On this page,
you will find my review of my favourite personal development books
-- what
I consider to be the best books I've ever read.
I haven't read every self-help
book ever written (thank goodness) so this is just my somewhat limited opinion.
However, I have found all of the books listed below to be helpful, inspirational
and motivational.
Like all reading, though, you have to take action for
the wisdom to be effective!
PS don't get addicted to reading self-help!
Remember, the answers lie within; these books just help you realise this...
My
Favourite Self Help Books - A Personal Review
Self help books - what I
say...
Now let me repeat myself here by saying that I have not read every
single motivational self-help book! And I've only read a few self help ebooks
(online books), listened to the odd self help audio books; and I have little or
no experience of free self help books or ebooks (but you'll find links to such
resources below).
Having said that, I have read some outstanding self-help
books - life-changing books, make no mistake - and those are the self help
books I've listed.
By the way, if
you have read hundreds of inspirational books, you might want to ask yourself
why that is. Do you just like reading self-help literature for the sake of it
because, in my humble opinion, you only need to read a few good self-help
books - then you need to put what you read into action!
By the way you
can buy these self help books online from Amazon.com (or Amazon.co.uk where shown)...
So
let's get going. The self help books are listed in some kind of order...
I've just this week (Jun, 2009) finished this utterly inspiring book
by Gerald G. Jampolsky. It's only a small book on the subject of fear
but it nevertheless packs a punch, as it shows you how can literally let go of
fear via the daily 'love' lessons.
In
some ways, Love is Letting Go of Fear is a bit of lightweight version of Guy Finley's
book, below. But that is fine. I recommend that you read both of these books.
For they talk about the same truth: Love is the opposite of fear, and fear
conspires to make victims of us all.
I'm not going to explain much more
about this book, as it's so short you might as well read it as read my review
of it. I will share with you a few of the simple lessons, and leave you with the
final words of this book.
Okay, here are some example lessons:
Lesson
1: All That I Give I Give to Myself Lesson 2: Forgiveness is the Key to Happiness Lesson
3: I am Never Upset for the Reason I Think
And the final words of this
brilliant book: "Teach only love for that is what you are"
Oh,
I will say this, though: One thing I really admire about Gerald G. Jampolsky,
is that he uses personal examples of his own fear, and how it got the better
of him. And I find this honesty, refreshing and reassuring. His examples show
me that he has not mastered fear - it is everywhere after all - and that he also
needs to constantly remind himself of his own tendencies towards fearfulness.
Dr
Jampolsky simply possesses a deeper understanding of how fear can be defeated
via love, humility and real forgiveness. Yes, this best-selling book comes
highly recommended (by me)! :-)
I read Guy Finley's The Secret of Letting Go in summer 2008, when I
was trying to 'let go' of (yet another) failed romantic relationship. I was in
a lot of pain, and I just wanted to get over this relationship as wisely as possible.
Little did I know that Guy's book is about far more than letting go of failed
relationships...
In
fact, The Secret of Letting Go is about letting go of 'egoic pain', for want of
a better expression.
In fact, Guy's book - all of Guy Finley's teachings,
actually (he writes books, gives talks, produces audio ebooks, DVDs - all as part
of his not-for-profit Life of Learning Foundation) - is much more than a self-help
book, it's a spiritual guide to living life fearlessly AND in the NOW.
Yes, I think of Guy Finley as a kind of 'practical' Eckart Tolle - they both talk
about the same 'truth', but just use different language.
And, personally
speaking, as much as I appreciate and enjoy reading Eckhart Tolle, Guy Finley's
teachings seem to be more usable - to me, anyway.
So what's in the book?
Profound wisdom and 'truth', approached from many different angles that will force
you to take a long, hard (and forgiving) look at yourself and who you blame for
the troubles you've experienced in your life.
If you've read or listened
to anything by Guy Finley then you'll know what to expect from this life-changing
book. And if not, then I highly recommend you buy The Secret of Letting Go as
it's a great introduction to the teachings of Guy Finley.
Notes: (1) I am not and never will be a fan of gurus per se, but I am a fan of Truth
- and Guy shows you a great glimpse of it, in his teachings and self help books,
DVDs etc. (2) I've just finished The
Essential Laws of Fearless Living by Guy Finley and, again, I found this
book to be truly inspirational!
The subtitle of this transformational book is Healing Our Relationships,
Coming to Ourselves and that is what this powerful self help book is all about,
really - healing our relationships. I don't want to say too much about it (and
spoil it for you) other than I genuinely believe it to the most illuminating (helpful)
self-help book I've ever read - more important than Tolle's A New Earth
(which really is saying a lot).
