one of the best things you can do to improve yourself every day is to read the wisdom of others here are 25 books I recommend you add to your reading list this year because we're starting off the year right let's go with a daily reader the daily stoic by Ryan Holiday by Far and Away one of my favorite books of all time I read it every single day for 3 years straight I still continue to read it but the daily stoic is essentially layman's terms for what we need to know about what the stoic were teaching us about how to live a great life if you're not familiar with stoicism it can be pretty well summed up by the four virtues self-control courage Justice and wisdom Ryan takes the stoics words and turns them into basic understanding for us to take these lessons away from these very very wise men from many many many many moons ago this book I can say barnon has changed my life probably more than any other and how I handle myself how I handle the interactions I have with other people and continue to conduct myself in the way that I would want to in my day-to-day life and it's a page a day so it's a win I have so like look at this I have notes I have highlights I mean there were years I did highlighter only there were years I took notes in the margins there were years I just underlined things like it was just crazy how I had to absorb this information it took me a long time to get a basic understanding of it but one thing I got an understanding of was that I wanted my own page a day reader Ryan inspired me I wanted to have my own page ofday reader so that's why my second recommendation is 365 days of good morning good life if you didn't know I wrote a book called good morning good life more on that later and this is the page day reader that is inspired from that methodology so covering all of our seven main pillars mindset career wealth Health relationships spirituality and Legacy every single day we cover one of those territories so whether you need some motivation as to why you'd get out out of bed today or to hit the gym or you just need an idea of how to have a better conversation with somebody if you're just getting into the reading game pick up these two books and then you just have to read two pages a day to start to get into the lifestyle of becoming a daily reader because we just talked about it my third recommendation is good morning good life this is the morning routine manual just fill three buckets movement mindfulness Mastery and you can start the day on your terms and another motivator for you if you're like I don't know if if I'm ready to make all this positive change in my life I recommend the high- five habit by Mel Robbins Mel Robbins is such an epic author if you haven't heard of her 5c rule that was the first life-changing book I read from her but the high five habit just got me going in a completely different way there was something about giving myself a high five that was so motivating so not just the idea of that habit if you think it's silly wait until you read this I think she'll convince you otherwise but in general taking control of your life by having such a positive outlook and saying I am here for you self no matter what's going on no matter where we need to go no matter what we need to overcome unconditional love and support for what's next and that's what I got from this number five is the 12 week year by Brian Moran I talk about this book a lot here because I believe that what we think we can do in a year we can probably do a lot faster and Brian has a whole system in this book to help you set an annual goal but then to get it done in 12 weeks instead of 12 months it's not just about shortening the timeline it has to do with how you incentivize yourself how you check in how you have that accountability so if you're thinking I would really love to see myself at this point 12 months from now this is what I wanted to look for me this year I encourage you to pick this up and start to rethink what's possible for you in a shorter timeline and to help you with that number six is going to be big essentialism by Greg mccuan we can sum this up with a simple illustration you have a certain amount of energy and what you do with it is up to you you can go in One Direction and make something big happen or you can use that same amount of energy and go in lots of different directions the amount of energy that you have is not going to change but your focus will and whether or not you complete something has to do with how well you choose and keep going if you are in a place right now where you're trying to figure out if you can make something happen read essentialism so that Greg can convince you to stay focused on the one thing that makes the biggest difference in your life so that you'll keep at it every single day and actually achieve it my seventh recommendation is if you are struggling with creativity and getting the wonderful things that you still have to create out of you and that's the artist Way by Julia Cameron I've talked about this book a lot from one particular practice that she talks about and that's the idea of the morning Pages it's a great mindful moment for you to check in and just get everything out of your mind and on to paper starting the day like this you get the bad dreams The Grudges the gross stuff that you just wish you weren't thinking about out of your mind and on paper you've given it a purpose and a place to go Julia encourages you to get all of that out first that's what the morning pages are for so that then you can move on to your best work your morning pages are not meant to be this gorgeous Journal that your grandchilden will read someday it is to get the gross out of the way so that you can move on to your creative work and this has helped me so much I actually need to burn all of my morning Pages cuz I have this horrible collection of all of them I think I was proud of myself for making the time to write those pages for all those years I have all these journals but they're full of nothing but crap because my best work came after doing the morning pages and there's so much more to take out of this so if you're trying to get more and tapped in with your creativity and making beautiful things becoming an author or doing your art you have to read this let's switch into business mode number number eight is from gin Wickman and it is traction when I say this book has changed my business life this book has changed my business life if you are entrepreneurial in any way I don't care if you're a solopreneur or you're growing a team and getting bigger and bigger you have to have this book on your radar we're often times building a business just completely willy-nilly and off the top of our head that's not a good idea not only should you have a coach and some Frameworks in place but you need guidance from people who have done it and done it well for businesses that have gone on to be successful just as they are or went on to become sold to larger operations you need a machine that works regardless so pickup traction it helps you even when you are a very very very small team to make sure you're putting that infrastructure in place that makes you efficient and off the back of that number nine Dan Martell's buyback your time this is very eye openening for those