Must Read Books

After decades of research, world-renowned Stanford University psychologist Carol S. Dweck, PhD, discovered a simple but groundbreaking idea: the power of mindset. In this brilliant book, she shows how success in school, work, sports, the arts, and almost every area of human endeavor can be dramatically influenced by how we think about our talents and abilities. People with a fixed mindset – those who believe that abilities are fixed – are less likely to flourish than those with a growth mindset – those who believe that abilities can be developed.

Mindset reveals how great parents, teachers, managers, and athletes can put this idea to use to foster outstanding accomplishments.

A writer of the same class as Napoleon Hill, Norman Vincent Peale, and Dale Carnegie, Dr. Joseph Murphy has helped millions of readers and listeners to harness the immense power of their subconscious minds to positively influence their lives. By showing how simply changing your thinking can produce dramatic changes, Dr. Murphy demonstrates that the strength of the unconscious mind is almost limitless.

By focusing your mental will, you can achieve professional success, build wealth, strengthen personal and professional relationships, build your self-confidence, and even bring about changes to your physical well-being – all through the power of the mind. With practical and approachable lessons, Dr. Murphy shows that the power to change your life lies within you.

Internationally renowned psychiatrist, Viktor E. Frankl, endured years of unspeakable horror in Nazi death camps. During, and partly because of, his suffering, Dr. Frankl developed a revolutionary approach to psychotherapy known as logotherapy. At the core of his theory is the belief that man’s primary motivational force is his search for meaning.

Man’s Search for Meaning is more than a story of Viktor E. Frankl’s triumph: it is a remarkable blend of science and humanism and an introduction to the most significant psychological movement of our day.

The lack of personal accountability is a problem that has resulted in an epidemic of blame, complaining, and procrastination. No organization or individual can achieve goals, compete in the marketplace, fulfill a vision, or develop people and teams without personal accountability.

John G. Miller believes that the troubles that plague organizations cannot be solved by pointing fingers and blaming others. Rather, the real solutions are found when each of us recognizes the power of personal accountability. In QBQ! The Question Behind the Question, Miller explains how negative, inappropriate questions like “why do we have to go through all this change?” and “who dropped the ball?” represent a lack of personal accountability. Conversely, when we ask better questions, QBQs, such as “what can I do to contribute?” or “how can I help solve the problem?” our lives and our organizations are transformed.

The Daily Stoic offers a daily devotional of Stoic insights and exercises, featuring all-new translations from Emperor Marcus Aurelius, playwright Seneca, and slave-turned-philosopher Epictetus as well as lesser-known luminaries like Zeno, Cleanthes, and Musonius Rufus.

Every day of the year, you’ll find one of their pithy, powerful quotations as well as historical anecdotes, provocative commentary, and a helpful glossary of Greek terms. By following these teachings over the course of a year (and, indeed, for years to come), you’ll find the serenity, self-knowledge, and resilience you need to live well.

In The Four Agreements, don Miguel Ruiz reveals the source of self-limiting beliefs that rob us of joy and create needless suffering. Based on ancient Toltec wisdom, the “The Four Agreements“ offer a powerful code of conduct that can rapidly transform our lives to a new experience of freedom, true happiness, and love.

Don Miguel Ruiz has dedicated his life to sharing the wisdom of the ancient Toltec. For more than two decades, he has guided others toward their personal freedom. Today, he continues to combine his unique blend of ancient wisdom and modern-day awareness through journeys to sacred sites around the world.

Never Split the Difference takes you inside the world of high-stakes negotiations and into Voss’ head, revealing the skills that helped him and his colleagues succeed where it mattered most: in saving lives. In this practical guide, he shares the nine effective principles – counterintuitive tactics and strategies – you, too, can use to become more persuasive in both your professional and personal lives.

In Tell to Win, Guber shows how to move beyond soulless PowerPoint slides, facts, and figures to create purposeful stories that can serve as powerful calls to action. Among his techniques:

*Capture your audience’s attention first, fast and foremost
*Motivate your listeners by demonstrating authenticity
*Build your tell around “what’s in it for them”
*Change passive listeners into active participants
*Use “state-of-the-heart” technology online and offline to make sure audience commitment remains strong

Dr. Joe, author of the New York Times bestseller You Are the Placebo as well as Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself and Evolve Your Brain, draws on up-to-the-minute research in neuroscience, epigenetics, and quantum physics to show how this kind of transformation takes place and what it can mean for our lives.

Dr. Joe offers nothing less than a program for stepping outside our physical reality and into a new world. ‘This is who we really are,’ he writes, ‘and this is the future I’m creating-one in which each and every one of us becomes supernatural.’

Whether they are corporate professionals, budding entrepreneurs, or they own a home business, most people are looking to achieve more in less time, while earning enough money to live comfortably.

