Self Improvement Books
I’ve always been a fan of personal development books. I feel happiest when I know that I am growing
So one of the best ways for me to consistently learn and grow is by reading personal development books.
- Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes Into Stepping Stones for Success by John C.Maxwell What it’s about: Topping the list of motivational books, Failing Forward teaches that failure is an indication that you are making progress.
In fact, the amount of times you fail in the next 12 months is directly correlated to how successful you will be in the coming years.
One of the best lessons in this book is: “Failure isn’t the opposite of success, but the road to it.”
Maxwell provides you with practical lessons on how to turn mistakes into stepping stones.
He teaches that failure is an inside job. That the difference between the average person and those that achieve greatness is how they view and respond to failure.
2. Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (Harper Perennial Modern Classics) by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
What it’s about: This personal development book is filled with insight. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi devotes a big part of this book to the idea that:
“A person can make himself happy or miserable, regardless of what is actually happening ‘outside’, just by changing the contents of his consciousness.”
He then proceeds by quoting Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and Viktor Frankl, proving that this idea has been around for a long time.
Consider this book to be the handbook on happiness.
Csikszentmihalyi essentially defines happiness, then proceeds to explain how you can achieve it by putting yourself in a state of optimal experience called Flow.
Flow is the state in which you are so involved in an activity that nothing else matters.
In Flow state, your concentration is so intense that no attention is given to outside problems and your sense of time gets positively distorted.
3. The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene
What it’s about: Power is an essential part of life. In his personal development book, Greene gives you 48 Laws of Power that you can recognize and apply at any point in your life.
This book is a compilation of tactics to help you achieve more and avoid mistakes as you climb through life.
This is highly recommended for people who want to gain power, keep power, and protect it from those trying to manipulate you.
4. Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time by Brain Tracy
What it’s about: In this personal development book, Tracy provides you with 21 different strategies for overcoming procrastination.
This is a great book for getting motivated, holding yourself accountable, and keeping your eye on the prize.
It teaches you to eat the frog first thing in the morning – meaning that you should do the most vital task of the day first thing.
5. Jonathan Livingston Seagull: A Story by Richard Bach
- With lines like: “Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation,” this book will move you deeply. I re-read it in Thailand. Still amazingly good.