of you who are in your business and you're just loving it so much you think that you'll never fall out of love with it spoiler alert a job still becomes a job at some point what I like about buyback your time is that you think more in terms of how to grow when you look at the tasks that need to be done in your life or in your business as something that should be passed on to someone else someone else who's way better at it than you for those of you who think oh this book isn't from me I'm not big enough yet you need to read this book right now until you see your operation as something that needs to be done as a team it is just a job you are not growing a business Dan really spotlights that in the way that he talks about how you buy back your time so that you focus on what your best skill sets are and you spend time in that lane and allow everything else to go to someone else who will do a better job of it than you and they get paid what they get paid you buy back that time so that you can focus on the things that bring in the funding that make that happen that make you get paid more and that make the business fruitful I don't care if you think you're not at this level yet the more you think I'm not there yet I'm not there yet I'm not there yet you will stay exactly where you are you will never be able to buy back your time because you'll be too busy just making sure you only charge enough to pay for the light bill and you will not be growing think in terms of growth and reverse engineer it so that you take the right steps today to get to where you need to be and read this book so it motivates you to think about ways that you can start buying back your time sooner than later it is very easy to lean on labels there's plenty of labels to choose from we can blame so many reasons why we are the way that we are or we can look at those things that we know about ourselves because we're self-aware and learn more how to lean into it and what I love about quiet from Susan Kain is this book is all about leaning into being an introvert I am a self-proclaimed introvert I know former versions of myself that has always rationalized my behavior by saying well I'm an introvert so get used to me stoicism says not so much there are powerful things about being an introvert too what can you leverage about yourself in that way that makes you a better person and not more closed do you not take care of yourself as an introvert because you need to show up for other people no you need to take care of yourself if you need to rehabilitate I know after I'm around a lot of people and with a lot of high activity I need to retreat back and have some quiet time time that's what I need for me but I think Susan also really helps to encourage you to look at how you can see yourself as an introvert as a powerful thing and the way to leverage that in your life whether it's just for making yourself feel better or in your day-to-day career or anything in between and Ryan holiday is back with number 11 and that is the obstacle is the way we're so busy trying to find all of the reasons why the challenges and the trials of our life are good enough reason for us to settle back take a beat and not try harder but when you read this book oh my gosh you're going to be freaking out cuz you're going to realize all of the things that have happened to you might have actually been happening for you and the challenges of your life were tests of what you were going to do about it and if you could learn how to get through those things you could do so much more so how did you pass the test what did you do with the adversity that happened the obstacle is the way and specifically as we women continue to get motivated we need to hear from other women who have broken through barriers and that's why I love bernee Brown's daring greatly this woman and her writing has just changed I think what it really means to be an ambitious woman in this lifetime and I have so much to thank her for but daring greatly in particular has opened my eyes to how many things I could do differently and how many ways I could approach life differently to just dare a little bit bigger as someone who's always been a rule follower a little bit scared always kind of like hiding in the background daring greatly is an idea that I don't take to it's just I don't know if that's for me that already sounds like it's not a me thing but that's the whole point we only have so much time in this Human Experience to do the things we want to do the things that we feel called to do and the ways that we serve and you have have to be willing to be very courageous to make those things happen a lot of the time so Berne Brown's daring greatly better be on your list if you're feeling like you could step up to the plate a bit more number 13 is from one of my favorite thought leaders Ed mlet the power of one more you ever go to the gym and it's like okay do 10 reps like no problem get to 10 and call it quits what if it was 11 you've already told yourself in your mind like no no no no the assignment was 10 I'm not going to do 11 the power of one more is all about that thought process I could do the assignment I could do what I was told to do or I could go a little bit further and by continuing to lift those weights I stretch my muscle even more and it grows even more just by that one more just by that little percentage trying harder if you think you need some help in the area of I don't even know what it means to try harder am I doing enough or I need to go a little bit more let Ed guide you with this book number 14 Arnold Bennett's how to live on 24 hours a day it's basically an essay that was somebody put it into a book and when I found it on Amazon it rocked my world it also rocked many of your worlds because I made a video about it and people were mind blown how do you live on 24 hours a day now a little bit of this book was a bit controversial right it's dated material and so there's some things that he talks about like having your wife bring you a cup of tea at night that was kind of like bro when you look at how much time you have it changes your perspective you can make a list of things to do that's as long as how tall you are but you're not going to get it all done until you look at how much time you actually have let Arnold's wisdom the areas that have to do with looking at your life differently change your mind about how you're using your time one of my favorite tidbits in this book is when he talks about the formal dinner at night do you know how much time that takes out of all of our day for all of us to come home somebody has to prep the dinner then we have to sit at the table because that's the right thing to do sit down eat the and you're supposed to and it's like wait wow that takes a lot of time and a large meal at the end of the day makes you really really tired and then you end up vegging out and wasting the rest of your day what if you did it differently if you like that cool if you don't like it why are you doing it we conform to so many things because it's what everyone else is doing but what if there was another way for you to go about it next is getting things done from David Allen the art of stressfree productivity this is the beginning of a great series of sort of some time