The absolute BEST book you MUST read!

[SteveBatt]

Think and grow rich lead me to unscripted and 5 A.M club led me to them all I have 5 new books to read at the moment I find I can draw different information from different authors but MJ as been my favourite author followed by Robin Sharma.
Napoleon Hill was very good but written a long time ago in the 30s so required more patience in reading but very ahead of its time.

 

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[Somerandomdude]

In one of my last podcast interviews, I was asked "In your opinion, what is a must read book?"

My answer threw the interviewer for a loop because I didn't provide a specific book.

Instead I said: The absolute best book you must read is actually the book that will help you solve the problem that sits in front of your face.

So if you're struggling to be an entrepreneur, that book might be TMF or UNSCRIPTED .
If you're struggling to build a brand, it might be a book on branding.
If you're struggling to grow your social media and its effectiveness, it might be a social media book.
If you're struggling to find VC funding, it might be a book on VC funding.

You see, you should stop reading books for the sake of reading books.

Read books that solve your problems.

If you're on a long distance road trip and you blow a tire, but don't know how to change a tire, what book should you be reading?

How to change a tire?

OR

The Lean Startup?

And the only thing that tells you WHICH books you should be reading?

*** ACTION ***

Because ACTION highlights your challenges and weaknesses. If you don't start the journey and eventually get to that blown tire, you never come across the problem and learn how to change it. (Or learn how to hire someone to change it.)

I find myself going from book to book every week whenever I have a problem I need to face I have a book that can solve the problem,is like having different weapons for different battles in life sometimes I’m reading something and it just doesn’t make “click” and that’s when i know i must focus on what’s happening in my life then another week I have a problem related to the book and reading it seems like discovering a gold mine

 

[Rachie]

As a newbie on this platform I can relate to this. I started reading so I could do something instead of nothing and while reading TMF and unscripted it shifted to: not just read anything, but read something. Something that will actually help with the direction that you wanna go now. Very good topic!

 

[unicon]

3 SKILLS ARE
1) CONCEPTUAL
2) HUMAN
3) TECHNICAL

ALL PROBLEMS HAVE THEIR SOURCE IN HUMAN BEHAVIOR, ONCE HAVING READ THE TOP BOOKS ON HUMAN SKILL (M SCOTT PECK -THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, ETC.). THEN REACH OUT FOR CONCEPTUAL PRIORITIES LINKING HUMAN AND TECHNICAL (WORDS AND NUMBERS).
CONCEPTUAL SKILL IS SIMPLIFICATION AND CONNECTING (VALUE), A CONSTANT SEARCH FOR FUNDAMENTALS.
PARADOXICALLY HUMAN SKILL IN PROBLEM SOLVING ALLOWS UNDERSTANDING OF PROCESS, THEN ALLOWING TO SEE GOD. PERFECTION IS SOMEWHERE IN-BETWEEN.
TECHNICAL SKILLS IS A BOX FULL OF LISTS AND CUTOFFS (COMPUTER). EXAMPLE: GEORGE GILDER'S - WEALTH & POVERTY, LIFE AFTER GOOGLE, ETC.
BOOK CHOICES ARE ABOUT BIG PICTURE SIMPLICITY CONCEPTUAL SKILLS. a RECONCILING CONCEPTUAL LOCK IS THE GOAL. FASTLANE IS A BIG PICTURE BOOK (CONCEPTUAL).

 

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[metamorphose]

Thats one of the thing that i regret in my teens. I was just reading books that youtubers recommended to me, and this leads to action faking of its finest. You think you are making progress and you feel good, but it is just another way to procrastinate when you don't read the books that make you solve your the problems you need to solve.

 

[mikecarlooch]

IMO, reading is like a diet. If you read too much, you get too 'fat' and 'obese' until you can't move to take action. Thus the term, 'analysis paralysis'. Analogically, if you eat too much, you are not likely to use all the vitamins or nutrients....it's likely to go down the drain.
But if you read only what you need, there's a higher chance of the knowledge is going to be deployed rather than just sit in that miserable pinkish gunk we call a brain. Analogically, people who eat only what they need to eat do use up the stored energy and vitamins more sufficiently and efficiently.

