Once upon a time there was a boy named J, who was obsessed with stealing beliefs.
Anytime he encountered an idea, his diagnostic mind analyzed it for weaknesses. He didn’t want half-assed beliefs, he wanted the purest, the best, the strongest.
He was also a speed-reader.
So, like many kids, he started out reading comics and fiction books, but as he grew older he started reading non-fiction, personal development books, and even textbooks.
And he stole all the best ideas and beliefs for himself.
This helped transform him from J, the boy, to J-Ryze, the consigliere.
But as the number of books he read skyrocketed into the thousands… something strange began to happen.
A book that teaches you to “neg a woman as a trick to seduce them” was far inferior to a book that teaches “how to be a high-value, authentic, aligned man.”
He started becoming a book-elitist.
What does that mean?
It means that all words are not created equal.
Reading 300 pages of the same-old, substandard ideas annoyed & antagonized him.
After reading so many books, and painful trial-and-error, J realized most pages were fluff, filler, common sense, or inapplicable.
The former sets you up for reliance on memorized tricks, the latter alters your beliefs to be naturally, habitually attractive.
Or a book that teaches you to “grind out a job you hate and save up money” is far inferior to one that teaches you to “tap into your inner-value and turn it joyfully into wealth.”
And since there’s far more of the former, than the latter…
J-Ryze realized most books weren't helping people nearly as much as they could be.
Especially his clients.
His clients were thought-leaders and influencers, doing big things in the world, so… they needed better books. And they didn’t have a ton of time to research which were best.
So J went prowling for superior reading-lists.
And although the internet was littered with book-lists… they were all filled with the same old books.
Weak sauce.
So, fed up with what was out there…
J made his own list of book recommendations, designed to be better curated and a more valuable guide than the rest.
J figured it would at least help his empire-building influencer clients, because they were the kind of people who’d appreciate books full of true wisdom, rather than whatever’s popular.
So if you wanna explore better books, without further adieu, I present…
"J-Ryze's Ultimate Mega Book-Recommendation List Of Epicness."
Quick Summary (Just the book titles.)
Currently Reading: Playing To Win, A Sense Of Urgency, Switch, Great By Choice.
Full Summary (Includes authors, descriptions, photos, etc.)
Now, despite the story I told earlier, I’m not really a ‘book-elitist’, I’m super-grateful for every author. A book takes a ton of work (I know, I published one), and I respect and appreciate every person who’s written one. And I’m sure every book out there has helped the right person, at the right time.
That said, some books are less refined. Some books have more filler. Some books express deeper ideas. And the ones that really nail it, aren’t always the ones that appeal to the masses, those of ‘average minds.’
So… the following books are the best I’ve found on each topic. I know it’s a lot of books, so I’d suggest picking a topic that speaks to you, and starting there.
(P.S. For the occasional category, I’ve only read 2 or 3 really great books on a topic, so I’ve included my ‘best guess’ of books I’d like to read.)
(P.P.S. For now, I’m just including the Amazon blurbs & reviews, but I’ll consider writing my own personal take on them eventually instead.)
(P.P.P.S. ON SPEED-READING: There are tricks to ‘speed-reading’ and I’ve considered writing my own guide on how to learn it, but for now, you might consider Kwik’s stuff: KwikLearning. I’ve not tried it but I’ve heard good things.
1. I'm not making the money I want... What can I read for money blocks?
Money Mindset — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO IMPROVE WEALTH BELIEFS
- Busting Loose From The Money Game – Robert Scheinfeld
- Money & The Law Of Attraction – Esther & Jerry Hicks
- Think And Grow Rich – Napoleon Hill
Honorable mention
- Secrets Of The Millionaire Mind – T. Harv Eker
Busting Loose From The Money Game
Robert Scheinfeld
“I had become despondent and disillusioned in my life – having worked diligently at visualization through meditation – but to no avail – I was still unhappy and frustrated and felt stagnant. My life now, though not changed drastically (yet), is so much more intriguing. Everything suddenly makes sense and I am happy ALL THE TIME! Mini miracles have occurred since I adopted the philosophies in the book, like my shaver blade disappearing and then re-appearing on the ledge of my bathtub! I know that sounds absurd, but it’s the truth.
Robert Scheinfeld’s book surpasses all, and I mean ALL, the self-help and ‘spirituality’ teachings I’ve read about… and I’ve read a lot. With each book I read, I learned to look at life in a slightly different way, resembling a sort of evolution in perspective; perhaps all in preparation for this mind-blowing book! Don’t be fooled by the title (I was). It’s so much more than the title indicates. A visit to his website ([…]) will give you a clearer idea of what his book is about. Like all spirituality books, if the book is meant for you, you’ll feel a definite resonance. And to the skeptics: You needn’t believe what he says, just try his suggestions; if you try sincerely, you’ll be amazed at the results!” – Christin Petra Bux
“Players rarely question the origins of the games they play.”
Money & The Law Of Attraction
Esther & Jerry Hicks
This Leading Edge work by Esther and Jerry Hicks, who present the teachings of the Non-Physical consciousness Abraham, explains that the two subjects most chronically affected by the powerful Law of Attraction are financial and physical well-being.
This book will shine a spotlight on each of the most significant aspects of your life experience and then guide you to the conscious creative control of every aspect of your life, and also goes right to the heart of what most of you are probably troubled by: money and physical health. Not having enough money or not having good health puts you in the perfect position for creating more of that which you do not have.
This book has been written to deliberately align you with the most powerful law in the universe—the Law of Attraction—so that you can make it work specifically for you.Money, and the Law of Attraction is formatted in five, vibrant essays:
Part I – Processing of Pivoting and Positive Aspects
Part II – Attracting Money and Manifesting Abundance
Part III – Maintaining Your Physical Well-BeingPart IV – Perspectives of Health, Weight, and Mind
Part V – Careers, as Profitable Sources of Pleasure
Also included is a free CD (excerpted from a live Abraham-Hicks workshop) that features the Art of Allowing your physical and financial well-being to come through.
“In the vibration of appreciation all things come to you. You don't have to make anything happen.”
Think And Grow Rich
Napoleon Hill
Here are money-making secets that can change your life. Inspired by Andrew Carnegie’s magic formula for success, this book will teach you the secrets that will bring you a fortune. It will show you not only what to do but how to do it.
Once you learn and apply the simple, basic techniques revealed here, you will have mastered the secret of true and lasting success. And you may have whatever you want in life.
Must read book.
It’s a must read book at least once in a lifetime for those who are really going through “what I want and how can I get it”.
This books is so rich and precise in it’s way that anyone can relate them with it. Everything explained through a lot of examples can help you connect better, though too many examples can take your mind off while reading the book but it’s worth it.
Some beautiful poems have also been introduced which is worth sharing with everyone.
The book describes how to bring a burning desire to existence by imagination and putting it into your sub conscious mind with faith by autosuggestion and constantly reminding you of what you want.
The book also has ideas for the ones seeking for a specific job and how to get it.
You’ll get a lot of ideas while reading, – note them down immediately! By the time you’re finished reading the book, you’ll see a change.
“Every adversity, every failure, every heartbreak, carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.”
2. People keep telling me to build a clear brand, what can I read for that?
Brand-Building — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO CLARIFY YOUR BRANDING
- Building A Story Brand – Donald Miller
- Positioning – Al Ries
- Unconscious Branding – Douglas Van Praet
Honorable mention
- Brand Like A Rock Star – Steve Jones
Building a Story Brand
Donald Miller
New York Times best-selling author Donald Miller uses the seven universal elements of powerful stories to teach listeners how to dramatically improve how they connect with customers and grow their businesses.
