Standing On Business & Living Your Values Out Loud | Choosing To Support Local Businesses Over Amazon

In the ever growing presence of oligarchies backed by billionaires and/or mega-corporations (many of which are owned by those same billionaires), I have come to the decision to practice one of the main pillars I attempt to advocate for & encourage to my own clients is to always do their best to act in accordance with their values, even in the presence of uncomfortable thoughts & feelings. Often the only way to stand up for our values is to do it when it is uncomfortable.

Because of the increasingly volatile, Constitution-ignoring, & historical environment we all find ourselves in (unfortunately), I am making the choice to no longer offer Amazon affiliate links for books that I recommend to both clients and clinicians through the Resources page of my website. While I'm not foolish enough to think I am dealing some kind of fatal blow to Jeff Bezos' pocketbook, I also can not in good conscience continue to line his pockets with any more money, even if it is a handful of copper pennies.

Instead, I will make the more values-consistent choice to continue offering my affiliate links through my Bookshop.org setup, where I have lists set up of books I recommend both for clients/self-help, as well as clinicians/practitioners. Many of them are the exact same books I had listed for the Amazon list. The only difference is that instead of supporting a faceless mega-corporation, you instead get to support a local bookstore of your choosing, which I think we can all agree is a way better option.

In the interest of transparency, I do still get a small kickback if you do choose to buy a book from one of the links on my Bookshop.org lists. To be completely honest with you though, one of the major reasons I use them is not even the affiliate/kickback part of the process, it is because it makes it incredibly easy to make lists of books I recommend for people, which is an incredible blessing for a lazy ADHD soul like myself. So if you see a book on there that you are interested in, but want to buy it somewhere else, please feel free to do so! I am more excited about you choosing to get the book, not if I get money from the event.

If you do choose to buy a book though, please let me know what you think about it! If you love it, if you hate it, or even if it was just kind of "meh" for you, I would love to hear about it! Additionally, if you look at my lists and your immediate thought is "I can not believe that Jared never thought to include (INSERT THE NAME OF BOOK YOU THINK IS AMAZING), what an idiot!". Please drop me a line and let me know! I love hearing about new books. It nourishes my soul and fills up my bookshelves with more books to eventually read one day in the future (that list never stops growing unfortunately...)