Good thing you put this in the book discussions thread. New people need to read this before sending themselves into wantrapreneur hell. I was there before, and I actually prefer losing ten thousand dollars on a bad business decision than go there again.

I currently struggle with this.. Constant reading and consumption of information. Sometimes I'll switch audiobooks 5 times in 20 minutes because I want to be sure I constantly have that feeling that I'm learning something NEW.

The reason I don't stop is because I'm terrified of losing the habit of learning. I remember what it was like having 0 brain cells in high school, pretty much a dummy. The last 6-8 months of this reading habit have transformed my brain.

However, what used to feel like learning and nuggets of wisdom now feels like paralysis. The combination of switching audiobooks and now the racing thoughts of feeling like I should be doing something other than listening to that audiobook, completely destroy my focus on some days.

How would you guys go about keeping this learning habit, while also not reading/consuming as much?

I am all about the team producer/team consumer thing. But if you don't consume, how do you learn new information?

I know that "Doing" is likely the answer I'll get, but if doing was the only answer, why do most hard working people never learn how to make more than $50,000 a year? How would that person making $50,000 at their soul-sucking job ever figure out all of the info about leadership, scale, cents, etc if they never read information about it?

My fear is that if I don't keep learning, valuable knowledge will slip through the cracks and I won't live to my fullest potential because I didn't continue reading books from the likes of very successful people.

Like, wasn't Bill Gates the type of kid that would sit in his room for hours upon hours a day studying his interests in books?

I feel like since my environment doesn't consist of constantly learning from the mindset and disciplines of successful people I will through osmosis start to gain the bad habits of the people around me, like watching a ton of TV, scrolling on social media or not having any vision in life, walking in circles with no direction (i've been there, going back to it would be total hell).

I feel like this fear is a blessing and a curse, but I want to be on the light side of it, not the dark. It feels reading is one of the best things I can do to be the outlier in my family.

I asked a lot of questions here, lol. But what are your guys thoughts?

Thanks!

 

[Antifragile]

John Wooden: "Five years from now, you're the same person except for the people you've met and the books you've read...."

What one book would you wish you had if you were stranded on a deserted island? “A book on how to build a ship”

I will through osmosis start to gain the bad habits of the people around me, like watching a ton of TV, scrolling on social media or not having any vision in life, walking in circles with no direction

Why? You have your own brain - use it. You don’t need to be surrounded by only successful people to be successful. You decide what and who you want to be. Not your environment. Accept it as a fact. Move on and enjoy living on your own terms.

 

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[MTF]

I currently struggle with this.. Constant reading and consumption of information. Sometimes I'll switch audiobooks 5 times in 20 minutes because I want to be sure I constantly have that feeling that I'm learning something NEW.

The reason I don't stop is because I'm terrified of losing the habit of learning. I remember what it was like having 0 brain cells in high school, pretty much a dummy. The last 6-8 months of this reading habit have transformed my brain.

Tim Ferriss recently addressed it in a podcast. He said that reading books is a socially-acceptable method of procrastination. His advice was to focus on knowledge that's "just in time" (stuff you're dealing with now) rather than "just in case" (stuff you "may" need sometime in the future).

Also, you don't need to read business books to learn. Consider reading autobiographies or non-business non-fiction to learn about topics that interest you. And treat it as your entertainment, not one of your business tasks.

 

[andyhaus44]

Darren Hardy recommends the 1-1-5-3-1-30-30-5 plan, and it seems to be a great way to stay on track.

Every quarter, he works on one specific area and focuses on:
1 Goal
1 Skill
5 Books
3 Audiobooks
1 Program/seminar
30 Minutes of reading
30 Minutes of listening to an audiobook

5 step study process:
* study - focus on applications directly related to that one skill
* extract the best 3 ideas (if there are 100 ideas, there are no ideas)
* act - implement one idea per month
* measure - measure each improvement over a period of 30 days
* review - plan, do, review, adjust

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1MwH5MiIrc

 

[LuckyPup]

I currently struggle with this.. Constant reading and consumption of information. Sometimes I'll switch audiobooks 5 times in 20 minutes because I want to be sure I constantly have that feeling that I'm learning something NEW.