Donald Miller’s StoryBrand process is a proven solution to the struggle business leaders face when talking about their businesses. This revolutionary method for connecting with customers provides listeners with the ultimate competitive advantage, revealing the secret for helping their customers understand the compelling benefits of using their products, ideas, or services.
Building a StoryBrand does this by teaching listeners the seven universal story points all humans respond to, the real reason customers make purchases, how to simplify a brand message so people understand it, and how to create the most effective messaging for websites, brochures, and social media.
Whether you are the marketing director of a multibillion-dollar company, the owner of a small business, a politician running for office, or the lead singer of a rock band, Building a StoryBrand will forever transform the way you talk about who you are, what you do, and the unique value you bring to your customers.
“Imagine your customer is a hitchhiker. You pull over to give him a ride, and the one burning question on his mind is simply 'Where are you going?'”
Positioning
Al Ries & Jack Trout
The first book to deal with the problems of communicating to a skeptical, media-blitzed public, Positioning describes a revolutionary approach to creating a “position” in a prospective customer’s mind-one that reflects a company’s own strengths and weaknesses as well as those of its competitors. Writing in their trademark witty, fast-paced style, advertising gurus Ries and Trout explain how to:
• Make and position an industry leader so that its name and message wheedles its way into the collective subconscious of your market-and stays there
• Position a follower so that it can occupy a niche not claimed by the leader
• Avoid letting a second product ride on the coattails of an established one.
Positioning also shows you how to:
• Use leading ad agency techniques to capture the biggest market share and become a household name
• Build your strategy around your competition’s weaknesses
• Reposition a strong competitor and create a weak spot
• Use your present position to its best advantage
• Choose the best name for your product
• Analyze recent trends that affect your positioning.
Ries and Trout provide many valuable case histories and penetrating analyses of some of the most phenomenal successes and failures in advertising history. Revised to reflect significant developments in the five years since its original publication, Positioning is required reading for anyone in business today.
“A product is something made in a factory. A brand is something made in the mind.”
Unconscious Branding
Douglas Van Praet
For too long marketers have been asking the wrong question. If consumers make decisions unconsciously, why do we persist in asking them directly through traditional marketing research why they do what they do? They simply can’t tell us because they don’t really know. Before marketers develop strategies, they need to recognize that consumers have strategies too . . . human strategies, not consumer strategies. We need to go beyond asking why, and begin to ask how, behavior change occurs.
Here, author Douglas Van Praet takes the most brilliant and revolutionary concepts from cognitive science and applies them to how we market, advertise, and consume in the modern digital age.
Van Praet simplifies the most complex object in the known universe―the human brain―into seven codified actionable steps to behavior change.
These steps are illustrated using real world examples from advertising, marketing, media, and business to consciously unravel what brilliant marketers and ad practitioners have long done intuitively, deconstructing the real story behind some of the greatest marketing and business successes in recent history, such as Nike’s “Just Do It” campaign; “Got Milk?”; Wendy’s “Where’s the Beef?”; and the infamous Volkswagen “Punch Buggy” launch as well as their beloved “The Force” (Mini Darth Vader) Super Bowl commercial.
“The best way to build rapport with people or companies is to share in their beliefs and behaviors. When we don’t mesh with [a brand]...we routinely dismiss them.”
3. My content doesn't resonate with people, what can I read to get shared?
Shareability — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO CREATE SHAREABLE CONTENT
- Break Through The Noise – Tim Staples & Josh Young
- Storynomics – Robert McKee
- Conversational Capital – Bertrand Cesvet
Honorable mention
- Contagious – Jonah Berger
Break Through The Noise
Tim Staples & Josh Young
The odds of getting a video onto YouTube’s front page are 1-in-2,000,0000, but Tim Staples, founder and CEO of Shareability, knows how to make the algorithms of Youtube, Google, Facebook and Instagram work for you – and he has the results to prove it, with a thriving business that has gotten their videos onto YouTube’s front page an amazing 25 times. Here he shows savvy marketers, entrepreneurs, and online celebrity wannabes how they, too, can develop clever videos that amass millions of views.
Staples outlines a nine-step approach that anyone can use to launch their product or service without having to invest a fortune.
Case studies featured in the book include how Shareability launched ROC Headphones,a multi-million dollar global brand, with a viral video of Cristiano Ronaldo in disguise without spending a nickel on traditional advertising; how they used babies to create the most successful social video ever about the Olympic Games; how they propelled a small pet food company from obscurity to an IPO on the power of two viral videos; and how theyhelped Cricket Wireless become the most shared brand in the wireless space beating telco powerhouses like Verizon, AT&T and Sprint.
“When they share, they're telling the world that [your brand] is worth everyone's time and attention.”
Storynomics
Robert McKee
Based on the hottest, most in-demand seminar offered by the legendary story master Robert McKee– STORYNOMICS translates the lessons of storytelling in business into economic and leadership success.
Robert McKee’s popular writing workshops have earned him an international reputation. The list of alumni with Academy Awards and Emmy Awards runs off the page. The cornerstone of his program is his singular book, Story, which has defined how we talk about the art of story creation.
Now in STORYNOMICS, McKee partners with digital marketing expert and Skyword CEO Tom Gerace to map a path for brands seeking to navigate the rapid decline of interrupt advertising.
After successfully guiding organizations as diverse as Samsung, Marriott International, Philips, Microsoft, Nike, IBM, and Siemens to transform their marketing from an ad-centric to story-centric approach, McKee and Gerace now bring this knowledge to business leaders and entrepreneurs alike.
Drawing from dozens of story-driven strategies and case studies taken from leading B2B and B2C brands, STORYNOMICS demonstrates how original storytelling delivers results that surpass traditional advertising. How will brands and their customers connect in the future? STORYNOMICS provides the answer.
“Story is about trying to make sense out of the confusion, chaos, and terror of being a human being.”
Conversational Capital
Bertrand Cesvet
“In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell presents an important idea without any ‘how to.’ Now Bertrand Cesvet provides the ‘how to’ you need to create ‘Tipping Points’ for your business and success. This book is a compelling presentation of a powerful idea. This is how the new world will do business. Highly recommended if you care about your future.”
Stewart Emery, coauthor of international best-seller Success Built to Last
“Ultimately, magic is unexplainable. Still, Conversational Capital provides the most insightful analysis of what makes our shows ring in the heart of fans.”
Guy Laliberte, founder, Cirque du Soleil
“Like all great ideas, Conversational Capital is at its core simple: word-of-mouth momentum can be created, harnessed, and used to build consumer passion for a brand better and more cost-effectively than almost any other marketing medium.”
Rupert Duchesne,CEO of Aeroplan
“Marketing is an art that Conversational Capital turns smartly into science. This book provides the complete prescription for getting consumers excited about your ideas.”
Jim Champy, coauthor, Reenginering the Corporation, and author, Outsmart!
Embed into Your Products and Experiences the Ingredients that Drive Advocacy:
- Create products and services that consumers find truly significant
- Intensify consumption experiences to transform your brands into market leaders
- Don’t settle for serendipity: manage and control the word-of-mouth around your brand by manipulating eight powerful experience amplifiers
For all the books that speak of the value of consumer advocacy, few indicate how to create it to begin with. Armed with a compelling set of examples from their own work in fostering leading brands, the authors reveal the triggers of word-of-mouth and a process to embedding them in your own products, helping you create stuff people love to talk about. From Bertrand Cesvet, chairman of Sid Lee, a leading purveyor of experiential design and communications services that leverages commercial creativity for breakthrough brands including Cirque du Soleil, adidas, and Red Bull.
