Book Club: Fitting in Is Overrated

To thine own self be true. But can you do that while still being a valued part of the wider community? Or must you always sacrifice your own inclinations and desires to fit in? For anyone who has ever felt like an outsider at work, in groups, in school, or even in your own extended family, help is on the way. Bestselling author Leonard Felder, PhD, has written the first book with advice on how to be successful personally and professionally when you think differently, live differently, create differently, or solve problems differently than those around you. 

This wise and perceptive guide is neither about withdrawing into isolation and passivity, nor about spending every waking hour battling with others. Rather, it’s about choosing wisely when to speak your truth and saying it in a way that gets positive results. Dr. Felder shows exactly how creative, thoughtful, unique individuals can survive and thrive in situations that used to make them shut down or retreat into a shell. He provides actual examples from his own practice and precise techniques that will assure your good ideas, outsider perspective, and innovative solutions are respected and taken seriously, even by rigid people. 

Both inspiring and practical, it offers soothing balm and useful answers for everyone who heard too often during adolescence or young adulthood that “you just don’t fit in”—and for the ones who love and counsel them, too. Even more important, it reveals how the very qualities that made you different can become your greatest strengths and most important gifts to the world.

Dr. Leonard Felder, author of Fitting in is Overrated, spent the last week blogging for Jewcy.  In that time, he suggested that Jews should take a second look at McCain and Palin before getting deeper into bed with them, congratulated those of us who have strayed from the Jewish path in search of deeper enlightenment, offered his insights on how to stay healthy, positive, and persistent when your good ideas are being opposed or dismissed, reminded us how important our roots are, and told us all to stop being such damn people-pleasers.  Want more?  Check out his excellent book.