Invitation to Book Launch Team or International Advisory Board
Hello there,
I would like to invite you to join a new group I´m forming: either the new Book Launch Team (BLT) for my new book, Love and Suffering: Break the Emotional Chains that Prevent You from Experiencing Love, which was just published on April 2nd, or the International Advisory Board (IAB) we are forming for the nonprofit organization that I run, The Center for Social Leadership.
Why Now?
Consider the direction our global society has been moving in for quite some time now: Economic disparities have widened at an unprecedented pace and scale. In the 29 years from 1989 to 2018, CEOs went from earning 58 times as much as the average employee’s salary to 278 times their salary. Civic institutions have been shuttered and we have become shuttered. Children in the UK, for instance, now spend less time outside than prison inmates. Politicians are rewarded for dividing us: a Cambridge University study found that negative, hostile messages attacking an outgroup are twice as frequently shared or retweeted as messages toward one’s ingroup. Development assistance and aid for those in need in developing countries and impoverished regions of our own cities and towns has precipitously declined.
As a consequence, we have become more individualistic, socially isolated and lonely. Based on the UCLA Loneliness Scale, over three of every five Americans now feel socially isolated from others. It’s a global epidemic: in Australia, 62 percent of young adults and 46 percent of the elderly are now lonely. Three of every 4 people in Britain do not know the names of their neighbors. Crimes among the elderly in Japan have increased by 400 percent over the past two decades, as at least in prison there are people to talk to and one is not ignored. Innumerable people now feel psychologically, economically, socially and/or politically not included, not valued and not respected. These feelings, as I have found in my recent research, lead to the experience of high levels of loneliness.
I do not wish to capitalize on this suffering. In our current environment (and, yes, I am lonely too sometimes), I have written this book (please take a look at Love and Suffering on Amazon to see what it’s all about) as a small way to help us expand our love for each other, and have decided that 100 percent of my proceeds from Love and Suffering (and all of my future books) will be donated to nonprofit education programs in Africa and Latin America. This social initiative can only work if each of us plays a role. This is where you come in.
What Does Being a Member of the Book Launch Team Require
Me to Do?
As a member of the Book Launch Team, your role would be one of
the following:
1) Reviewer and Supporter | Purchase Love and Suffering on Amazon (about $15) and then write a “verified” review, which looks better on Amazon. Your review doesn’t have to be long—even a few sentences is sufficient.
2) Reviewer | Receive a free Advance Reader Copy of Love and Suffering and write an Amazon review after reading it.
Then, if you feel so inclined (but not required, don’t worry 😊), you can ask some friends to also write a review of Love and Suffering.
How Would I Be Making a Social Impact by Joining The Center for Social Leadership’s Book Launch Team or International Advisory Board?
Both the BLT and IAB play a pivotal role in the development of The Center for Social Leadership’s (CSL) programs that:
(1) teach leadership to and build the capacity of nonprofit organizations – see the thousands of nonprofit organizations from over 30 countries whose leaders have participated in CSL’s Certificate of Executive Nonprofit Leadership program and read their testimonials and evaluations, including the 4 annual programs I currently teach pro-bono each year in Mexico City, Kenya, Rome and Amsterdam.
(2) teach low-income, disadvantaged youth worldwide the leadership skills they need to become economically self-sufficient (read testimonials and evaluations from the over 500 disadvantaged youth who have participated in CSL’s Young Leaders Program over the past two decades).
Both the BLT and IAB will help give wings to Love and Suffering, the sales of which is one of our primary means of raising funds for the nonprofit education programs that CSL offers in Africa and Latin America.
What are the Benefits to Me of Joining either the BLT or IAB?
By joining the Center for Social Leadership’s Book Launch Team, you will receive a special 10% discount for the exclusive Love Progression Series (a $245 value). If, on the other hand, you join the International Advisory Board, you will receive an IAB-members-only 100-percent-free invitation to join the Love Progression Series (IAB members recruit at least five friends over the next year to review Love and Suffering).
The Love Progression Series includes five 1.5-hour interactive videoconferencing sessions; a Love Progression Series workbook with additional exercises not in Love and Suffering; over 2.5 hours of video in which
I share additional stories, the latest psychological research studies and new information that expands on the four “plateaus” of the Love Progression Model—acceptance, forgiveness, gratitude and love—that you will permanently own;
and opportunities to make friends and expand your social network with other participants.
In addition, if you join the IAB, we will have an annual videoconferencing IAB meeting to discuss CSL’s progress in Africa and Latin America and so you can meet other IAB members. If you are considering which to join—the BLT or IAB—our suggestion is one of the following:
1) If you are enthusiastic about joining the IAB, go for it! Spend just five
minutes doing the brief application and wait for your hopeful acceptance
letter from Gerard.
2) If you’re on the fence, join the BLT by spending only a few minutes on the brief application and wait for your hopeful acceptance letter from Gerard. Then, if you feel motivated to do so—but no pressure—after you write your review, ask your friends to do the same (by forwarding this email, for instance) and join the IAB.
If you have further questions about the Book Launch Team or International Advisory Board, please contact Gerard Corr (cc’d), our volunteer coordinator
for both the BLT and IAB, at [email protected] or +1-778-347-5418 (phone/Whatsapp). (We are all volunteers in this social change initiative,
including me.)
I would love for you to join us and hope you will consider it.
Warm regards,
Anthony Silard
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