The absolute BEST book you MUST read!

[MJ DeMarco]

FYI: Original post has been edited to reflect updated from the Fastlane newsletter.

 

[InspireHD]

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.

I'm not sure if we're talking about the same interview, but I watched a youtube video two nights ago that ended the same way. He definitely wasn't ready for that answer. It just goes to show you're on an entirely different level than these people. It's great to hear your discussions. Thanks for doing so many!

 

[S.Y.]

There are books that are transcending current problems. At least for me, and that book is Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (the Hays translation is my favorite). I have re-read this book many times.

The only way I can explain why is:
1. It grounds me and allows me to go through life like a bamboo: flexible and resistant
2. Every time I open it, read something useful

I just randomly opened a page and read the following:

"Disgraceful: for the soul to give up when the body is still going". If I had a bad day and I read this, it would push me to keep grinding.​

Another random page:

"Give yourself a gift: the present moment.
People out for posthumous fame forget that the Generations To Come will be the same annoying people they know now. And just as mortal. What does it matter to you if they say x about you, or think y"​

Aka f*** the hater. Keep learning.

Last one:

"Dig deep; the water - goodness - is down there. And as long as you keep digging, it will keep bubbling up"​

aka persistence

That said, execution is king! Fully agree with that.

 

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[High Sierra]

"A book that will help you solve the problem at hand" is the ultimate UNSCRIPTED answer of course... but I drive quite a bit, so I listen to a lot of audio books. Subjects like "How to Change a Tire" or "How to Format a Webpage" don't work very well in the audio format, obviously.

Fix your thinking / attitude books do pretty well, though (as long as they're the right ones). If you're looking for something along these lines (to fill in gaps between multiple passes through TMF and UNSCRIPTED )... a few decent ones I've run across are: "Unf*ck Yourself", "You are a Badass at Making Money" and... for something a little different... Kevin Hart's "I Can't Make This Up".

I believe these suggestions are compatible with the rest of the thread, because... (1) Audio books, when properly used, should not interfere with progress in your life because you listen to them while you're already doing something else you need to do. (2) Very often, your attitude / thinking / mindset *is* one of the biggest problems at hand.

 

[jpmartin]

MJ that is a tough question, the best? I'm sorry I have to cheat.... here's my list. If I gave it a serious thought, it would have to be something that profusely changed the way I think... and that could even be when you write your own biography every year in your journal. When you read it, it changes you.

 

[ChrisV]

The Bible

 

[Guest103804]

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

 

[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

 

[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.

 

[Colin B]

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.)

LOL - threw the interviewer. (Great answer)

 

[MiguelHammond10]

Great post, that's why i read the UNSCRIPTED twice because i wanted to have all the knowledge to solve problems.

 

[LuckyPup]

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.)

(Looking at my bookshelf and computer files) AMEN, AMEN, AMEN!

 

[Nemolein]

There are plenty of books about entrepreneurship that motive / inspire you to take action but in my opinion that's not enough to do something that could change your life forever. For me, action come from inside of us, books wake us up to take action but if we don't have that desire to take action, books then can't do anything more. The main reason people read books is to get inspired, but again that's not gonna change nothing unless decide to change our mindset and thoughts. Books are a delicious meal, it's up to us to take the meal, we can smell it but can't eat it till take action to stand up from the table, go to meal and eat it. Books are meal that we smell them, but can't "eat" them because we don't do nothing to take them.

 

[racyred09]

That's a great reminder. Simple yet profound. I find myself action-faking by listening to audiobooks that get me pumped up, like "Think and Grow Rich" or general business strategy books when I should actually be reading books about the specific things that I need to work on a lot and could apply immediately (like marketing!!). It's sort of like a security blanket and I need to stop. Thanks!

 

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[EmergingX]

If the book is skill-related instructions book, like for doing programming, engineering, etc., then the table of contents is all that is really needed to decide what part in the book is worth reading. What part is likely to help in your particular situation to overcome the obstacle or problem you are currently facing (reading the whole book from start to finish is insanely unwise) as it puts you into spending most of your time reading instead of doing and the stuff doesn't really connect up to the experimentation process.

In case the book is more like a story, like this is what I did and that is what happened, then paying attention to what kinds of results the person got in return of taking those actions is very important before considering reading it. Because if those results are not the outcomes that you aspire to, then the stories have maybe some 5% usefulness in comparison to stories that align with your most important purposes, which in comparison, let's say, are vastly and meaningfully more useful. Like 95% of usefulness. That kind of thing.

And we can improve through stories at a deeper level as to the way we operate in our environment. Some call the better ones of such books "transformational". For me one has been Think and Grow Rich, which is sort of a hybrid, as it has also some elements of how-to that I mentioned in the first paragraph. But the value of such books is not some step-by-step guide but to help you to think about how you could change your behavior. So that's the value with those.

For instance, in relation to my own purposes, I recently listened one audio-book by Max Tegmark, Life 3.0, which is about artificial intelligence. And the reason why I welcomed the content of that book into my brain was to influence my mind to think towards that direction. Thinking towards what direction to go with the doing; instead of expecting it to tell me anything about what to do.

Similarly, I have even created one such book, which unintentionally formed into the format of a book, after I was trying to find out about what separates the most successful entrepreneurs from less successful. I have found this book useful at helping me to think about what I need to change about my own behavior, titled The Little Book of Self-Made Billionaires, discoverable at Amazon.

By the way, if the "majority" of your time is spent reading stuff, then no matter what you read, the usefulness to you is near zero, as in comparison to what you could do instead with that time, unless your most important purpose is to do nothing else in life than to read.