The reason I don't stop is because I'm terrified of losing the habit of learning. I remember what it was like having 0 brain cells in high school, pretty much a dummy. The last 6-8 months of this reading habit have transformed my brain.

However, what used to feel like learning and nuggets of wisdom now feels like paralysis. The combination of switching audiobooks and now the racing thoughts of feeling like I should be doing something other than listening to that audiobook, completely destroy my focus on some days.

How would you guys go about keeping this learning habit, while also not reading/consuming as much?

I am all about the team producer/team consumer thing. But if you don't consume, how do you learn new information?

I know that "Doing" is likely the answer I'll get, but if doing was the only answer, why do most hard working people never learn how to make more than $50,000 a year? How would that person making $50,000 at their soul-sucking job ever figure out all of the info about leadership, scale, cents, etc if they never read information about it?

My fear is that if I don't keep learning, valuable knowledge will slip through the cracks and I won't live to my fullest potential because I didn't continue reading books from the likes of very successful people.

Like, wasn't Bill Gates the type of kid that would sit in his room for hours upon hours a day studying his interests in books?

I feel like since my environment doesn't consist of constantly learning from the mindset and disciplines of successful people I will through osmosis start to gain the bad habits of the people around me, like watching a ton of TV, scrolling on social media or not having any vision in life, walking in circles with no direction (i've been there, going back to it would be total hell).

I feel like this fear is a blessing and a curse, but I want to be on the light side of it, not the dark. It feels reading is one of the best things I can do to be the outlier in my family.

I asked a lot of questions here, lol. But what are your guys thoughts?

Thanks!

I'm also an avid reader; I read to improve myself, to increase my capabilities, to expand my awareness and to be entertained. These are the reasons why I read. I would suggest you examine the "why" for your consumption of information. Is it a means to an end, or is the consumption an end unto itself? Has there been a quantifiable or qualifiable result from your info consumption? Remember this: Data is not information. Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not wisdom.

 

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[Mr.Maverick]

Great reminder! I had this problem starting out.

Coming from a slow lane job I realize that I needed something valuable to offer and sell.

I didn't need to consume more books for the sake of it.

I had to shift my mindset from

"I'm reading this because I might need this in the future" into "what is something valuable I can offer to someone that needs it?".

I had to stop being a consumer and start becoming more of a producer.

 

[Isaac Odongo]

I am fiction writer, so I read books on how to write fiction and they helped me tons. Recently, I began to think about getting financially better, stronger, and free. At first I read Kiyosaki, then One Minute Millionaire and dozens of others. A few really helped me. Such as Three Feet from Gold. But it was Brian Tracy who drove me to my FTE. MJ taught me to forget about compound interest and focus on Fastlane entrepreneurship. MJ's response was on the money. I apply it sometimes, though I need to read with more focus for the best results.

 

[Oahnay14]

In one of my last podcast interviews, I was asked "In your opinion, what is a must read book?"

My answer threw the interviewer for a loop because I didn't provide a specific book.

Instead I said: The absolute best book you must read is actually the book that will help you solve the problem that sits in front of your face.

So if you're struggling to be an entrepreneur, that book might be TMF or UNSCRIPTED .
If you're struggling to build a brand, it might be a book on branding.
If you're struggling to grow your social media and its effectiveness, it might be a social media book.
If you're struggling to find VC funding, it might be a book on VC funding.

You see, you should stop reading books for the sake of reading books.

Read books that solve your problems.

If you're on a long distance road trip and you blow a tire, but don't know how to change a tire, what book should you be reading?

How to change a tire?

OR

The Lean Startup?

And the only thing that tells you WHICH books you should be reading?

*** ACTION ***

Because ACTION highlights your challenges and weaknesses. If you don't start the journey and eventually get to that blown tire, you never come across the problem and learn how to change it. (Or learn how to hire someone to change it.)

Dude, that's a game changer. Thanks for your insight.

 

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[Lyzmin]

You're describing the difference between 'just in time learning' and 'just in case learning' perfectly.
Also what you don't use you lose, so it's even not helping you in the long run!
Great share @MJ DeMarco