This book reveals the proven techniques thousands of people have used to attain all of the money they wanted while living healthy, happy and balanced lives. The Power of Focus, the new blockbuster from the coauthors of the bestselling Chicken Soup for the Soul, is a practical no-nonsense guide that shows readers how to reach their business, personal and financial goals without getting burned out in the process.

How leaders can achieve something meaningful--transform a brand, a workplace, a technology, themselves--beyond holding an influential position.
Do you want to do work that is worthy of your time and talent? Do you want to make your mark on your industry, company, or within your community? Are you satisfied with the fact that reengineering, quality improvements, and other changes never really make a lasting impact?

Then you need to go beyond the techniques of improvement and learn the skills that it takes to be extraordinary. The power to be extraordinary is not one we are born with. Rather, it is a power that one can learn, and Tracy Goss helps executives realize this power. Here in this book for the first time, Goss makes her coursework available to the general reader.

“I set out to write a book about what to do to make a great work of art. Instead, it revealed itself to be a book on how to be.” —Rick Rubin

The Creative Act is a beautiful and generous course of study that illuminates the path of the artist as a road we all can follow. It distills the wisdom gleaned from a lifetime’s work into a luminous reading experience that puts the power to create moments—and lifetimes—of exhilaration and transcendence within closer reach for all of us.

“I used to drink,” writes John Bradshaw, “to solve the problems caused by drinking. The more I drank to relieve my shame-based loneliness and hurt, the more I felt ashamed.”

Shame is the motivator behind our toxic behaviors: the compulsion, co-dependency, addiction and drive to superachieve that breaks down the family and destroys personal lives. This book has helped millions identify their personal shame, understand the underlying reasons for it, address these root causes and release themselves from the shame that binds them to their past failures.

"Learning to trust is one of life's most difficult lessons. That’s because trust is not a verb; it’s a noun. But what if the real problem is not that we can’t trust other people; it’s that we can’t trust ourselves?"

Iyanla explores what trust really is and reveals why some of the most shocking trust violations offer us profound opportunities for personal growth and healing. Her pragmatic trust prescriptions—rooted in self-awareness, intuition, communication, and spiritual practice—will challenge you to face your deepest fears and free you to cultivate new levels of increased authenticity, greater resilience, renewed peace, and joy.

Stephen Cope says that in order to have a fulfilling life you must discover the deep purpose hidden at the very core of your self. The secret to unlocking this mystery, he asserts, can be found in the pages of a two-thousand-year-old spiritual classic called the Bhagavad Gita—an ancient allegory about the path to dharma, told through a timeless dialogue between the fabled archer, Arjuna, and his divine mentor, Krishna.

Cope takes readers on a step-by-step tour of this revered tale and highlights well-known Western lives that embody its central principles—including such luminaries as Jane Goodall, Walt Whitman, Susan B. Anthony, John Keats, and Harriet Tubman, along with stories of ordinary people as well. If you’re feeling lost in your own life’s journey, The Great Work of Your Life may help you to find and to embrace your true calling.

How do we make sense of our lives when our world seems to be falling apart?

This beautifully written guide from scholar and teacher Stephen Cope shows that crises don’t have to derail us from our purpose—they can actually help us to find our purpose and step forward as our best selves.

In this sequel to his best-loved book, The Great Work of Your Life, Cope again takes the ancient yogic text the Bhagavad Gita—the epic narrative of the warrior Arjuna’s odyssey of self-discovery—as a roadmap for our journey to our own true calling. Then he builds on that foundation using the stories and teachings of famous figures, as well as stories of ordinary people and his own rich personal experience. 

As a professional baseball player, Jim Murphy's sense of worth revolved around results. He was focused on achievement but also afraid of failure. When he started coaching professional and Olympic athletes, he often encountered the same mindset. He became obsessed with learning how the best in the world performed with poise under pressure.

After years of research, Murphy had a revelatory insight: the pursuit of extraordinary performance and the pursuit of an exceptional life are the same path.

Merging two decades of research and interviews with top athletes and leaders with this training system, Inner Excellence will put you on a path towards a more satisfactory and joyful life.

Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors integrates a neurobiologically informed understanding of trauma, dissociation, and attachment with a practical approach to treatment, all communicated in straightforward language accessible to both client and therapist. Readers will be exposed to a model that emphasizes "resolution"--a transformation in the relationship to one's self, replacing shame, self-loathing, and assumptions of guilt with compassionate acceptance. Its unique interventions have been adapted from a number of cutting-edge therapeutic approaches, including Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Internal Family Systems, mindfulness-based therapies, and clinical hypnosis.

The first definitive guide to using the wisdom of the Enneagram for spiritual and psychological growth

“A clear path for personal and spiritual evolution.”—Harville Hendrix, Ph.D., author of Getting the Love You Want

The ancient symbol of the Enneagram has become one of today's most popular systems for self-understanding, based on nine distinct personality types. Now, two of the world's foremost Enneagram authorities introduce a powerful new way to use the Enneagram as a tool for personal transformation and development. Whatever your spiritual background, the Enneagram shows how you can overcome your inner barriers, realize your unique gifts and strengths, and discover your deepest direction in life. 