And furthermore, in comparison to what you could do instead, the majority of books on the market have little value and reading more of such books won't do any good. If somebody has some average skill of doing something and he writes a book about how he does it, you will receive average perspectives on how to go about doing things. And if somebody has really bad skills, the same thing.

Maybe try asking yourself who is the absolute best on earth doing what you yourself want to do, or if you are after very ambitious purposes then who at least has made the most progress to that direction which you are aiming at.

If that person had written a book about his methods, then that's the book to read and if it has table of contents then see if there's something you can immediately recognize that would help to overcome what you have experienced as obstacle or problem.

If the person has not written a book, then maybe listen that person's interviews, go and talk to those guys, ask questions, show them that this is the most important thing for your to achieve too, making your point that you will potentially be a help at achieving it.

If you have discovered a few of such people, then you only have to read a total of those few books written by those people; or if they don't have books then ask them questions to which you do not have answers to. You literally do not have time to read what someone with average abilities thinks or does. That would be a total waste of your brain's limited resources. The vastly limited human brain that we currently all possess have strict limits both in thinking speeds and how much can be stored in such a brain, for instance, per day, per month, and so forth.

 

[Caroline888]

Another excellent thread.
I agree with some of the posts - with the need to read the book to change the mindset.
The Millionaire Fast Lane and Unscripted - were like a detonate. What's now?!.... as they say, true change comes from within.... so I read and re-read... there is intelligence merged within...

 

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[Siberia]

The best book for me is the right one to answer my current question.

It is the one that best suits mine here and now.

 

[Vitaly the Winne]

I've finished both TMF and Unscripted , great books!

Like many members have already said, analysis paralysis plays a big role in why some people either never reach their full potential, or take a very long time to start reaching it.

I've personally already failed at several business models (network marketing, affiliate marketing, and even phone flipping) for one reason or another, and some of these reasons are absolutely my fault. What I've noticed is that each and every idea starts out exciting and interesting, and the more information I get and the more books I read on the subject my mind starts filling up with more and more, at the same time losing steam and the will to continue the project due to analysis paralysis and action faking, too much reading on any subject can take away from actually doing the things that can make a particular idea successful, it's been a tough lesson.

Just like every success story, this is just another chapter of lessons learned until I win. Hopefully my experience helps some people on here see why more information isn't always the right thing to go for.

 

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[ChrisV]

I admit, when I first saw this response, I rolled my eyes. Hard habit from an adolescence surrounded by "do gooder" Christian's with very little follow through.
But then I caught myself and remembered one simple thing....
If someone asked me the MOST valuable thing to strive for, in the blink of an eye the answer would be wisdom. Hands down. No contest.
And that came from my mother who, as I was growing up, made me read 1 chapter from Proverbs every single day. 31 chapters. 31 days in a month. Pretty logical.
I figure I've read that book more than 200 times.
And heres the thing. You dont have to be a Christian to appreciate it. You dont even have to own a bible. (Plenty online.)
But if you do this "one simple trick", you will find it is the greatest repository of wisdom in the world.
A lot of it you wont quite understand on the first several reads. But there will come times, for the rest of your life, where a life circumstance will suddenly stop you and you will realize that THAT was what the specific passage was about. And you will know how to handle it.

I'm an atheist, and I still say The Bible.

 

[Bertram]

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 just came onto the forum for a few minutes while being in away mode for a week to deal with funeral arrangements for my father, and laughed out loud the minute I read this:

How to change a tire?

OR

The Lean Startup?

Very, very funny. I have stacks of beautiful books people have given me to read - and I would like to - but aimless reading isn't gonna happen.


Keep it coming MJ.

 

[Mezy]

I found this at the right time. I'm in a rat race job at the moment aimlessly taking in information.

If your goal is to find a new inspiration though, then that's supported by this approach.

Focus on a goal and support it with educational resources. I.e add one brick to the same foundation every day rather than picking a different foundation every week.

 

[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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[ZackerySprague]

The GAP versus The GAIN. Teaches you how to become more grateful with what you have and the progress you've versus going against the ideal.

How social media brainwashes your mind and how you should seek what you desire by yourself.

Learning the fact that the trauma that has happened to you or negative experiences have lessons you must learn. Otherwise you will be stuck forever.

I didn't practice a lot of gratitude in my life. I was always on an obsessive need for money to get out of debt and never truly appreciated where I was at. I actually feel bad for not practicing as much gratitude as I should have. I looked at the world in somewhat of a negative way because of my debt situation.

Always practice gratitude and for what you have, always have a more positive view of life.

What's In It For Them by Joe Polish has definitely transformed my relationships with people and communication.

 

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[Greg R]

Bump.

Dammit. I could have just bumped this thread!

Giving you back your rep+.

 

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[Ripe]

Where can we find this podcast episode in question? (I just ran out of audiobooks ;P)

 

[scott wisniewsk]

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.)

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Bump.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Bump.

 

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[RB96]

That's a great reminder. Simple yet profound. I find myself action-faking by listening to audiobooks that get me pumped up, like "Think and Grow Rich" or general business strategy books when I should actually be reading books about the specific things that I need to work on a lot and could apply immediately (like marketing!!). It's sort of like a security blanket and I need to stop. Thanks!

SO UNBELIEVABLY TRUE @MJ DeMarco !!! i have just found myself getting more Books to add to my book list on Audible and Action Faking

I need to Implement and Act upon the teachings and methods of Books I have already read!

Not be an Insight Junkie

and get myself into

"Analysis Paralysis"

I have been quoting since the start of the Year!!!

 

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