1% of the proceeds from the royalties earned by the authors will be donated to the One Drop Foundation. The mission of the One DropTM Foundation is to fight poverty around the world by giving everyone access to safe water.
“We call our series of observations Conversational Capital because this story telling process is a form of powerful currency.”
4. OK, but I'm ready for massive traffic, what can I read to get media buzz?
Media Buzz — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO GET MEDIA ATTENTION
- Trust Me, I’m Lying – Ryan Holiday
- Make It Rain – Areva Martin
- Pitch Anything – Oren Klaff
Honorable mention
- Media Secrets – Jess Todtfeld (to be read)
Trust Me i'm lying
Ryan Holiday
The cult classic that predicted the rise of fake news—revised and updated for the post-Trump, post-Gawker age.
Hailed as “astonishing and disturbing” by the Financial Times and “essential reading” by TechCrunch at its original publication, former American Apparel marketing director Ryan Holiday’s first book sounded a prescient alarm about the dangers of fake news. It’s all the more relevant today.
Trust Me, I’m Lying was the first book to blow the lid off the speed and force at which rumors travel online—and get “traded up” the media ecosystem until they become real headlines and generate real responses in the real world. The culprit? Marketers and professional media manipulators, encouraged by the toxic economics of the news business.
Whenever you see a malicious online rumor costs a company millions, politically motivated fake news driving elections, a product or celebrity zooming from total obscurity to viral sensation, or anonymously sourced articles becoming national conversation, someone is behind it. Often someone like Ryan Holiday.
As he explains, “I wrote this book to explain how media manipulators work, how to spot their fingerprints, how to fight them, and how (if you must) to emulate their tactics. Why am I giving away these secrets? Because I’m tired of a world where trolls hijack debates, marketers help write the news, opinion masquerades as fact, algorithms drive everything to extremes, and no one is accountable for any of it. I’m pulling back the curtain because it’s time the public understands how things really work. What you choose to do with this information is up to you.”
“Regardless of the topic, the more an article makes someone feel good or bad, the more likely it is to make the Most E-Mailed list.”
Make It Rain
Areva Martin
What if you could get in front of millions of prospects with the avid endorsement of famous influencers – without spending a dime?
It’s happening right in front of you every day. Guest experts on TV, radio, podcasts, blogs, and live streaming are getting local and national exposure for their businesses and brands that they could never have afforded to reach with ads.
For a decade, Areva Martin has used the media to build a huge platform that expanded the influence and power of her brand exponentially. Media appearances on Dr. Phil, Anderson Cooper 360, The Doctors, CNN, MSNBC, FOX, and more have virtually eliminated the need of a marketing budget for her thriving law firm and nonprofit organization while securing her place as one of America’s most sought after thought leaders.
In Make It Rain! Areva breaks the silence to reveal what insiders know about the power of media appearances to revolutionize a business and brand and get your core message out to the people who need it most.
You’ll learn how to:
- Match your brand to the right audience and media venues
- Craft pitches producers can’t resist
- Jump on breaking news shows
- Pivot and speak in soundbites like the pros
- Amplify every interview with social media
- Turn appearances into platform and become a rainmaker
Never before have there been more ways to build a presence that matters. Whether you are the executive of a corporation, the author of an upcoming book, the owner of a rapidly growing small business, or the public face of a local nonprofit or association, if you have a business to build or people you want to help, nothing beats using the media to create the visibility, influence, and power you need. Are you ready to Make It Rain!?
“Being a rainmaker will have a direct impact on your bottom line and give you a lot more leverage to help the people you care about most.”
Pitch Anything
Oren Klaff
When it comes to delivering a pitch, Oren Klaff has unparalleled credentials. Over the past 13 years, he has used his one-of-a-kind method to raise more than $400 million – and now, for the first time, he describes his formula to help you deliver a winning pitch in any business situation.
Whether you’re selling ideas to investors, pitching a client for new business, or even negotiating for a higher salary, Pitch Anything will transform the way you position your ideas.
According to Klaff, creating and presenting a great pitch isn’t an art – it’s a simple science. Applying the latest findings in the field of neuroeconomics, while sharing eye-opening stories of his method in action, Klaff describes how the brain makes decisions and responds to pitches. With this information, you’ll remain in complete control of every stage of the pitch process.
Pitch Anything introduces the exclusive STRONG method of pitching, which can be put to use immediately:
- Setting the Frame
- Telling the Story
- Revealing the Intrigue
- Offering the Prize
- Nailing the Hookpoint
- Getting a Decision
One truly great pitch can improve your career, make you a lot of money – and even change your life. Success is dependent on the method you use, not how hard you try. “Better method, more money,” Klaff says. “Much better method, much more money.” Klaff is the best in the business because his method is much better than anyone else’s. And now it’s yours.
Apply the tactics and strategies outlined in Pitch Anything to engage and persuade your audience – and you’ll have a stronger pitch and better outcome.
“Our bodies 'know' the situations we meet in life and how we should respond.”
5. I reach my tribe, but they don't take action... what can I read to move them?
Influence — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO INFLUENCE OTHERS
- Presuasion – Robert Cialdini
- Triggers – Marshall Goldsmith
- Hooked – Nir Eyal
Honorable mention
- Made To Stick – Chip & Dan Heath (to be read)
Presuasion
Robert Cialdini
The acclaimed New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller from Robert Cialdini—“the foremost expert on effective persuasion” (Harvard Business Review)—explains how it’s not necessarily the message itself that changes minds, but the key moment before you deliver that message.
What separates effective communicators from truly successful persuaders? With the same rigorous scientific research and accessibility that made his Influence an iconic bestseller, Robert Cialdini explains how to prepare people to be receptive to a message before they experience it. Optimal persuasion is achieved only through optimal pre-suasion. In other words, to change “minds” a pre-suader must also change “states of mind.”
Named a “Best Business Books of 2016” by the Financial Times, and “compelling” by The Wall Street Journal, Cialdini’s Pre-Suasion draws on his extensive experience as the most cited social psychologist of our time and explains the techniques a person should implement to become a master persuader.
Altering a listener’s attitudes, beliefs, or experiences isn’t necessary, says Cialdini—all that’s required is for a communicator to redirect the audience’s focus of attention before a relevant action.
From studies on advertising imagery to treating opiate addiction, from the annual letters of Berkshire Hathaway to the annals of history, Cialdini outlines the specific techniques you can use on online marketing campaigns and even effective wartime propaganda. He illustrates how the artful diversion of attention leads to successful pre-suasion and gets your targeted audience primed and ready to say, “Yes.” His book is “an essential tool for anyone serious about science based business strategies…and is destined to be an instant classic. It belongs on the shelf of anyone in business, from the CEO to the newest salesperson” (Forbes).
“The best persuaders become the best through pre-suasion - the process of arranging for recipients to be receptive to a message before the encounter it.”
Triggers
Marshall Goldsmith
Bestselling author and world-renowned executive coach Marshall Goldsmith examines the environmental and psychological triggers that can derail us at work and in life.
Do you ever find that you are not the patient, compassionate problem solver you believe yourself to be? Are you surprised at how irritated or flustered the normally unflappable you becomes in the presence of a specific colleague at work? Have you ever felt your temper accelerate from zero to sixty when another driver cuts you off in traffic?
Our reactions don’t occur in a vacuum. They are usually the result of unappreciated triggers in our environment—the people and situations that lure us into behaving in a manner diametrically opposed to the colleague, partner, parent, or friend we imagine ourselves to be. These triggers are constant and relentless and omnipresent. So often the environment seems to be outside our control. Even if that is true, as Goldsmith points out, we have a choice in how we respond.
