How To Do Everything Better...

Let others do the heavy lifting for you- read a book. There's no need to reinvent the wheel. Somewhere out there someone is an expert at what you need to learn.

While I like some mindless reading every now and then, by and large I prefer self-development books or ones that otherwise give me something to think about.

A friend asked me a while back if there were books I would recommend she read as she works on making some changes in her life. I have listed my favorite books below; these are ones that have been most influential on how I operate (or try to operate) my life.

Many of these books could be categorized multiple ways, but I made an attempt to organize them in the way that made the most sense to me. I've included links to learn more about the books or authors. I would imagine all of these are available through your library or on Amazon.com. I also like half.com for book purchases, just fyi.

Life/ Lifestyle:

• The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth am I Here For? by Rick Warren
• Where Will You be 5 Years From Today? by Dan Zandra
• The Case for Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus by Lee Strobel
• The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman
• Naturally Thin: Unleash Your Skinny Girl and Free Yourself From a Lifetime of Dieting by Bethenny Frankel
• The Skinny Girl Dish: Easy Recipes for Your Naturally Thin Life by Bethenny Frankel

Career Development:

• First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Marcus Buckingham
• Now, Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham and Donald Clifton
• Go Put Your Strengths to Work: 6 Powerful Steps to Achieve Outstanding Performance by Marcus Buckingham
• The Truth About You: Your Secret to Success by Marcus Buckingham
• Find Your Strongest Life: What the Happiest and Most Successful Women Do Differently by Marcus Buckingham

Business Development:

• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
• Strengths-Based Leadership by Tom Rath and Barry Conchie
• Secret's of Closing the Sale by Zig Ziglar
• Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don't by Jim Collins
• Good to Great and the Social Sectors by Jim Collins
• E-Myth Mastery: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a Worldclass Company by Michael Gerber
• The Daily Drucker by Peter Drucker

Books that make you go hmmmm....:

• Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner
• SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, And Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner
• The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell
• Epic Ain't Easy by Jed Dunham

What are you reading? Share with me your thoughts on these books or others!