, while the rest of us remain stuck on the ground?Don't Keep Your Day Job will get you fired up, ready to rip it open and use your zone of genius to add a little more sparkle to this world. Cathy Heller, host of the popular podcast Don't Keep Your Day Job, shares wisdom, anecdotes, and practical suggestions from successful creative entrepreneurs and experts, including actress Jenna Fischer on rejection, Gretchen Rubin on the keys to happiness, Jen Sincero on having your best badass life, and so much more. You'll learn essential steps like how to build your side hustle, how to find your tribe, how to reach for what you truly deserve, and how to ultimately turn your passion into profit and build a life you love.

The Achievement Habit: Stop Wishing, Start Doing, and Take Command of Your Life


Bernard Roth - 2015
    It’s a muscle, and once you learn how to flex it, you’ll be able to meet life’s challenges and fulfill your goals, Bernard Roth, Academic Director at the Stanford d.school contends.In The Achievement Habit, Roth applies the remarkable insights that stem from design thinking—previously used to solve large scale projects—to help us realize the power for positive change we all have within us. Roth leads us through a series of discussions, stories, recommendations, and exercises designed to help us create a different experience in our lives. He shares invaluable insights we can use to gain confidence to do what we’ve always wanted and overcome obstacles that hamper us from reaching our potential, including:Don’t try—DO; Excuses are self-defeating; Believe you are a doer and achiever and you’ll become one; Build resiliency by reinforcing what you do rather than what you accomplish; Learn to ignore distractions that prevent you from achieving your goals; Become open to learning from your own experience and from those around you; And more.The brain is complex and is always working with our egos to sabotage our best intentions. But we can be mindful; we can create habits that make our lives better. Thoughtful and powerful The Achievement Habit shows you how.

Thinking: The New Science of Decision-Making, Problem-Solving, and Prediction


John Brockman - 2013
    Dennett on decoding the architecture of the "normal" human mindSarah-Jayne Blakemore on mental disorders and the crucial developmental phase of adolescenceJonathan Haidt, Sam Harris, and Roy Baumeister on the science of morality, ethics, and the emerging synthesis of evolutionary and biological thinkingGerd Gigerenzer on rationality and what informs our choices

Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery


Garr Reynolds - 2007
    Presentation Zen challenges the conventional wisdom of making "slide presentations" in today’s world and encourages you to think differently and more creatively about the preparation, design, and delivery of your presentations. Garr shares lessons and perspectives that draw upon practical advice from the fields of communication and business. Combining solid principles of design with the tenets of Zen simplicity, this book will help you along the path to simpler, more effective presentations.--back cover

The Story Factor: Inspiration, Influence, and Persuasion through the Art of Storytelling


Annette Simmons - 2000
    Over one hundred stories drawn from the front lines of business and government, as well as myths, fables, and parables from around the world, illustrate how story can be used to persuade, motivate, and inspire in ways that cold facts, bullet points, and directives can’t. These stories, combined with practical storytelling techniques show anyone how to become a more effective communicator. From “who I am” to “I-know-what-you’re thinking,” Simmons identifies the six stories you need to know how to tell and demonstrates how they can be applied. This revised edition offers a guide to using storytelling in specific business circumstances, including corporate reorganizations, layoffs, and diversity issues.

Storyworthy: Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling


Matthew Dicks - 2018
    

Body of Work: Finding the Thread that Ties Your Career Together


Pamela Slim - 2013
    More and more of us are blending big company jobs, startup gigs, freelance work, and volunteer side projects. We take chances to expand our knowledge, capabilities, and experience. But how do we make sense of that kind of career - and explain it?Pamela Slim, the acclaimed author of Escape from Cubicle Nation, gives us the tools to have meaningful careers in this new world of work. She shows how to find the connections among diverse accomplishments, sell your story, and continually reinvent and relaunch your brand.