In Triggers, his most powerful and insightful book yet, Goldsmith shows how we can overcome the trigger points in our lives, and enact meaningful and lasting change. Goldsmith offers a simple “magic bullet” solution in the form of daily self-monitoring, hinging around what he calls “active” questions. These are questions that measure our effort, not our results. There’s a difference between achieving and trying; we can’t always achieve a desired result, but anyone can try. In the course of Triggers, Goldsmith details the six “engaging questions” that can help us take responsibility for our efforts to improve and help us recognize when we fall short.
Filled with revealing and illuminating stories from his work with some of the most successful chief executives and power brokers in the business world, Goldsmith offers a personal playbook on how to achieve change in our lives, make it stick, and become the person we want to be.
“A trigger is any stimulus that reshapes our thoughts and actions. In every waking hour we are triggered by people, events and circumstances that have the potential to change us.”
Hooked
Nir Eyal
How do successful companies create products people can’t put down?
Why do some products capture widespread attention while others flop? What makes us engage with certain products out of sheer habit? Is there a pattern underlying how technologies hook us?
Nir Eyal answers these questions (and many more) by explaining the Hook Model—a four-step process embedded into the products of many successful companies to subtly encourage customer behavior. Through consecutive “hook cycles,” these products reach their ultimate goal of bringing users back again and again without depending on costly advertising or aggressive messaging.
Hooked is based on Eyal’s years of research, consulting, and practical experience. He wrote the book he wished had been available to him as a start-up founder—not abstract theory, but a how-to guide for building better products. Hooked is written for product managers, designers, marketers, start-up founders, and anyone who seeks to understand how products influence our behavior.
Eyal provides readers with:
• Practical insights to create user habits that stick.
• Actionable steps for building products people love.
• Fascinating examples from the iPhone to Twitter, Pinterest to the Bible App, and many other habit-forming products.
"Businesses that create customer habits gain a significant competitive advantage.”
6. It feels like my words fail, what can I read to get my point across?
Rhetoric — Best Books
TOP BOOKS ON MAKING YOUR POINT
- Don’t Think Of An Elephant – George Lakoff
- Thank You For Arguing – Jay Heinrichs
- Hypnotic Writing – Joe Vitale
Honorable mention
- Arguing And Thinking – Michael Billig (to be read)
Don't Think Of An Elephant
George Lakoff
Since it became an international best-seller in 2004, Don’t Think of an Elephant! has been the definitive handbook for progressives who want to articulate their goals and values to voters, understand how conservatives think and why people often vote against their best interests, and frame the political debate.
Completely revised and updated to tackle today’s issues, the 10th-anniversary edition not only explains what framing is and how it works but also reveals why, after a brief stint of winning the framing wars in the 2008 elections, the Democrats have gone back to losing them, and what can be done about it. In this powerful new volume, George Lakoff delves into the issues that will dominate the midterm elections in 2014, the coming presidential elections, and beyond.
He examines the current progressive and conservative frames on climate change, inequality, immigration, education, abortion, marriage, healthcare, national security, energy, and more. He explores why some issues have been difficult to frame, guides listeners on how to frame complex issues without losing important context, and drives home the important differences between framing and spin.
Do you think facts alone can win a debate? Do you think you know what makes a Tea Party follower tick? Do you think you understand how to communicate on key issues that can improve peoples’ lives? Whether you answer yes or no, the insights in Don’t Think of an Elephant! will not only surprise you, but also give you the tools you need to develop frames that work, and eradicate frames that backfire.
“People do not necessarily vote in their self-interest. They vote their identity. They vote their values. They vote for who they identify with.”
Thank you for arguing
Jay Heinrichs
A master class in the art of persuasion, as taught by professors ranging from Bart Simpson to Winston Churchill, newly revised and updated.
The time-tested secrets taught in this book include Cicero’s three-step strategy for moving an audience to action, and Honest Abe’s Shameless Trick for lowering an audience’s expectations. And it’s also replete with contemporary techniques such as politicians’ use of code language to appeal to specfic groups and an eye-opening assortment of persuasive tricks, including the Eddie Haskell Ploy, the Belushi Paradigm, Stalin’s Timing Secret, and the Yoda Technique.
Whether you’re an inveterate lover of language books or just want to win a lot more anger-free arguments on the page, at the podium, or over a beer, Thank You for Arguing is for you. Warm, witty, erudite, and truly enlightening, it not only teaches you how to recognize a paralipsis when you hear it, but also how to wield the weapons of persuasion the next time you really, really, want to get your own way.
“Instead I made him feel triumphant, triumph made him benevolent, and that got me exactly what I wanted.”
Hypnotic Writing
Joe Vitale
Discover the secrets of written persuasion!
“The principles of hypnosis, when applied to copywriting, add a new spin to selling. Joe Vitale has taken hypnotic words to set the perfect sales environment and then shows us how to use those words to motivate a prospect to take the action you want. This is truly a new and effective approach to copywriting, which I strongly recommend you learn. It’s pure genius.”
-Joseph Sugarman
“I’ve read countless book on persuasion, but none come close to this one in showing you exactly how to put your readers into a buying trance that makes whatever you are offering them irresistible.”
-David Garfinkel
“I couldn’t put this book down. It’s eye opening and filled with genuinely new stuff about writing and persuading better. And it communicates it brilliantly and teaches it brilliantly-exemplifying the techniques by the writing of the book itself as you go along.”
-David Deutsch
“Hypnotic Writing is packed with so much great information it’s hard to know where to start. The insights, strategies, and tactics in the book are easy to apply yet deliver one heck of a punch. And in case there’s any question how to apply them, the before-and-after case studies drive the points home like nothing else can. Hypnotic Writing is not just about hypnotic writing. It is hypnotic writing. On the count of three, you’re going to love it. Just watch and see.”
-Blair Warren
“By 'Hypnotic Writing' I mean writing that is irresistible. Writing that rivets your eyes to the page. Writing that is so clear and concise and effective that you can't resist reading all of it.”
7. Ok, headlines matter, what can I read to get better at copy?
Copywriting — Best Books
TOP BOOKS ON Improving your copy skills
- Cashvertising – Drew Eric Whitman
- Hey Whipple, Squeeze This – Luke Sullivan
- How To Write A Good Advertisement – Victor O. Schwab
Honorable mention
- Breakthrough Advertising – Eugene M. Schwartz
Cashvertising
Drew Eric Whitman
FACT: Your brain is being controlled-and you don’t even know it.
Because if you think the ads you’re seeing today are just pretty pictures with nice, creative copy, you’re mistaken. Truth is, you are being powerfully influenced by dozens of proven scientific principles of advertising psychology… little-known techniques of consumer persuasion that go completely unnoticed by the buying public. And they’re causing you–and millions like you–to spend enormous amounts of money every day on countless products and services.
But what are these principles? How do they work? And how can you use them in your own advertising
Prepare yourself for a unique learning experience as author Drew Eric Whitman takes you on a wild, roller-coaster ride through the streets of New York’s famed Madison Avenue and teaches you the specific psychological techniques that today’s top copywriters and designers use to influence the masses… and how you can use them to rapidly increase your sales, no matter what you sell.
In 207 fast-moving pages, Whitman teaches you dozens of well-guarded secrets that he learned during his 30+ years in the ad business, including:
* How to Push Your Prospects’ Hot Buttons in Every Ad, Sales Letter, or Email–It’s not hard to do once you know the secret.
* Why Developing Your “USP” Can Leave Your Competition in the Dust–It’s the quickest way to instantly begin out-marketing your competitors. (And they’ll never know what hit them.)
* Why You Don’t Need a Degree in Business to Create Great Ads–But there is one thing you MUST know or your ads will likely fail miserably.