management and task management stuff David Allen's systems for figuring out how to get things done in a way that's not overwhelming and actually doing a good job of prioritizing and putting things in places that actually help you get things done instead of just overwhelming you this is required reading if you don't know how to get things done how how are we even existing in this life this is the secret and then from there you've got to pick up these two books from Thiago Forte so the first being building a second brain this is a great way to take what David teaches in the previous book getting things done and start looking at how you compartmentalize projects and different areas of your life and he really breaks it down even more with the param method in the followup book I think that if you read all three of these you'll become the most productive person than you'll have ever met in your life period now part of getting things done compartmentalizing projects and actually making things happen means taking notes which is why I recommend Sanka ain's how to take smart notes if you think you know how to take notes you'll read this book and go hm nope could have been doing that better the most basic of things who taught you how to take notes sometimes you just get thrown into school and they just expect you to know how to take notes nobody even teaches you it's absurd it's one of the most basic basic things it's supposed to help get you through the education program and you don't even get taught how to do it who's teaching us how to learn thank God for the internet I think a lot of students in college might be more familiar with this book but you adults out there in your businesses and your home life and you're just trying to figure out like what did I even write there and where did I write it I can't keep track of my life how to take smart notes is a GameChanger from Ryan Sahan big money energy now I have a lot of very like big thinking and systematic books books that I'm going to recommend on money but there's something about Ryan's life and his approach and the way that he's made things happen in his career and in how he conducts himself that have just astounded me that he's not just a reality TV star that had everything handed to him he took the opportunities that came his way actually he kind of went and got them super hardcore without letting anybody say no which I also think is something to learn from and then made the most of it by turning all of it into into something bigger so he actually has another book called sell it like Sahan which is much more geared towards sales but this book Big Money energy if you have a hard time with the idea of money and it being important to you I think Ryan could motivate your little face off with this funny writing in this book to make you feel differently and then after that make sure you pick up you are a badass at making money by Jensen cherot what I love about this is a woman's perspective about money I think it's very important that we as women talk about money with each other so that it is not tabooed so that it is not weird we can't get better if we don't understand I always have my coaching clients talk about a financial win if they want to have a question to bring to the table if you're not getting Financial wins we need to help you I don't want you sitting in the background acting like everything's fine if everything is not fine but the only way that we make sure that we help each other is to actually talk about it Jen's ability to talk about money as a woman who wants to help other women is one of my favorite money books of all time next is remit setti I will teach you to be rich I love this because it's got a lot of practical stuff about making money and managing it properly so that it serves you and you are not serving it pick this one up no guilt no excuses no BS it is a simple approach and I think it'll make you feel a little bit better about getting a bigger understanding of your money situation now if all of this is super uncomfortable for you if you're like I don't I can't can't with the money conversation just get over the money is not important money is not the most important thing fine of course totally get that but money helps you solve problems and to be able to solve problems for yourself is great to be able to solve problems for your family when you really need it is vital so you have to get to the root of this issue and I recommend you do it by reading Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert kosaki this will change your mind and finally if you're in business and we got to talk about money profit first Mike mallwitz this book is a reread for me every year along with traction that helps me make sure my business is starting on the right page when it comes to finances an organization if you have no idea how to handle your money in business required you must read this download the worksheets go and do your research it's so simple you can't run your business on a spreadsheet you have to run your business on real cash in the bank and he helps you do it most of my recommendations of books are always very practical and meant to get you moving and doing but in order to do things very effectively you need to know who you want to be and part of knowing who you want to be is knowing who you are obtaining that self-awareness means having a bit more experience with what it means for you to be spiritual everybody's got their their own interpretation of spirituality and they might think it's more religion than anything else but if you're lost in this area these are the books that I recommend The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz this is almost like stoicism but for you noticing what's true already about yourself it's such a quick read and it is probably one of the most game-changing books that will ever happen for your mindset he calls it a practical guide to personal freedom and I think think what happens is when you read The Four Agreements you start to rectify your feelings about the limiting beliefs that you continue to carry through your life so if you feel very limited right now or you feel you have some beliefs that are not serving you pick this one up and the final book I want to share with you will be the ultimate Spiritual Awakening of your entire life and I say that because that's the case every single time that I read it Michael Singer the untethered Soul there's so much to say about this book but I think the biggest thing I want you to take away is that we often have thoughts and we think a lot of those thoughts but they are not who we are and what Michael is trying to teach you is that there are things about your Human Experience that are happening and there are things about who you truly are that are happening and the more you're able to look at them separately the better you are at not taking things personal the better you are at seeing the big picture and most importantly the better you are are living your life completely to the fullest because you don't have to be worried about every single little thing just because it was a fleeting thought links to every single one of these beautiful books will be in the description down below I cannot wait to see the person you become after you have read them