What books do you recommend in the following arenas and why: Leadership Management Spirituality Personal Development Business Books Motivational *I'm curious how many of us on this site get into this sort of stuff, thanks in advance. My current favorites are Patrick Lencioni (Team Building), Daniel Pink (Drive and Whole New Mind), Tim Ferriss (4 Hour Workweek), Seth Godin (Linchpin)
I do. My current favorite is "Talent Is Overrated" by Geoff Colvin and "Biopycology" by John P.J. Pinel. But I sort of prefer listing to this sort of books, or The Teaching Company Lecture series. My TTC favorites are "Explaining Social Deviance" and "Sociology of Sexuality".
What do you mean by 'personal development'? If you mean Psychology I suggest you read as much as you can by Lacan and Jung. And Lacan is a good writer, who can put the complex topic of psychoanalysis in readable English.
With personal development I think he means self help books+books about how to improve a lot of interpersonal and mental skills. But Jung was sort of, just mostly... Wrong. But an interesting theorist, historically.
I would go for the earlier mentioned Biopsycology book to start with covers all the basics, and really fun reading. And there are a lot of book for high school or basic university college level psychology courses their generally is good and give you an modern overview of the field. If you more into reading about therapy anything on cognitive behavioral therapy got a good evidence based approach.
First off, W176 - I have recently gotten into Neil Gaiman and love your quote. Nice touch. When I was referring to Self-Help, it is in the context of motivation. I do agree there are psychology books which can help in this area as well as social economics books. I am going to check out the mentioned reading. I was curious regarding users on this site and their interest in this field as I am working on a collection of essays which fall into this "tag." Thanks Lemex for your input as well. I always want to be someone who has open ears to what is available. Is there any of these books you are reading recently or any that have stuck out in your mind to read next? Possible new titles?
The best novels and poetry out there actually fit a sliver into this area. I'd go looking for some profound writing; they usually impact the way you look at the world. One uncommon book I've been into is called: Gödel, Escher, Bach It's about one famous mathematician (Kurt Gödel), an artist (Escher) and a musician (Bach). However, I wouldn't recommend it for those who are just looking for ways to be a better person. It's more of a philosophy thing...
I'm fairly well versed in self-help and personal development material. I'm currently co-authoring a book on relationship management. The best book I've ever read in any genre is The Inner Game of Tennis by W. Timothy Gallwey. It's about achieving peak performance. You'll find it in the sports section. I'm not kidding. It's actually my favourite book. A great book on Buddhism is When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times by Pema Chodron Another great book is The Way of the Superior Man by David Deida. It's about masculinity and sexual polarity. I'm currently reading Memories, Dreams, Reflections by Carl Jung.
Agreed Completely agree. I find this same motivation while reading social economics. There are so many different roads to personal development, it is great to hear of quantified experiences. Thanks Nathanael
Thanks for the recommendation. Love hearing about new reads. Do you still read other books while you read personal development, such as fiction? Sometimes I have trouble keeping my thoughts separated with 2 or 3 genres of books simultaneously.
This is the most untrue thing I've ever read Lacan is notoriously difficult to read. His ecrits are about the size of a small brick and about as readable
I went through a HUGE self-help phase, when I barely read anything else. I think The Inner Game of Tennis is what took me out of that phase, because it answered so many of the questions I was looking to answer. (It's also beautifully written.) Now I am mostly reading literary works, with the exception of the book by Jung.
