I hope this email finds you well and filled with excitement about adding new books to your shelves! I am thrilled to kick off this newsletter and to share my passion for great reads with you! I am so excited to explore new titles together every single Sunday. Reading has been so essential to my learning process, especially down my entrepreneurial journey! Expect a wide array of genres ranging from finance and business, to self-help and spirituality, to romance, and perhaps even some fantasy thrown in for a wild escape!

This week’s book recommendations are packed with value!!!! Here is how it’s going to go:)))

1. What I read last week!

2. What I am currently reading for the week!

3. Books I have my eye on/are on queue for the next read!

P.S. If you’re interested in purchasing the book to enjoy for the week, simply click on the image! Anddd read the entire email for a sincere thank you at the end! ⋆˙⟡♡

What I read last week!

This book was an enjoyable and easy read packed with practical insights and tangible, real-world examples. I found myself very impressed by Noah Kagan’s (AppSumo founder, one of Facebook’s first employees) first book!!!! One key lesson that I took away from Million Dollar Weekend is the significance of cultivating a community prior to launching your business venture. Kagan emphasized the importance of creating a Minimal Viable Product (MVP) as a means to quickly and cheaply test the validity of the solution to your customer’s problem. The book highlighted the common mistake that entrepreneurs make where they invest in product development without first securing a dedicated customer base or community, which can be quite costly and prolong the success of your company. One of the many challenges in the book prompts readers to attempt acquiring their first three customers before investing any time or resources into developing their business. I embraced this challenge and established an MVP for my new project, successfully acquiring three customers using a simple setup involving a Google Forms and Zelle (all free). While it may not have fancy features and certainly doesn’t mark the official launch of my business, this exercise helped validate that there is indeed a market willing to pay for the service. It provided me with the confidence to progress further into the development process.

What I am currently reading for this week!

I am currently almost finished with Atomic Habits which has truly lived up to the hype. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to improve their habits, develop effective systems, and cultivate discipline and consistency in their lives. One of the key insights from the book is the concept of compounding results: if you aim to improve by just 1% each day, you’ll end up 30 times better over the course of a year. James Clear, the author, emphasizes that success is not solely about setting ambitious goals but about building great systems. He writes that you don’t rise to the level of your goals; rather, you fall to the level of your systems, which truly shifted my perspective. Clear suggests that shifting your identity to align with the habits you want to cultivate is crucial. This resonated deeply, as I believe in the power of continuously shifting towards your higher self, while also recognizing that the point of power always resides in the present moment. Personally, I have been diligently working on improving my habits and systems, all of which are aimed at achieving my goals. Clear’s message about consistency and discipline reinforce the notion that with the right habits and systems in place, goals become secondary, as progress becomes automatic through consistent action. The book provides practical strategies for creating and breaking habits, and it goes into depth on each aspect, offering insights that can be implemented immediately. Make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, and make it satisfying. I highly recommend you give this book a read, and download a habit tracker as well on the app store. It’s life changing.

Books that I have my eye on/are on queue for the next read!

What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School and Good to Great were two books recommended in a video posted by Emma Grede, co-founder & CEO of Good American and Founding Partner of Skims! Grede’s work ethic, mindset, and entrepreneurial journey are truly inspiring, making her recommendations invaluable. Out of all the book recommendations in her video shared on Instagram, she emphasized that these two were the ones we should read first. I am beyond excited about reading these!

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But wait, there’s most definitely more!! We’re not stopping at books! From language learning (j’apprends le français), to pilates (Natural Pilates is the best in LA if you needed a rec), to starting a business, (all while being an entrepreneurship student at LMU) I would love to share content detailing my other journeys as well. Let me know what you want to see by hitting reply and sharing your thoughts. Thank you for subscribing to this newsletter, your support means the universe to me. I look forward to building my personal brand with you, publicly.

Here’s to building our personal brands and chasing dreams, one page at a time.

God bless you,

Kendra Fleming

kendrafleming.com

beauty and wellness, entrepreneurship and investing, music and technology