Ask Steve – Recommended Reading
July 17th, 2006 by Steve Pavlina
Could you recommend some of your all-time favorite books?
Sure.
Since the early 90s I’ve been reading about a book a week, so that adds up to quite a few books. I’ll scan my office bookshelves to recall which ones had a meaningful impact on me after I read them.
Here are some of my personal favorites in no particular order:
Edit 8/22/06: A more complete version of this list, conveniently sorted into categories, can be found here: personal development books.
- Power vs. Force by David Hawkins (levels of consciousness)
- The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield (wisdom)
- The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran (wisdom)
- As You Think aka As a Man Thinketh by James Allen (power of thought)
- The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra (manifesting intentions)
- Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill (wealth)
- Tao Te Ching by Lao Tsu (wisdom)
- Ask and It Is Given by Esther Hicks (manifesting intentions)
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey (personal effectiveness)
- The Art of War by Sun Tzu (slaughtering your enemy efficiently)
- The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene (ensuring your enemy doesn’t slaughter you first)
- Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman (inner peace, no slaughtering)
- Chaos and Genius by James Gleick (chaos science and fractals; Richard Feynman bio)
- Unlimited Power and Awaken the Giant Within by Tony Robbins (achievement and NLP)
- Maximum Achievement and Time Power by Brian Tracy (time management)
- The Egoscue Method of Health Through Motion by Pete Egoscue (pain-free structural alignment)
- Using Your Brain for a Change by Richard Bandler (NLP)
- Learned Optimism by Martin Seligman (optimism, duh)
- The Power of Now and A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle (consciousness and awareness)
- Diet for a New America and The Food Revolution by John Robbins (health and ethical food choices)
- Mad Cowboy by Howard Lyman (why a cattle rancher won’t eat meat)
- Too Good to Leave, Too Bad to Stay by Mira Kirshenbaum (awesome book on diagnosing relationship issues)
- Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand (philosophy in 1000 pages)
- The Psychology of Winning by Denis Waitley (victory)
- Lucid Dreaming and Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming by Stephen LaBerge (lucid dreaming)
- Far Journeys by Robert Monroe (astral projection)
- Cosmic Trigger Vol I, Vol II, and Vol III by Robert Anton Wilson (“weird” doesn’t begin to describe it)
- Anatomy of an Illness by Norman Cousins (laughter as medicine)
- Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl (finding meaning in the Holocaust)
- Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank (Holocaust story)
- Brain Building in Just 12 Weeks by Marilyn vos Savant (becoming a smarty pants)
- Built to Last and Good to Great by Jim Collins (business)
- Incarnations of Immortality by Piers Anthony (awesome fiction series):
- On a Pale Horse (Death)
- Bearing an Hourglass (Time)
- With a Tangled Skein (Fate)
- Wielding a Red Sword (War)
- Being a Green Mother (Nature)
- For Love of Evil (Satan)
- And Eternity (God)
- The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin (personal effectiveness)
- The Disappearance of the Universe by Gary Renard (awareness and forgiveness)
- A Course in Miracles by the Foundation for Inner Peace (what the Bible meant to say)
- Bringers of the Dawn by Barbara Marciniak (channeled teachings of the Pleiadians)
- Inspiration by Wayne Dyer (finding your purpose)
- Creative Visualization by Shakti Gawain (visualization)
- The Millionaire Course by Marc Allen (wealth, read my interview with Marc Allen)
- Getting Things Done by David Allen (workflow and productivity)
- A Child Called It, The Lost Boy, and A Man Named Dave by Dave Pelzer (abuse and recovery)
- Organizing From the Inside Out by Julie Morgenstern (getting organized)
- Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki (wealth advice with fake stories)
- How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie (social skills)
- The China Study by T. Colin Campbell (health, read my book review)
- Code Complete and Rapid Development by Steve McConnell (software development)
- The Self-Publishing Manual by Dan Poynter (self-publishing)
I guess I have a lot of favorite books. 
This entry is part of the “Ask Steve” series. See the original Ask Steve post for details, or view the Archives (July 2006) to peruse the entire series.