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What self-help / personal development books did you find valuable?
Which titles have you enjoyed in the "self-help" or personal development category? How did they help you and what lasting changes have you made since reading them?
I found Atomic Habits by James Clear to be life-changing. I've read many times that it's the ultimate example of a book that could have been a paragraph, or a blog post, etc. But for me, there is value in spending time with the concepts. I ran the London Marathon this year, which is one of the greatest achievements in my life, and I have no doubt it is ultimately as a result of having read this book a couple of years before.
People who dismiss things in such a manner often don't acknowledge the difference between knowing something intellectually and internalizing it on a fundamental level. There absolutely are books that are inflated beyond necessity, but it could also be that whatever specific book they're complaining about just wasn't meant for them.
I think I've started that book three times and ironically never built the habit to continue reading it. It's probably because I was trying to go slowly enough to build other habits with the advice in the book and never applied it to reading.
Yes, Atomic Habits I think is the ultimate self help book, because you really can apply it to virtually every facet of life that you want to improve. Diet, exercise, spending time with loved ones, learning new skills, literally anything and everything I feel like it can help with.
My one criticism with it is how slow the book tells you to take things. On the one hand, I know a lot of people will try to change 20 things in their life at one time and then get burnt out and quit, and the book tries to prevent that. But on the other it encourages you to do something like.... Put on your shoes every day for 3 months and get in the habit of that, then walk to the mailbox daily for three months, then finally walk to the end of the street... It would be years and years before you got into a habit of going for a mile walk every day. And it only encourages you to do try and do one or two new habits at a time. I think most people are capable of wayyy more than that.
The author says he went from cleaning his room daily to being a star athlete in 4 years due to his methods. It's not really consistent with the pace he tells people to take the atomic habits. People shouldn't primarily rely on self motivation or discipline to achieve their goals. He's right about that. But sprinkle a little in and I think most people are capable of a lot more than putting on their running shoes for three months.
Arrest-Proof Yourself - An Ex-Cop Reveals How Easy It Is for Anyone to Get Arrested, How Even a Single Arrest Could Ruin Your Life, and What to Do If the Police Get in Your Face -- Dale C. Carson, Wes Denham
I think I'm too European to fully understand this recommendation, but it makes me feel sad :(
I don't live in America either, and I thought the Royal Hong Kong Police Force I grew up with and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were the good guys too. But the first has proven itself to be tools of an authoritarian regime, and the other was "created to control indigenous peoples" and had been instrumental in twarting workers rights, climate protests, and of course were tools of indigenous genocide.
I know not all cops are bad, but learning how to protect oneself from the bad ones is an important survival skill. Because the bad ones are dressed up the same as the good ones, and both of them think you dress exactly the same as bad citizens they need to hurt.
In a similar vien, we strongly encouraged all of our pledges to watch this video on why you should never talk to the police: https://youtu.be/d-7o9xYp7eE
I recently finished Nonviolent Communication by Marshall Rosenburg and Fight Right by John and Julie Gottman. Both were very good and I think are valuable and complimentary reads for anyone looking to improve their communication skills. They both get a little hokey at points, but the frameworks they both lay out are good.
How to Think by Alan Jacobs.
I don't think I can give it a good description, but I'll try. It's about how cognition works, why stereotypes are a thing, and how people change their minds. It's definitely worth reading.
The Introvert Advantage, by Marti Olsen Laney.
This one is worth reading if you think you might be an introvert or might know someone who is, but it isn't essential if you are an extrovert. It's an extroverted world, so you extroverts don't need survival strategies.
Also I want to clear up a misconception of introverts. People who are outgoing can still be introverts and people who are shy can be extroverts. How someone seems to act when around people doesn't define their introvertedness. My grandmother swears to this day that I am an extrovert just because I seem outgoing, even though on basically every test I end up extremely introverted.
My understanding of it is that it depends on what energises you. I consider myself an outgoing introvert. I'm highly sociable and enjoy going out and seeing people, doing things with friends and even going to the office occasionally. But it absolutely exhausts me and I need plenty of time between social events to recharge and I thrive on solo time.
That is exactly right. That's definitely how I appear to my grandma. For some reason she won't believe my stated experience that I need time to recover. After a party or similar, I feel exhausted. Not physically, emotionally. And from the extroverts I've known, they feel emotionally supercharged after things like that.
I'd definitely recommend giving it a read. Introversion affects a lot of things that most people don't think about. I haven't read it in a long time, but one tidbit that always stuck with me was that introverts are more likely to prefer many small snacks throughout the day rather than a few large meals.
I know I'm going to make a lot of eyes roll, but The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up was really impactful. I grew up in a moderate/severe hoarder house (not so bad as to be on TV, but still pretty bad.) This book gave me the mental script to counteract my hoarder impulses. To this day I still find myself saying "thank you" to things as I throw them out.
The other book I'd recommend is I will teach you to be rich. The author can be pretty condescending at times, and pummels the reader with the main points. Despite the flaws, this book provides a basic complete financial plan.
I found Kondo's organizing tips to be helpful in general. The ones i specifically use to this day is folding clothes so that they 'file' not stack in drawers, folding socks instead of using the elastic to bind them, & nesting bags.
I still manage to be a slight hoarder.. but try really hard to buy less things because i know i will have trouble throwing things out. Its been almost a decade since I read that tho - so would be one to revisit.
I came here to comment about Marie Kondo's book as well! I had what sounds like a similar take from it that you did - it changed my relationship to "stuff" in a pretty profound way. I recognized how often "things" were really proxies for my emotions. I learned so much about myself by examining the stuff I was holding on to and by reflecting on why I felt the need to hold on to it in the first place. It was quite interesting to watch my brain begin to notice other things in my life that didn't "spark joy". Like my (now ex-) partner...