Your
relationships will improve if you read this book and take on board what C Terry
Warner has to say! And I'm not talking about casual relationships, here, but
those long-term relationships with siblings or parents or even children where
you have tried and tried and tried to make things better but failed. Warner's
incredible book has the answer. Warning! It might not make comfortable reading.
Interestingly, I bought this book on the recommendation of Brian Caniglia,
author of an ebook that showed you how to you get your ex- back. (By the way Brian's
Ex Back ebook
is a great read, should you be in that position!) Brian basically said there was
little point in getting back with your ex- if you were just going to repeat the
same mistakes. He recommended Warner's book as it helped you to take an honest,
victim-free look at your relationships; it helped you to recognise the sometimes
damaging role that you play in your damaged relationships.
This book simply teaches about the importance of the present moment,
the now. It talks about stillness, silence and enlightenment. And it talks
about the tyranny of the egoic form (the Pain Body). It talks about the future
of humankind, too. (Wow, what a book! Lol.)
Actually, A New Earthis an amazing book, and a lot more engaging (and easier to read and
comprehend) than Tolle's first landmark book The Power of Now, in my opinion
anyway. Like many other readers, I also intend to read it many times over. However,
I do not think, as critics seem to want to refute, that it has the answers. I
don't believe self-help books (or any books, for that matter) are meant to have
answers - good self-help books simply try and show you where the answer lies within
you. And that's what Tolles book does, admirably so, for me anyway.
A
note of caution. To many this book might seem a lot of spiritual mumbo jumbo
("unutterable twaddle" as The Daily Express puts it) - what the heck
is a pain body when it's at home? And there are many Christians that seem to be
reacting defensively to Tolle's message (as summed up by this fascinating book
called A
New Earth, An Old Deception: Awakening to the Dangers of Eckhart Tolle's #1 Bestseller
by Richard Abanes), so this book might not be for you. I just thought I should
mention this. (By the way, what the heck's a pain body? Well I think it wrote
A New Earth, An Old Deception. :-O)
Personally, I find it hard
to find fault with the truth that there really is no past and there really is
no future, there is just now. It's a simple message that you have may have read
many times before so if you believe that you don't need to read this book, then
fine don't read it. As I think the Self
Help Collective website testifies, I am not a fan of gurus. Instead, I believe
in you, and I believe in me! I also believe that we all sometimes just need a
helping hand along the way. And Tolle's A New Earth does that for me.
NOTE: I would say a common theme in the self help books 2) and 3)
above, and maybe in the fourth book (Unconditional Love) is one of allowing
others to have their beliefs, even if they differ from yours. This is a very important
life tenet for me - accepting differences in others - it might not be for you:
you might just like being right all the time! ;-)
Unconditional Love: How to Live With an Open Heart in a Changing
World is Ed and Deb Shapiro's close look at that big word called love. Now
all parents can tell you - glowingly (and alarmingly in some cases) - about that
very first moment of seeing their firstborn, that moment they became parents.
These people experienced the full power of unconditional love: a love that will
more or less never extinguish no matter what! Unconditional Love is a book with
a message that this kind of unconditional love is available to all, whether
you're a parent or not.
Now,
and I don't mean to sound trite here, I'm a big fan of love: love conquers
all; love is never wrong; "Love, love me do"... Yes, I believe in love
- not the falling-in-and-out-of-love love (that's infatuation!) - I believe in
the love that is unconditional love. So if loving someone means that I
can never see them again or that I can only be friends (and not lovers) then that's
fine - I shall simply express my love in a different way. And I guess that's why
I really enjoyed reading the Shapiro's Unconditional Love because they
believe in love the same way I do, too.
If you want to live with an open
heart - fearless living - then I recommend this book.
This
is a book about the power of thoughts, your thoughts, to create the world that
you want to live in. It is far more than a positive thinking book - it teaches
how to create thoughts to heal relationships, to achieve long-term goals in life
and even to determine what you will achieve today. Again, this is another book
that I will always refer to throughout life - after all, successful living requires
occasional reminders. :-)
The Tibetan Art of Positive Thinking
might be a bit spiritual mumbo-jumbo for some so maybe those people might want
to read Personal Progress through Positive Thinking by Hilary Jones and
Frank Gilbert or the ever-popular The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman
Vincent Peale.
Don't you just hate it when you start arguing with someone, heatedly
so, only for them to turn around to you and tell you that you're projecting your
problems onto them! The thing is, quite often that person is right. You're getting
angry with someone because they're displaying qualities you dislike that you know
are inside of you. That, my friend, is your shadow.