* How to Develop a Powerful Ad-Agency Mindset–What the pros know about consumer buying behavior and how you can use it to your advantage.
* How to Save $600 for Every $1,000 You Spend on Ads–This idea alone is worth infinitely more than the price of this book…and you can start using it immediately.
* The Amazing 5-Second, No-Fail Headline Test–Chances are your ads, emails, websites and other promotional materials fail this test every time. One small change boosts your response.
* What a Good Ad Should “Feel” Like–How to connect to readers on a deep, emotional level.
* How to Install Persuasive Images in People’s Brains–Learn how to direct how people think about your products and services.
*Why People Really Buy Your Product or Service–Sorry, but it’s not what you think. (But you better know the reason… or else.)
* Where to Always Put Your Biggest Benefit–Miss this and you’re flushing your ad dollars down the toilet.
* How to Write “Dragon-Slayer” Headlines that Get Read and Get Response–Tons of examples you can “steal” for your own ads.
* Long vs. Short Copy: Which Is Really Best for Response? Don’t believe the lies! We’ll set the record straight and you’ll learn to cash-in.
* How to Use the Devilishly Effective Pyramid Principal–Lure readers into your ads by understanding human eyeball behavior.
* 22 Tested and Proven Headline Prescriptions you can start using RIGHT NOW.
* How to Turn Ordinary Words in “Money-Magnet” Copy that motivates, influences, persuades. (Yes, you can really do it.)
* Put Your Copy Here and Boost Readership by 10-200%–Why doesn’t everyone do this?
* 10 Sure-Fire Ways to Start Writing Your Ads–So easy, it’s almost automatic.
* How to Cause People to Mentally Demonstrate Your Products… Before They Buy.
* How Emotional Words Melt Sales Resistance a Red-Hot Knife Through Butter.
* “Sneaky” Ad-Design Psychology Tricks that Work Like Magic–Start using them tonight.
* Typestyles that Actually REDUCE Readership–Are you using them?
* This “Evil” Design Sin Depresses Your Readership Up to 50%–Do you do it?
* Widely Used Typeface LOWERS Comprehension Up to 67%–Are you using it?
* The Eye-Grabbing “Advertising Guillotine”–The one image humans can’t resist.
“I call them the 'Life Force 8'. These eight powerful desires are responsible for more sales than all other human wants combined. Here they are. Learn them. Use them. Profit from them.”
Hey Whipple, Squeeze This
Luke Sullivan
The classic guide to creating great advertising now covers all media: Digital, Social, and Traditional
Hey Whipple, Squeeze This has helped generations of young creatives make their mark in the field. From starting out and getting work, to building successful campaigns, you gain a real-world perspective on what it means to be great in a fast-moving, sometimes harsh industry. You’ll learn how to tell brand stories and create brand experiences online and in traditional media outlets, and you’ll learn more about the value of authenticity, simplicity, storytelling, and conflict.
Advertising is in the midst of a massive upheaval, and while creativity is still king, it’s not nearly enough.
This book is an essential resource for advertising professionals who need up-to-date digital skills to reach the modern consumer.
- Turn great ideas into successful campaigns
- Work effectively in all media channels
- Avoid the kill shots that will sink any campaign
- Protect your work
- Succeed without selling out
Today’s consumer has seen it all, and they’re less likely than ever to even notice your masterpiece of art and copy, let alone internalize it. Your job is to craft a piece that rises out of the noise to make an impact. Hey Whipple, Squeeze This provides the knowledge to create impressive, compelling work.
“You are faced with a blank slate, and in a fixed amount of time, you must fill it with something interesting enough to be remembered by a customer who, in the course of a day, will see thousands of other ad messages.”
How To write a good advertisement
Victor O. Schwab
Call it advertising, call it promotion, call it marketing, but whatever you call it, every business and organization depends on words with impact. You need to grab the attention of potential customers, clients, or supporters and call them to action. Few among us are born talented copywriters, that rare combination of both facile wordsmiths and natural salespeople. Most of us need some help, and even naturals can improve by studying the best. Victor O. Schwab was one of the greats. Considered a marketing master during his 44-year career, he was the copywriter who propelled Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People into a mega-seller.
How to Write a Good Advertisement, Schwab’s classic guide, has stood the test of time. In just over 200 pages, this book clearly explains the core elements of an effective advertisement.
Schwab shows us how to
- Get attention with better ad copy
- Build credibility in your advertising
- Create winning layouts and choose the best ad size
- Test ad effectiveness
- Convert inquiries to sales
- Make special offers that dramatically increase response and sales
How to Write a Good Advertisement gets you quickly up to speed with examples of powerful profitable headlines (with explanations of why those headlines work so well), and quick lesson reviews that help you turn what you’ve read into skills you own. Schwab provides us shortcuts without sacrificing long-term understanding. Fifty years after publication this book is still the standard bearer, sought after by a new generation of copy-writers and businesspeople. Read it, apply it, and watch your sales soar.
“An advertisement can not stimulate sales if it is not read; it cannot be read if not seen; and it will not be seen unless it can get attention.”
8. But what about my visuals, what do I read to improve those?
VISUAL DESIGN — Best Books
TOP BOOKS ON Improving your design skills
- The Non-designer’s Design Book – Robin Williams (to be read)
- How To (…) – Michael Beirut (to be read)
- Design Is Storytelling – Ellen Lupton (to be read)
Honorable mention
- Branding With Type – Stefan Rogener (to be read)
The Non-designer's Design Book
Robin Williams
For nearly 20 years, designers and non-designers alike have been introduced to the fundamental principles of great design by author Robin Williams.
Through her straightforward and light-hearted style, Robin has taught hundreds of thousands of people how to make their designs look professional using four surprisingly simple principles. Now in its fourth edition, The Non-Designer’s Design Book offers even more practical design advice, including a new chapter on the fundamentals of typography, more quizzes and exercises to train your Designer Eye, updated projects for you to try, and new visual and typographic examples to inspire your creativity.
Whether you’re a Mac user or a Windows user, a type novice, or an aspiring graphic designer, you will find the instruction and inspiration to approach any design project with confidence.
THIS ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO DESIGN WILL TEACH YOU
- The four principles of design that underlie every design project
- How to design with color
- How to design with type
- How to combine typefaces for maximum effect
- How to see and think like a professional designer
- Specific tips on designing newsletters, brochures, flyers, and other projects
“Once you can name something, you're conscious of it. You have power over it. You're in control. You own it.”
How To (...)
Michael Beirut
The first monograph, design manual, and manifesto by Michael Bierut, one of the world’s most renowned graphic designers—a career retrospective that showcases more than thirty-five of his most noteworthy projects for clients as the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Yale School of Architecture, the New York Times, Saks Fifth Avenue, and the New York Jets, and reflects eclectic enthusiasm and accessibility that has been the hallmark of his career.
Protégé of design legend Massimo Vignelli and partner in the New York office of the international design firm Pentagram, Michael Bierut has had one of the most varied and successful careers of any living graphic designer, serving a broad spectrum of clients as diverse as Saks Fifth Avenue, Harley-Davidson, the Atlantic Monthly, the William Jefferson Clinton Foundation, Billboard, Princeton University, the New York Jets, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and the Morgan Library.
How to, Bierut’s first career retrospective, is a landmark work in the field. Featuring more than thirty-five of his projects, it reveals his philosophy of graphic design—how to use it to sell things, explain things, make things look better, make people laugh, make people cry, and (every once in a while) change the world.
Specially chosen to illustrate the breadth and reach of graphic design today, each entry demonstrates Bierut’s eclectic approach. In his entertaining voice, the artist walks us through each from start to finish, mixing historic images, preliminary drawings (including full-size reproductions of the notebooks he has maintained for more than thirty-five years), working models and rejected alternatives, as well as the finished work. Throughout, he provides insights into the creative process, his working life, his relationship with clients, and the struggles that any design professional faces in bringing innovative ideas to the world.
