Even in this digital world we live in, it still feels good to pick up interesting books. There are tons on my bookshelves that I enjoy dipping back into. Here are some of my personal favourites and why I recommend them.
Starting with straight forward practical solutions. The first books on this list offer concepts and strategies for starting, building and developing an idea, project or business. Further down the list we move into the realm of personal and spiritual development and include a few books that offer alternative ways of thinking or viewing the world.
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Start With Why : Simon Sinek
Categories: Business Development / Management / Branding / Marketing
Book Description: The book explores how great leaders inspire people to take action and asks why some peopl e and organizations are more inventive, pioneering and successful than others.
Why I like it: It’s great for getting you thinking about your business from the perspective of why you are in business and what is the bigger purpose of what you offer.
The One Thing : Gary Keller & Jay Papasan
Categories: Business Productivity / Focus / Achieving Goals
Description: If you want more productivity from your work, more satisfaction in your life and more time with friends and family. This book teaches you how to achieve it by cutting out the clutter and focussing on one thing at time.
Why I like it: As someone who enjoys variety and has a tendency to flit from thing to thing, this book gives me practical tools and a solid reminder of the importance of committing to one thing at a time.
How To Be F*cking Awesome : Dan Meredith
Categories: Entrepreneurship / Business Development
Description: If you prefer a down to earth attitude, and don’t hold much merit with law of attraction theories then this book might be just up your street. Dan Meredith is the power behind Coffee With Dan, one of the largest free entrepreneurial groups in Facebook.
Why I like it: Dan has one of those characters that is larger than life, he’s outspoken and frivolous but has a heart of gold and gets stuff done! His book includes practical advice and tips for build a successful business.
Ask : Ryan Levesque
Categories: Business Development / Marketing
Description: This book provides powerful strategies for discovering exactly what people want and how to give it in a way that makes them ‘fall in love‘ with you and your company.
Why I like it: Ask introduces the principles and use of surveys to discover buyer intent. It covers the tools required to test the market before developing a product or service.
Key Person of Influence : Daniel Preistley
Categories: Business Development / Marketing / Personal Branding
Description: Your ability to succeed in business often depends on your ability to influence. But it doesn’t take decades of hard work, academic qualifications or a generous measure of good luck to become a Key Person of Influence. There is a strategy to fast-track your way to the inner circle of the industry you love and this book show you the way.
Why I like it: Although my version of the book is 10 years old the principles are still current. It covers the process of building a personal brand using online tools, techniques and marketing channels very effectively.
80/20 Sales And Marketing : Perry Marshall
Categories: Business Development / Marketing / Productivity
Description: Learn how to cut your work in half and double your sales by applying the 80/20 rule to zero in on the right 20% of your market.
Why I like it: Perry Marshall is a marketer famous for his work with Google Adwords. He noticed that some ads. did better than others and realised that it was to do with the 80/20 principle that he explains in the book. I have since discovered for myself how it affects every aspect of business and personal life and is something that is now so familiar to me I am surprised when others aren’t aware of it.
The 12 Week Year : Brian P Moran & Michael Lennington
Categories: Business Development / Productivity / Achieving Goals
Description: The 12 week year takes a process used by world class athletes and translates it into an effective strategy for business and everyday life. It shows you how to develop clarity and focus on what matters. Breaking the year down into 12 week cycles provides a healthy sense of urgency to get things done.
Why I like it: If you are someone that likes to achieve goals this book provides a wonderful exploration of the goal setting and achievement process. It breaks the year down into four sections to maximize productivity.
Stop Procrastinating Start Living : Gemma Ray
Categories: Personal Development / Goal Achievement
Description: Gemma Ray is a professional broadcaster, communications coach and leading speaker on discipline, productivity and procrastination for real people with real struggles. In this book she brings her personal experience, research and refreshingly honest anecdotal observations on how to beat procrastination and boost productivity for self care and success.
Why I like it: Gemma Ray is a down to earth, say it like it is author who writes books to solve her own problems. She’s a self professed procrastinator and wrote this book to get her life together. She is a personal friend and podcast guest who I admire.
Goal Mapping : Brian Mayne
Categories: Business Development / Personal Development / Goal Achievement
Description: Setting goals is something we do naturally with varying levels of success. Becoming a master at goal setting is the first step in mastering life. Brian Mayne’s Goal Mapping system utilises seven key processes to stimulate whole brain activity and harness the necessary components of conscious intent. By constructing personalised goal maps that combine words and pictures you create your own unique blueprint for future success.
Why I like it: I have had the good fortune to work directly with Brian and have used his online Goal Mapping tools with great success. This, combined with his fascinating life story is what prompted me to invite him to share his tools with us in the 2020 Spirit-duality event. He is someone who has great integrity and this is reflected in his work.
Playing The Matrix : Mike Dooley
Categories: Manifestation / Personal Development / Conscious Creation
Description: This is a master class for creating the life you want to live that offers a simple yet unexpected concept for creating major life changes. Mike clearly reveals why manifesting sometimes works with incredible ease and why it sometimes doesn’t work at all.
Why I like it: Mike’s story is a wonderful exploration of how manifestation is possible. The book outlines the principles that were later included in the film The Secret.
Meditate : Talwinder Sidhu
Categories: Meditation / Personal Development
Description: At the age of 25 Talwinder Sidhu started his career as a life coach and found his passion in offering meditation instruction to his clients. Through teaching meditation, he has helped hundreds of people get out of unhealthy relationships, manage mental health issues without medication, start careers, launch businesses and explore their inner spirituality.