I
have to say I had very little understanding of 'shadows' before I read John Monbourquette's
How to Befriend Your Shadow and I also think that this book could have
been written better - the subject order needs to be changed, to my mind. Still,
Monbourquette's book is also a transformational read.
Above all, How
to Befriend Your Shadow tells you when you're projecting your problems in
a conflict situation and when the other person really does have a problem - and
that really is worth knowing, in my opinion.
This is a personal self-help book written by someone who has both succeeded
and failed in life, and come to recognise the value of treating life's inevitable
adversities as the teaching tools that they are. This is Al Weatherhead's The
Power of Adversity, and it reveals how Al battled parental 'rejection', bouts
of severe ill health, two failed marriages, business setbacks and still became
a successful businessman, philanthropist and husband!
Whilst
I did not find The Power of Adversity to be life-transforming like
the books above, I found it to be an engaging read nevertheless, and it confirmed
many of the things I now believe (in self-help) about living my best life.
So
I can highly recommend this book.
What I particularly enjoyed about The
Power of Adversity, was the fact that much of this book is about the author Al
Weatherhead's story - his triumphs, yes, but also his failures, some of them quite
personal.
There is humour, self-effacement, and brutal honesty. Al understands
that you can't do this all by yourself - sometimes, especially when times are
hard, it's okay to reach out and ask for help.
This is one of adversity's
many lessons to us, should we but notice.
Also, Al realises that life is
always a work in progress, and that his life, like yours and mine, will always
be filled with adversities - some of which we may find hard to bear. Still, Al
believes in the power of adversity to make you stronger. And, now, so do I.
So
this is a message to Mr Al Weatherhead: "Thanks for sharing your wisdom with
us. And I enjoyed your book" :-)
And here is some of Al's wisdom.
It may sound a little uncompromising, but nevertheless I believe in the essence
of these words...
"We are not meant, in the
grand scheme of life, to be happy and comfortable. Rather, we are meant to
forge our characters on the anvil of adversity" -- Al Weatherhead
This is not really a self-help book;
instead, it's a beautiful insight into one woman's wisdom. Each page starts with
the words, "When I love myself enough" and then Kim McMillen tells us,
after years of the suffering that most of us have experienced, how she now has
resolved to live life: wiser, and with more self-love.
Sometimes self-help
- helping yourself - comes from listening to how someone else has helped themselves.
That's why this book is highly recommended reading. Really.
Don't take self help books too seriously! Well,
that's what Craig
Ferguson thinks about self help books. Is his video a chicken soup for your
funny bone? Maybe.
"Live! Love! Learn!" that's what Tupak
Soiree says in Will Ferguson's satire on self help books and the self-help industry.
Yes, Happiness(TM) is not a self-help book; it's a fictional book about a self-help
book that works (called What I Learned on the Mountain). It may well
be the perfect antidote for those of you that are self-helped out!
So
Will's novel wonders what would actually happen if a self-help book worked, for
everyone!I'm not sure I agree with his conclusions - the end of the world
as we know it (or at least the end of the tobacco and alcohol and even the self-help
industry) - but Happiness™ is certainly food for thought, and it's
a great swipe at an ever-burgeoning industry: self-help. Yes, self-help is an
industry, a business, and you and I are playing our part by being avid consumers
of the product, the next big thing. It's good to remember that fact, and that...
"Self-help
is the opium of our age" -- Will Ferguson
"It's only
a book, Edwin. And happiness can't be found in books. Trust me, I know"
Touché
So
if you're going to read one of my recommendations then please read Happiness™
too! After all, you really can't fault Will's faux self-help mantra can you: "Live!
Love! Learn"?
Self help books - what these other
recommended resources say...
Now I haven't read all of the important self-help
books ever written! Who has? So I include these recommended resources just in
case my list of self help book reviews hasn't included a particularly book (or
subject) you're interested in:
by Gerald G. Jampolsky
)
or 
)
)
)
)
)
)
by Esther and Jerry Hicks (The Teachings of Abraham)
by Will Ferguson
So
Will's novel wonders what would actually happen if a self-help book worked, for
everyone! I'm not sure I agree with his conclusions - the end of the world
as we know it (or at least the end of the tobacco and alcohol and even the self-help
industry) - but Happiness™ is certainly food for thought, and it's
a great swipe at an ever-burgeoning industry: self-help. Yes, self-help is an
industry, a business, and you and I are playing our part by being avid consumers
of the product, the next big thing. It's good to remember that fact, and that...
& 