Offering insight and inspiration for artists, designers, students, and anyone interested in how words, images, and ideas can be put together, How to provides insight to the design process of one of this century’s most renowned creative minds.
“I wanted to create things with a purpose, things that people would see all over the place, things that were about something other than themselves.”
Design Is Storytelling
Ellen Lupton
How storytelling shapes great design
Good design, like good storytelling, brings ideas to life. The latest book from award-winning writer Ellen Lupton is a playbook for creative thinking, showing designers how to use storytelling techniques to create satisfying graphics, products, services and experiences. Whether crafting a digital app or a data-rich publication, designers invite people to enter a scene and explore what’s there. An intriguing logo, page layout or retail space uses line, shape and form to lead users on dynamic journeys. Design Is Storytelling explores the psychology of visual perception from a narrative point of view. Presenting dozens of tools and concepts in a lively, visual manner, this book will help any designer amplify the narrative power of their work. Use this book to stir emotions, build empathy, articulate values and convey action; to construct narrative arcs and create paths through space; integrate form and language; evaluate a project’s storytelling power; and to write and deliver strong narratives.
“An experience engages consumers in a theatrical performance, creating a lasting memory and an emotional bond.”
9. What do I read for general business advice?
Business — Best Books
Top Books On Overall Business
- Built To Serve – Evan Carmichael
- The 4-Hour Work Week – Tim Ferriss
- The Lean Startup – Eric Ries
Honorable mention
- Business Model You – Alex Osterwalder
Built To Serve
Evan Carmichael
Literally the best business book I’ve ever had the privilege of reading. Covers the theory *AND* practice, clearly and concisely.
What is my purpose? How do I find my passion?
Most people wake up and drive to a job that they hate.
Think about your five closest friends. Are they happy? Do they live their lives with purpose? Do you? We put on a fake front for what we want people to see and think about us, but the reality is most people aren’t happy. We’re lost. We settle. We aren’t happy with where we are. You can’t be happy if you don’t know your purpose. It’s not possible. You want more but you don’t even know where to start. You know there is more out there. You see others having success and you want it, too; there is nothing wrong with that. You just need help finding your purpose so you can find the success you see all around you.
You can be productive, crush your goals, pretend that all the things that you’ve acquired actually mean something…but at the end of the day, if you don’t know your purpose, you’ll always feel like there’s something missing. You’ll know that you’re capable of more and that you’re not living the life you should be. You might be fooling the world, but you’re not fooling the person looking back at you in the mirror. You need to find your actual power source.
Your purpose is your source of power.
Once you find your purpose it’ll fuel you for life. You’ll do things that you never thought you were capable of. Achieving your purpose will force you to morph into a stronger version of yourself. You’ll have to push through fears, insecurities, and doubts that held you back. But somehow it’ll all feel possible and necessary because you’re purpose-driven now…and that’s the only thing you’ll ever need.
“I think entrepreneurs and leaders are trees. What does a tree do? A tree breathes in carbon dioxide which is poison for people...and spits out oxygen-positivity for the world.”
The 4-Hour work week
Tim Ferriss
This is a new, updated and expanded edition of this New York Times bestseller on how to reconstruct your life so it’s not all about work. Forget the old concept of retirement and the rest of the deferred – life plan – there is no need to wait and every reason not to, especially in unpredictable economic times. Whether your dream is escaping the rat race, experiencing high-end world travel, earning a monthly five-figure income with zero management, or just living more and working less, this book is the blueprint. This step-by step guide to luxury lifestyle design teaches: how Tim went from $40,000 dollars per year and 80 hours per week to $40,000 per month and 4 hours per week; How to outsource your life to overseas virtual assistants for $5 per hour and do whatever you want;
How blue-chip escape artists travel the world without quitting their jobs; how to eliminate 50 per cent of your work in 48 hours using the principles of a forgotten Italian economist; and how to trade a long-haul career for short work bursts and frequent ‘mini-retirements’. This new updated and expanded edition includes: more than 50 practical tips and case studies from readers (including families) who have doubled their income, overcome common sticking points, and reinvented themselves using the original book as a starting point; real-world templates you can copy for eliminating email, negotiating with bosses and clients, or getting a private chef for less than GBP5 a meal; how lifestyle design principles can be suited to unpredictable economic times; and the latest tools and tricks, as well as high-tech shortcuts, for living like a diplomat or millionaire without being either.
“ 'Someday' is a disease that will take your dreams to the grave with you.”
The Lean Startup
Eric Ries
Most startups fail. But many of those failures are preventable. The Lean Startup is a new approach being adopted across the globe, changing the way companies are built and new products are launched.
Eric Ries defines a startup as an organization dedicated to creating something new under conditions of extreme uncertainty. This is just as true for one person in a garage or a group of seasoned professionals in a Fortune 500 boardroom. What they have in common is a mission to penetrate that fog of uncertainty to discover a successful path to a sustainable business.
The Lean Startup approach fosters companies that are both more capital efficient and that leverage human creativity more effectively. Inspired by lessons from lean manufacturing, it relies on “validated learning,” rapid scientific experimentation, as well as a number of counter-intuitive practices that shorten product development cycles, measure actual progress without resorting to vanity metrics, and learn what customers really want. It enables a company to shift directions with agility, altering plans inch by inch, minute by minute.
Rather than wasting time creating elaborate business plans, The Lean Startup offers entrepreneurs—in companies of all sizes—a way to test their vision continuously, to adapt and adjust before it’s too late. Ries provides a scientific approach to creating and managing successful startups in a age when companies need to innovate more than ever.
“Startup success can be engineered by following the right process, which means it can be learned, which means it can be taught.”
10. How about books on better relationships?
Relationships — Best Books
Top Books To Improve Your Relationships
- The Way Of The Superior Man – David Deida
- Dear Lover – David Deida
- The Relationship Cure – John Gottman
Honorable mention
- The 5 Love Languages – Gary Chapman
The Way Of The Superior Man
David Deida
Though much has changed in society since the first publication of The Way of the Superior Man, men of all ages still “tussle with the challenges of women, work, and sexual desire.” Including an all-new preface by author David Deida, this 20th-anniversary edition of the classic guide to male spirituality offers the next generation the opportunity to cultivate trust in the moment and put forth the best versions of themselves in an ever-changing world.
In The Way of the Superior Man, Deida explores the most important issues in men’s lives―from career and family to women and intimacy to love and spirituality―to offer a practical guidebook for living a masculine life of integrity, authenticity, and freedom. Join this bestselling author and internationally renowned expert on sexual spirituality for straightforward advice, empowering skills, body practices, and more to help you realize a life of fulfillment, immediately and without compromise.
“He simply lives from his deepest core, fearlessly giving his gifts, feeling through the fleeting moment into the openness of existence, totally committed to magnifying love.”
Dear Lover
David Deida
Your Call to Open to Love’s Deepest Bliss
Every woman knows the fairy tale―find the right man, give him what he wants and needs, and he’ll love you forever. But when the myth you’ve been asked to believe fails to deliver―when you sense you’ve been settling for far less than you know in your heart is possible―then how do you attract and keep a man capable of meeting what you most passionately yearn for?
In Dear Lover, David Deida explores every aspect of the feminine practice of spiritual intimacy, from sexuality and lovemaking, to family and career, to emotions, trust, and commitment. Written as a collection of letters from a man to his dear lover, here is this internationally acclaimed writer’s invitation to practice love as a living art, as you discover how to pick the man of deep integrity who will satisfy the needs of your body, heart, and spirit.
