Reading Cultural-Historical Activity Theory

I don't remember how I came across the Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT). Probably from reading Vygotsky's Mind In Society, and then discursively reached the more recent works by Engestrom et al.

So far, CHAT is the most appealing theoretical framework to me because it is bold enough to encompass all the elements in life: subject, community, division of labor, rule, instrument, object, and outcome. The nature of this theory requires that researchers have sharp insights to identify the components of an activity system and detect its multi-directional dynamics.

This is hard!!! I tried to look at the case of Pair Programming through its lens, and I constantly got stuck while I sometimes felt illuminated somehow......

Perhaps I simply need to read more, read all the original works, and then see how confused I can be.