Why I like it: Talwinder (also known as Terry) contacted me to speak on the podcast. At the time of writing this I am half way through the book and his podcast interview is yet to be broadcast (it’s scheduled for August 2020). Terry brings a clear, easily understood way of writing and sharing his perspective on meditation.
The Surrender Experiment : Michael A. Singer
Categories: Personal Development / Meditation / Mindfulness / Auto Biography
Description: The Surrender Experiment is Michael Singer’s personal life story from his solitary years living in the woods, to a successful career as a computer programmer, the FBI raid that led to unfounded accusations by the US government, and the growth of a spiritual community back in the woods he loved. It includes lessons about putting aside conflicting beliefs, letting go of fears and transforming misdirected desires into a new way of living in a perpetual state of happiness.
Why I like it: This is an extraordinary life story from the point when Michael Singer first started meditating in the woods, covering a 20 year period up to the final court case that coincided with the publication of his other book: The Untethered Soul.
Love Money, Money Loves You : Sarah McCrum
Categories: Money / Abundance / Manifestation / Personal Development
Description: Instead of thinking about money as a ‘thing’ to be acquired, spent or saved, Sarah’s book introduces money as a flowing, loving energy that is abundant and creative and invites you into a dialogue to discover what this means for you.
Why I like it: Sarah took us through a process to ‘have a conversation‘ with money in our Spirit-duality event that was both surprising and revealing. Personally I am still working with the principles of the book, but having met Sarah, discovering how the book came about and what it has taught her, I am keen to follow it through.
One Thought That Changes Everything : Mara Gleason
Categories: Mindset / The Three Principles / Oneness / Personal Development
Description: One Thought Changes Everything asserts the bold notion that every problem we believe we face in the world is actually a problem in our thinking. She draws us to a clear understanding of how our thinking creates our reality, enabling us to gain new insights into how changing our thinking we have the power to change our reality.
Why I like it: This book goes beyond the usual concepts of consciousness and thinking to explore concepts such as who is doing the thinking and where do ideas and thoughts come from.
The Power of Letting Go : John Purkiss
Categories: Mindfulness / Meditation / Personal Development
Description: The Power of Letting Go is about releasing the things we hold on to and learning to live more intuitively. Letting Go shows us how to be present, enjoy each moment and surrender to something far more intelligent than your brain.
Why I like it: This book is about dropping the stories. It’s full of practical exercises to find clarity and let go of beliefs and patterns that stop you achieving what you desire. It’s more about life than business, but there is a lot that can be effectively applied to work situations. Listen to my podcast interview with John HERE
The Untethered Soul : Michael A. Singer
Categories: Personal Development / Meditation / Consciousness
Description: What would it be like to be free from limitations and sour beyond your boundaries? What can you do each day to find this kind of inner peace and freedom? The Untethered Soul offers a simple, profoundly intuitive answer to these questions.
Why I like it: It offers a spiritual perspective for freeing yourself from habitual thinking. In addition to the concepts it covers, I was intrigued by the fact that it was written while the author was under federal investigation for something he hadn’t done and was actively applying the skills he teaches in the book to the situation he was in.
Ikigai : Hector Garcia & Fransesc-Miralles
Categories: Personal Development / Self Awareness / Life Purpose
Description: You have a purpose in life. Your skills, your interests, your desires and your history have made you the perfect candidate for something. All you have to do is find it, and it’s easier than you might think.
Why I like it: Ikigai explores the Japanese principles of living a good life. The principle is that when you find what you love, what you’re good at, what the world needs and what you can get paid for, that is your Ikigai. I came across this as a diagram and it inspired me to buy the book to discover more about the principle and it’s origins.
The Artist’s Way : Julia Cameron
Categories: Art / Creativity / Self Expression / Personal Development
Description: Written for artists and writers to break through barriers and build creative freedom, Julia Cameron guides readers to uncover the problems and pressure points that may be restricting their creative flow and offers techniques that open up opportunities for growth and self-discovery. The Artist’s Way helps you back on track, rediscover your passion and take steps to change your life.
Why I like it: This book is a little off my usual topic but he reason it’s included amongst the books I recommend is because the chapter on writing Morning Pages is one of the most profound tools in my personal tool kit.
The Brain : David Eagleman
Categories: Neuroscience / Personal Development
Description: Written by a renowned neuroscientist, this book is the story of how your life shapes your brain, and how your brain shapes your life. It takes us into the worlds of extreme sports, criminal justice, genocide, brain surgery, robotics and the search for immortality.
Why I like it: This is a practical description of how the brain works from a medical perspective. But it also deals with thinking and how we take in information. It is a fascinating insight into what makes us tick.
Evolution 2.0 : Perry Marshall
Categories: Spirituality / The Meaning Of Life
Description: Drawing on the latest scientific discoveries, Evolution 2.0 meticulously researches evidence of evolution in an intensely thought provoking way. Effectively offering a paradigm shift in the battle between Darwinist and Creationist theories.
Why I like it: In Evolution 2.0 Perry Marshal takes us on a journey to explore the origins of DNA and how it fits into evolution. It covers aspects of Spirituality V Atheism at a very deep investigative level. It’s fascinating and implications provide a lot of food for thought.
Check out the podcast posts for more good reads from my Podcast Guests, or follow this link to some of their publications.