Not a book, but a philosophy podcast called Philosophize This by Stephen West.
It starts as a chronological walkthrough from the beginnings of western philosophy from ancient Greece to the modern day, and then branches out wider and deeper.
As someone who's felt spiritually lost for much of his teens and 20s, with a strong connection to science and lacking one to religion, working through my own interpretation of these ideas over the past 6 years has given me an amazing amount of perspective and clarity about the person I want to be and how to present that to the people around me.
There's something comforting about feeling underwhelmed by the ideas I believed in the past, moved beyond, and then being affirmed that people smarter than me found those same limitations. It promoted an openness to being wrong about my current beliefs while also pushing me to consider what values are important to me, and I think that's something incredibly valuable in our current climate of polarised worldviews.
I'm almost frustrated that my education didn't show me these ideas sooner, but being able to recognise myself in the ideas and flaws being presented makes it so much more impactful than just appreciating it abstractly.
Fun topic!
For me, The Now Habit by Neil Fiore.
I have ADHD, but I think most people could benefit from this book. I still procrastinate, but it has really provided me with a lot of helpful tools to be more productive in my everyday life. I wish I could come across another book that's been as powerful as this one...
EDIT: As OP mentioned in their suggestion, I highly recommend reading the entire book. However, here's a solid summary of the book which I often reference back to to refresh myself - https://hashref.com/summaries/TheNowHabit.pdf
Read Drama of the Gifted Child by Alice Miller almost a decade ago and it provided an interesting framework to understand myself and others. High level its about the dynamic between children who are sensitive to the needs of their parents and support them in some way, but as a result suppress their own needs (leading to depression e.g.). Common in abusive households or parents with mental illnesses.
Its a psychoanalysis book - so take what you want out of it. But i found the case studies and analysis to feel relatable even for someone who doesn't consider themselves to have been brought up in an abusive household.
I always hate to bring this up, but it think it's important for anyone who needed Miller's book (as I have). Her son wrote a book about her to demonstrate that she was exactly the kind of parent she decries: The True Drama of the Gifted Child by Martin Miller. I wish I could provide a link. It seems to be very hard to find now.
Oh interesting - thanks for sharing. Looks like its still available secondhand. Did reading this change how you interpreted Drama of the Gifted Child or credibility of Alice Miller?
Oh wow, that is a very difficult question. I think even Martin agrees that Alice is mostly right. And I would say that's true. At the same time, it changed my opinion of the "voice" behind the original. As with most books written by experts, there is a lot of definitive speak. The second book highlighted for me that even if a person is brilliant and worth listening to, that does not mean they actually solved their own problem. If that makes sense.
Not a book but I found this useful
https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn
There’s a kids version too, which I went through with both my kids, and I think they got some good stuff out of it.
The author of the course has several related books as well.
The Slight Edge by Jeff Olson. The author describes it as the self-help book that makes the other self-help books work, and I tend to agree. I imagine the content is along the lines of Atomic Habits (I haven't read that one) - it preaches the value of consistency in small disciplines over time, the accumulation of small decisions that compound over time in the same way that compound interest grows your savings account. As someone who didn't remember experiencing failure often when I was young (and therefore didn't learn to work to overcome it), it was an illuminating read and helped me recontextualize many things that I considered to simply be innate talent or natural ability.
All About Love: New Visions, by bell hooks.
This book closely examines love as a concept and as a practice.
The English word 'love' means a lot of different things. This book separates them from one another and demonstrates how they are applied (and not applied) in life. It helped me see some of my relationships with new clarity. I think everyone should read it.
In general I'm a little averse to the concept of a self-help book, but I have enjoyed a few books that I would describe as toeing the line between self-help and something else:
How To Solve It by George Polya. This is technically a book on how to solve problems in mathematics, but it really extends beyond that, and is a good primer on reasoning about problem-solving generally. There are lots of valuable insights and heuristics, and it's short enough that it's worth reading for most everyone.
How To Read A Book by Mortimer J. Adler & Charles Van Doren. This is just what it sounds like. It's a manual on how to approach reading complex texts and books in general, and it has a great Recommended Reading section at the end where the authors list off what is essentially a 'canon' of literature. IMO its problems are (a) since it dates from the mid-20th century, there is a predictable lack of diversity/variation among the recommendations, and (b) the book is probably a lot longer than it needs to be. Ironically, though, it has a section on judging the merits of when to skim a text versus when to give it full attention, so perhaps this affords an opportunity to apply those techniques immediately.
ABC of Reading by Ezra Pound. Obviously Ezra Pound is one of the great 20th century poets. This book has a flavor more or less akin to lecture notes for a course on literature. It's really delightful to essentially get instruction on aesthetic criticism directly from such a talented artist. If you read mainly contemporary works, this could be a great way to start developing an appreciation for classic literature and poetry.
The Craft of Research by... Booth et al. This is sort of a primer on conducting academic research. I don't really have much to say about it other than it's worthwhile if you expect to do research at some point. Has some good tips and may help spur you to think about the process of research on a more meta level.
Hm. This is not a self-help book, per se — nominally it's a parenting book. But the book Parenting Beyond Power by Jen Lumanlan has completely transformed the way I view nearly every relationship and interpersonal conflict in my life. Two years after first reading it, I still think about it at least once a week (admittedly this is at least in part because I now have a young child). I found it to be a really useful and practical dissection of how systemic power dynamics shape our relationships, and what alternatives we have for engaging with the people around us.