“Whether you are alone or in a relationship, your spiritual and sexual bliss require a daily allotment of whole-body pleasure and deep heart offering.”
The Relationship Cure
John Gottman
A groundbreaking, practical program for transforming troubled relationships into positive ones
“This is the best book on relationships I have ever read. . . . John Gottman has decoded the subtle secrets that can either enrich or destroy the quality of our ties with others.” Daniel B. Wile, Ph.D., author of After the Fight: Using Your Disagreements to Build a Stronger Relationship
“John Gottman is our leading explorer of the inner world of relationships. In The Relationship Cure, he has found gold once again.”William J. Doherty, Ph.D., author of Take Back Your Marriage: Sticking Together in a World That Pulls Us Apart
“When he says his five steps will help you build better connections with the people you care about, you know that they have been demonstrated to work.” E. Mavis Heatherington, Ph.D., professor of psychology, University of Virginia
From the country’s foremost relationship expert and New York Times bestselling author Dr. John M. Gottman comes a powerful, simple five-step program, based on twenty years of innovative research, for greatly improving all of the relationships in your life—with spouses and lovers, children, siblings, and even your colleagues at work. In The Relationship Cure, Dr. Gottman:
* Reveals the key elements of healthy relationships, emphasizing the importance of what he calls “emotional connection”
* Introduces the powerful new concept of the emotional “bid,” the fundamental unit of emotional connection
* Provides remarkably empowering tools for improving the way you bid for emotional connection and how you respond to others’ bids
“Complex, fulfilling relationships don't suddenly appear in our lives fully formed. Rather, they develop one encounter at a time.”
11. What about books to soothe my soul?
Soul-Soothing — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO FOR PROFUNDITY
- Ask And It Is Given – Abraham-Hicks
- It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It – Robert Fulghum
- Notes From The Universe – Mike Dooley
Honorable mention
- Meditation – Osho
Ask And It is Given
Abraham - Hicks
Ask and It Is Given, by Esther and Jerry Hicks, which presents the teachings of the nonphysical entity Abraham, will help you learn how to manifest your desires so that you’re living the joyous and fulfilling life you deserve.
As you read, you’ll come to understand how your relationships, health issues, finances, career concerns, and more are influenced by the Universal laws that govern your time/space reality.
And you’ll discover powerful processes that will help you go with the positive flow of life.
It’s your birthright to live a life filled with everything that is good—and this book will show you how to make it so in every way.
“You are the creator of your own reality.”
It was on fire when i lay down on it
Robert Fulghum
From the author to the reader:
Show-and-Tell was the very best part of school for me, both as a student and as a teacher.
As a kid, I put more into getting ready for my turn to present than I put into the rest of my homework. Show-and-Tell was real in a way that much of what I learned in school was not. It was education that came out of my life experience.
As a teacher, I was always surprised by what I learned from these amateur hours. A kid I was sure I knew well would reach down into a paper bag he carried and fish out some odd-shaped treasure and attach meaning to it beyond my most extravagant expectation.
Again and again I learned that what I thought was only true for me . . . only valued by me . . . only cared about by me . . . was common property. The principles guiding this book are not far from the spirit of Show-and-Tell. It is stuff from home—that place in my mind and heart where I most truly live.
P.S. This volume picks up where I left off in All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, when I promised to tell about the time it was on fire when I lay down on it.
“What counts is not what I do, but how I think about myself while I'm doing it”
Notes From The Universe
Mike Dooley
What if the Universe were to send you frequent reminders of the absolute power you have over your life? Author Mike Dooley, an interpreter for the Universe, has done exactly that in Notes from the Universe—a collection of empowering, invaluable truths that can be read front to back or opened at random.
This first book in the Notes from the Universe trilogy teaches its readers to live a life far richer than they had previously thought imaginable.
The Universe is here to remind us that we are in control. To have the life you desire, all you have to do is ask. The secret to manifesting change is not focusing on the how but instead, the end result of what you’re after—the kind of life you want. Then, once you are truly focused, the Universe will conspire on your behalf.
Author Mike Dooley has turned over every stone, knocked on every door, and followed every impulse. He has immersed himself in the truths he needed to hear most; these were the kind of lessons he wrote about in his weekly emails. What started in 1998 as a little poem sent out once a week to 38 email addresses has evolved into an inspiring anecdote delivered to over 300,000 subscribers from 169 countries, each receiving a new note from the Universe five days a week. Mike Dooley serves as an interpreter for the Universe.
Notes from the Universe begins a three-volume set that is brimful with powerful affirmations that will have you thinking positively, feeling confident, and walking the path to personal success.
When readers discover the truths the Universe is unveiling in Notes from the Universe,they will begin living happier, more fulfilling lives.
“Whether it's praise, love, criticism, money, time, space, power, punishment, sorrow, laughter, care, pain, or pleasure...the more you give, the more you will receive.”
12. I know I need to change my mindset, what books help there?
Mindset-Change — Best Books
TOP BOOKS TO Shift Your Mindset
- Iconoclast – Gregory Berns
- Soaring Beliefs – J-Ryze
- The Happiness Project – Gretchen Ruben
Honorable mention
- Your One Word – Evan Carmichael
Iconoclast
Gregory Berns
No organization can survive without iconoclasts — innovators who single-handedly upturn conventional wisdom and manage to achieve what so many others deem impossible.
Though indispensable, true iconoclasts are few and far between. In Iconoclast, neuroscientist Gregory Berns explains why. He explores the constraints the human brain places on innovative thinking, including fear of failure, the urge to conform, and the tendency to interpret sensory information in familiar ways.
Through vivid accounts of successful innovators ranging from glass artist Dale Chihuly to physicist Richard Feynman to country/rock trio the Dixie Chicks, Berns reveals the inner workings of the iconoclast’s mind with remarkable clarity.
Each engaging chapter goes on to describe practical actions we can each take to understand and unleash our own potential to think differently — such as seeking out new environments, novel experiences, and first-time acquaintances.
Packed with engaging stories, science-based insights, potent practices, and examples from a startling array of disciplines, this engaging book will help you understand how iconoclasts think and equip you to begin thinking more like an iconoclast yourself.
“The Iconoclast embodies traits of creativity and innovation that are not easily accomplished by committee. He eschews authority and convention. He thumbs his nose at the rules.”
Soaring Beliefs
J-Ryze
I write like I talk, some people don’t like it. If a passionate cuss-word here or there offends you, this book isn’t for you. If boobs or taboos trigger you, this book ain’t for you. If you’d rather be ignorant than face hard-truths, this book ain’t for you.
But…
If you’re open-minded, receptive, hungry to grow and change and be a better leader, a better person, you’ve found the right book.
This book is for ambitious heroes who wanna change the world, or at least change their own corner of it.
The words in these pages are some of my clearest views on life-changing topics.
Everything from body-transformation & health, to the power of sexuality, to the secret ‘play’ plays in your empire-building.
And I don’t say that lightly.
I have insanely high-standards, like… freakishly so.For myself, and for others. And that includes the beliefs, ideas, & words contained in this book.
I’ve written millions of words in my life, and Cynthia went through 559 of my Instagram posts, cutting away all but the best, leaving only 26 pages of pure gold.
Less is more. Your time is precious, and you deserve better beliefs, in as fast a read as possible.
Average won’t help you. Normal won’t help you. Average and normal people will get you average & normal results.
I’m not anywhere close to normal, and neither is this book.
It’s for unique, elite peeps who aim to elevate themselves, society, the world.
You want unusual results. You want to be an anomaly. You want to be the 1% of people who succeed bigger & better, make more, live happier. You want to increase influence and personal power.
