I swear this happened pretty much exactly as I’m about to describe it.

I had parked on a back street a few blocks from Betabrand, a nice leafy residential street. No one around. On my way back up the hill I was thinking about books I should read. This is an internal dialog I have often and it’s why I have a huge pile of unread books next to me now. But there were a few issues I really wanted to get some insight about:

Why it’s important for human beings to believe — Jonathan Haidt’s TED talk didn’t exactly start this, it has been on-going, obviously, for someone who makes a living understanding the importance of belief, but it brought it front of mind. Need to get into this more.

The rise of value-based branding — everyone’s doing the purpose thing now, aren’t they. Even though we’ve been at it for over a decade I feel a little exposed when I talk about it now. I wanted to go deeper on that, take it up (or down) a level.

The role of mythology in branding — am currently working on video games and learning more about archetypes through that process, so that’s what prompted that to come up.

Edward do Bono’s techniques — in said workshop related to gaming, a client asked me if I’d ever studied De Bono’s techniques. I had, but it was so long ago I could use a brush up if he’s going to be quizzing me on it.

Seth Godin — how does he get so much done, the bugger?

Facilitation — am I really as good at it as I think I am. Surely there are people who really know how to do it?

So then I turn the corner and someone’s having one of those ‘leave a box of old books on the sidewalk’ yard sale type of thing and lying there were these six books. Honestly.

Now, I work with a coach who is always telling me that we create our own reality. But this? I don’t think she had something so specific in mind.

Which one should I read first? They clearly all will have huge significance for me.