“Believing that something is wrong with us is a deep and tenacious suffering,” says Tara Brach at the start of this illuminating book. 

This suffering emerges in crippling self-judgments and conflicts in our relationships, in addictions and perfectionism, in loneliness and overwork—all the forces that keep our lives constricted and unfulfilled. Radical Acceptance offers a path to freedom, including the day-to-day practical guidance developed over Dr. Brach’s forty years of work with therapy clients and Buddhist students.

"My Grandmother's Hands will change the direction of the movement for racial justice."- Robin DiAngelo, New York Times bestselling author of White Fragility

In this groundbreaking book, therapist Resmaa Menakem examines the damage caused by racism in America from the perspective of trauma and body-centered psychology.

The body is where our instincts reside and where we fight, flee, or freeze, and it endures the trauma inflicted by the ills that plague society. Menakem argues this destruction will continue until Americans learn to heal the generational anguish of white supremacy, which is deeply embedded in all our bodies. Our collective agony doesn't just affect African Americans. White Americans suffer their own secondary trauma as well. So do blue Americans--our police.

Thinking in Systems is a concise and crucial book offering insight for problem solving on scales ranging from the personal to the global. Edited by the Sustainability Institute’s Diana Wright, this essential primer brings systems thinking out of the realm of computers and equations and into the tangible world, showing readers how to develop the systems-thinking skills that thought leaders across the globe consider critical for 21st-century life.

In a world growing ever more complicated, crowded, and interdependent, Thinking in Systems helps readers avoid confusion and helplessness, the first step toward finding proactive and effective solutions.

Think and Grow Rich has been called the “Granddaddy of All Motivational Literature.” It was the first book to boldly ask, “What makes a winner?” The man who asked and listened for the answer, Napoleon Hill, is now counted in the top ranks of the world's winners himself. The most famous of all teachers of success spent “a fortune and the better part of a lifetime of effort” to produce the “Law of Success” philosophy that forms the basis of his books and that is so powerfully summarized in this one.

In the original Think and Grow Rich, published in 1937, Hill draws on stories of Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and other millionaires of his generation to illustrate his principles. In the updated version, Arthur R. Pell, Ph.D., a nationally known author, lecturer, and consultant in human resources management and an expert in applying Hill's thought, deftly interweaves anecdotes of how contemporary millionaires and billionaires, such as Bill Gates, Mary Kay Ash, Dave Thomas, and Sir John Templeton, achieved their wealth. Outmoded or arcane terminology and examples are faithfully refreshed to preclude any stumbling blocks to a new generation of readers.

Trauma is a fact of life. Veterans and their families deal with the painful aftermath of combat; one in five Americans has been molested; one in four grew up with alcoholics; one in three couples have engaged in physical violence. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, one of the world’s foremost experts on trauma, has spent over three decades working with survivors.

In The Body Keeps the Score, he uses recent scientific advances to show how trauma literally reshapes both body and brain, compromising sufferers’ capacities for pleasure, engagement, self-control, and trust. He explores innovative treatments—from neurofeedback and meditation to sports, drama, and yoga—that offer new paths to recovery by activating the brain’s natural neuroplasticity. Based on Dr. van der Kolk’s own research and that of other leading specialists, The Body Keeps the Score exposes the tremendous power of our relationships both to hurt and to heal—and offers new hope for reclaiming lives.

There are only so many things we can give a f**k about so we need to figure out which ones really matter, Manson makes clear. While money is nice, caring about what you do with your life is better, because true wealth is about experience. A much-needed grab-you-by-the-shoulders-and-look-you-in-the-eye moment of real-talk, filled with entertaining stories and profane, ruthless humor, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck is a refreshing slap for a generation to help them lead contented, grounded lives.

One of the best-known motivational guides in history, Dale Carnegie’s groundbreaking book has sold tens of millions of copies, been translated into almost every known language, and has helped countless people succeed.

Originally published during the depths of the Great Depression—and equally valuable during booming economies or hard times—Carnegie’s rock-solid, time-tested advice has carried countless people up the ladder of success in their professional and personal lives.

The Dichotomy of Leadership. This most difficult—and essential— element of leadership requires finding the balance between the forces that pull at every leader in opposite directions. Humbling lessons learned in combat and in teaching leadership to the next generation of SEAL leaders, highlighted for the authors with crystal clarity what works and what doesn’t. As leadership consultants to over 1600 companies and organizations across the U.S. and multiple countries, they have worked with thousands of leaders across the full spectrum of industries in the business world.

Through dynamic examples from their combat and training experiences in the SEAL Teams and vignettes from the business arena, Willink and Babin demonstrate how each leadership concept applies on the battlefield, in business, and in life.