Even if you’re not an empire-builder, the beliefs and ideas contained on each of these pages can help almost anyone.
But ‘just anyone’ would’ve been scared away by now.
Point is… Want a better body? There’s a page on that. Want more wealth? There’s a page on that. Want to be happier? There’s a page on that.
So even if you just wanna live a chill life, you deserve to live it well, and this book will help.
“Name something you want: A better body, more money, happier relationships..I bet you the path to them requires you to drop the effort. So make an effort to drop the effort ;)”
The Happiness Project
Gretchen Ruben
What if you could change your life without really changing your life? On the outside, Gretchen Rubin had it all — a good marriage, healthy children and a successful career — but she knew something was missing. Determined to end that nagging feeling, she set out on a year-long quest to learn how to better enjoy the life she already had.
Each month, Gretchen pursued a different set of resolutions — go to sleep earlier, tackle a nagging task, bring people together, take time to be silly — along with dozens of other goals. She read everything from classical philosophy to cutting-edge scientific studies, from Winston Churchill to Oprah, developing her own definition of happiness and a plan for how to achieve it.
She kept track of which resolutions worked and which didn’t, sharing her stories and collecting those of others through her blog (created to fulfill one of March’s resolutions). Bit by bit, she began to appreciate and amplify the happiness in her life.
The Happiness Project is the engaging, relatable and inspiring result of the author’s twelve-month adventure in becoming a happier person. Written with a wicked sense of humour and sharp insight, Gretchen Rubin’s story will inspire readers to embrace the pleasure in their lives and remind them how to have fun.
“ 'What do I want from life anyway?' I asked myself. 'Well, I want to be happy.' But I had never thought about what made me happy or how I might be happier.”
13. This is great, but I have health issues, what can I read for that?
HEALTH — Best Books
TOP BOOKS ON BODY MASTERY
- You Can Heal Your Life – Louise Hay
- Beyond Brawn – Stuart McRobert
- Women Food & God – Geneen Roth
Honorable mention
- The 4-Hour Body – Tim Ferriss
You Can Heal Your Life
Louise Hay
Louise L. Hay, bestselling author, is an internationally known leader in the self-help field. Her key message is: “If we are willing to do the mental work, almost anything can be healed.” The author has a great deal of experience and firsthand information to share about healing, including how she cured herself after being diagnosed with cancer.
An excerpt from You Can Heal Your Life:
Life Is Really Very Simple. What We Give Out, We Get Back
What we think about ourselves becomes the truth for us. I believe that everyone, myself included, is responsible for everything in our lives, the best and the worst. Every thought we think is creating our future. Each one of us creates our experiences by our thoughts and our feelings. The thoughts we think and the words we speak create our experiences.
“Remember, you have been criticizing yourself for years and it hasn’t worked. Try approving of yourself and see what happens.”
Beyond Brawn
Stuart McRobert
This is a 512-page encyclopedia on how to build a terrific physique. This book offers the key to your training success. By acknowledging your individuality, this book teaches you precisely how to train yourself. Become your own expert personal trainer! Whether you’re male or female, a beginner or very advanced, young or not-so-young, want to train at home or in a public gym, this book is for you.
Apply what you learn and success will follow! The ‘how-to’ guidance includes: why conventional training is fundamentally wrong and must be bypassed; how to overhaul your training philosophy so that you’re destined for big gains; your ultimate size and strength potential, and the organisation to take you there; how to design and personalise your own training programs, step-by-step; how to conquer over training, maximise results, and never let age hold you back; how to eat in order to maximise your gains and improve your health; how to set up your own low-cost but super-productive home gym; and a real-life, step-by-step training cycle for you to learn from.
“The secret of life is getting today right. Everyone can get today right, and if you can do it once you can do it repeatedly.”
Women, Food, & God
Geneen Roth
Embraced by Oprah, the #1 New York Times bestselling guide that explains the connection between eating and emotion from Geneen Roth—noted authority on mindful eating.
No matter how sophisticated or wealthy or broke or enlightened you are, how you eat tells all.
After three decades of studying, teaching, and writing about our compulsions with food, bestselling author Geneen Roth adds a powerful new dimension to her work in Women Food and God.
She begins with her most basic concept: the way you eat is inseparable from your core beliefs about being alive. Your relationship with food is an exact mirror of your feelings about love, fear, anger, meaning, transformation and, yes, even God.
A timeless and seminal work, Women Food and God shows how going beyond the food and the feelings takes you deeper into realms of spirit and soul—to the bright center of your own life.
“Everything we believe about love, fear, transformation, and God is revealed in how, when, and what we eat.”
14. I've read these, & they keep talking about storytelling, any help?
Storytelling — Best Books
TOP BOOKS ON Improving your storytelling
- Story – Robert McKee
- The Anatomy Of Story – John Truby
- Putting Stories To Work – Shawn Callahan
Honorable mention
- Writing For Emotional Impact – Karl Iglesias
Story
Robert McKee
Robert McKee’s screenwriting workshops have earned him an international reputation for inspiring novices, refining works in progress and putting major screenwriting careers back on track. Quincy Jones, Diane Keaton, Gloria Steinem, Julia Roberts, John Cleese and David Bowie are just a few of his celebrity alumni. Writers, producers, development executives and agents all flock to his lecture series, praising it as a mesmerizing and intense learning experience.
In Story, McKee expands on the concepts he teaches in his $450 seminars (considered a must by industry insiders), providing readers with the most comprehensive, integrated explanation of the craft of writing for the screen. No one better understands how all the elements of a screenplay fit together, and no one is better qualified to explain the “magic” of story construction and the relationship between structure and character than Robert McKee.
“Story is about thoroughness, not shortcuts.”
The Anatomy Of Story
John Truby
“If you’re ready to graduate from the boy-meets-girl league of screenwriting, meet John Truby . . . [his lessons inspire] epiphanies that make you see the contours of your psyche as sharply as your script.”
―LA Weekly
John Truby is one of the most respected and sought-after story consultants in the film industry, and his students have gone on to pen some of Hollywood’s most successful films, including Sleepless in Seattle, Scream, and Shrek.
The Anatomy of Story is his long-awaited first book, and it shares all his secrets for writing a compelling script. Based on the lessons in his award-winning class, Great Screenwriting, The Anatomy of Story draws on a broad range of philosophy and mythology, offering fresh techniques and insightful anecdotes alongside Truby’s own unique approach to building an effective, multifaceted narrative.
“A story tracks what a person wants, what he’ll do to get it, and what costs he’ll have to pay along the way.”
Putting Stories To Work
Shawn Callahan
The most successful leaders are storytellers. By mastering business storytelling, they achieve extraordinary business results. As a modern-day leader, you know you should develop this skill, but you don’t have the time to do this in an ad-hoc way.
What you need is a practical, reliable method to follow, one that will allow your business to reap the benefits of storytelling as soon as possible.
In Putting Stories to Work, Shawn Callahan gives you a clear process for mastering business storytelling. He demolishes the thinking that storytelling has no place at work, reminding us that sharing stories is what we all do naturally, every day, and that it’s one of the most powerful tools for getting things done. You just need to adapt this natural superpower to boost your business.
Shawn’s story mastery process of Discover, Remember, Share, and Refresh is based on over two decades’ work with high-achieving global companies. In Putting Stories to Work, each step is spelled out in detail, backed up by research and plenty of great stories.
“The leaders who do tell stories have developed a process for improving their storytelling and finding good stories to tell - whether they know it or not.”
The End. For now. I hope you enjoyed my book-recommendations.
I do have a fiction list as well that I'll consider adding, but that's it for now!
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