Looking for tips for my self improvement book club. First meet is soon!

[Jack_Nimble]

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.

Spoiler: Group description

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!

 

[ebg]

I want to applaud you for the great initiative and challenging your discomfort with leading a group ^_^ You have what is most important in life - initiative. One suggestion I have is that the focus may be a bit broad. I have learned that having a good structure is very conducive to the success of any initiative. But that will become developed as time goes on. For clubs at my university, they all need a constitution that outlines the mission of the club, executive positions and their responsibilities, how to handle club elections, etc. There's a meditation place in my town that does has weekly meditation sessions and weekly book club meetings the day after. Maybe you could implement a short meditation session before each meeting? To help with funding, you could offer the sessions for free but accept donations (to help with renting a meeting space, initiatives within the club, etc.) I was thinking too that there could be a talking session, where everyone brings up whatever is on their mind. Please update us on how it goes! Good luck

 

[Hvergelmir]

I am open to any and all suggestions about how you would like such a group to operate if you were to attend.

I suggest that you keep posting updates here. I think quite a few people could be interested in your book recommendations and the insights you get.
Likewise I think you might get valuable feedback and ideas from people, here.

If I were to recommend a book that I think would be universally applicable, it would be 'the Art of Learning' by Josh Waitzkin.
I'm a bit afraid of recommending self help resources, because it's so much about timing and personal preference. I don't want to help pushing pseudo scientific nonsense, but neither to I believe in dry science for self reflection and change.
I think the book is a pretty safe bet, though. It's not about self help, but an interesting story which happened to help me deal with burnout and related depression 10-15 years ago.

 

[Jack_Nimble]

Bad news. The one person who did show up has since removed herself from group on meetup. Even though it was just me and one other person who showed up I really felt it went well, and I still think it did. It started with her asking why I was doing this. I had said I wanted a community of people who wanted to do better without religion being the main focus. She agreed. We talked about our failed attempts to locally find community in the past.

I mentioned I deal with depression. She mentioned CPTSD and suggested I may deal with that as well. Which was a real downer to read about honestly. It did seem quite fitting for myself but also it kinda seemed like just a more complex explanation of my cause of depression.

She and I talked for an hour and fifteen minutes. We did talk about some books including The Art of Learning. She said let's keep in touch on meetup. I said yeah we can pick a book or two within the next couple of days. Then I checked meetup this morning and she has removed herself from group.

There are three other members in the group online. One other RSVPed but didn't make it. Another comment e saying she couldn't make it that day but wanted to know what book was selected so she could keep up. I'm considering messaging her letting her know that no book was selected and the one who showed up has left group. Then asking her if there is a topic she would like to read into. I'm really not sure if that's a good idea though.

I'm crying a little bit now. Not just cause of this. But I've been mentally going downhill the past few weeks. Been prob more than a year since I've declined idk really. I figure I'll prob get over this within a few hours. I'm waiting to hear back today from a job I've accepted about what day I will start. I also have a job interview with another company this afternoon.

There is someone in a dating app I'm supposed to meet this Saturday. I really feel the need to message her and let her know I'm in no shape for dating. I feel that would be more honest. It's that or ghost her. I feel meeting her would be dishonest and misleading.

I'm just so sick of living. So sick of it.

I'm incredibly desperate for reliable non religious non political community. I'm considering checking out my local Universal Unitarianism church. I don't think they're really either of those things but idk. Can't hurt to check em out once I suppose.

Maybe now is a prime time for me to read The Art of Learning. Also considering Transcendental Meditation.

I just think there is no fixing or even helping my broken brain. Maybe I'm wrong but I think that requires other people in my life. Which is hard to find especially considering my fear of abandonment leading to avoidance.

Thank you for reading. I hope I don't sound selfish.

 

[Hvergelmir]

I'm considering messaging her letting her know that no book was selected and the one who showed up has left group. Then asking her if there is a topic she would like to read into.

Sounds transparent and honest.

With a niche group like this, I'm not surprised that it went the way it did.
The one who did show up might very well, simply have lost faith in the "group", with just you two showing up. There could also be any number of personal reasons. Ghosting is sadly the way most people prefer to leave things nowadays.

You have to decide for yourself if the focus of the group is too niche to work with or not.
I have some experience with starting very niche online gaming groups. Attendance is generally very low, and it often takes some time for an established core group to form.
Also consider joining an established group, that you find interesting. It could be anything, not even related to your core interests.