Personal Ramblings - Top 5 Books - Transformation / Personal Growth

I've read over 500 Books in the fields of Personal Growth, Transformation, Motivation, and Leadership. These are my 5 favorite books that I reread regularly.

Stedman Graham - You Can Make It Happen

Here is the outline from Stedman Graham's book. I met him a few years ago at a Mark Victor Hansen program. I read his book shortly after. It's worth a read....



Step 1: Check Your ID -- Who are you?
Step 2: Create Your Vision -- What is important to you?
Step 3: Develop Your Travel Plan -- How will you get there?
Step 4: Master the Rules of the Road -- How will you meet obstacles?
Step 5: Step Into the Outer Limits -- When should you take risks?
Step 6: Pilot the Seasons of Change -- How will you grow?
Step 7: Build Your Dream Team -- Who will you take along?
Step 8: Win by a Decision -- How will you make choices?
Step 9: Commit to Your Vision -- Where will you go?

Book Review - "The Big Five For Life - Leadership's Greatest Secrets"

If you read only one book in 2009, read "The Big Five For Life".
John Duffy

I've read at least fifty good books this year on motivation, leadership, transformation, business, psychology and personal growth but this book stands out. I couldn't put it down. If you take away and use just one of the ideas in the book it will make a difference in your life.

If you are a business owner, leader or aspire to be a leader you NEED to read this book. it is a fictional book similar in style to "The Monk who Sold His Ferrari" and is a great read about life and leadership.

Some Take aways for the book:

Create a personal and business Purpose for Existing (PFE)
Create Your Big Five ( Things you want to do,see or experience in your life before you die) and go for them.
Make every day a Museum Day. This is a great one read it to find out.....

This book resonates with the experiences I have had in my life regrading leadership and it inspires me to step up even further....

(Click on book picture to go directly to amazon.com.)

Looking Back - Looking Forward - Books Read in 2008 and.....

Some of the Books I read in 2008:

1. The Greatness Guide 2. Change of Die 3. Fist Stick Knife Gun
4. Influencer 5. Rules for Renegades 6. Laws of Leadership
7. The Middle Class Millionaires 8. Outliers 9. Good in a Room
10. I Chose to Stay 11. Unleasing the Power of Rubber Bands
12. Predictably Irrational 13. Will You Die With Me
14. Awaken the Giant Within 15. Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters
16, All Souls 17. Old Friends From far Away 18. Band of Sisters
19. How Successful People Win 20. Girls Will be Girls
21. The Success Principles 22, Do You 23. Your Life as Story
24. Losing My Virginity 25. The Billionaire Who Wasn't
26. The Pope's Children 27. The Drinking Life
28. The Big Five for Life 29. The Utmost Life 30. Strength for Life
31. Angela's Ashes 32. making the Impossible Possible
33. Ten Successful Start Ups 34. The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
35. Going Places

Books I am planning to read in 2009: My initial Hit List

1. Adventure Capitalist: The Ultimate Road Trip
2. Scratch Beginnings: Me, $25, and the Search for the American Dream
3. The Art of StoryTelling
4. Nothing's Impossible: Leadership Lessons for Inside and Outside the Classroom
5. The Man Who Loved China
6. The Life Coaching Handbook
7. How the Irish Invented Slang
8. My American Journey - An Autobiography - Colin Powell
9. Winners Never Cheat
10. The Big Picture: Money and Power in Hollywood
11. Frogs Into Princes: NLP
12. How the Irish Saved Civilization
13. The Time Paradox
14. The Teacher Who Couldn't Read
15. The Monk From Brooklyn: An American at the Shaolin Temple
16. Rules for Revolutionaries: The Capitalist Manifesto
17. How to Succeed in the Game of Life
18. Sharing the Wealth: My Story
19. Ten Points
20. More than a Dream: How One School's Vision is Changing the World
21. Ask and You Will Succeed
22. Idea Spotting: How to Find Your Next Great idea
24. Home Town Heroes
25. The 5000 Year Leap: a Miracle That Changed the World

Book Review - "Outliers -The Story of Success"

"Outliers" is the third book from Malcom Gladwell and follows his previously successful books, "The Tipping Point" and "Blink". It's a well written and entertaining book. In this book the key question that is raised is why do some people succeed. He poses the view that the success stories we read about are not the work of self made men but they are beneficiaries of hidden advantages and special opportunities. The book starts a conversation about the complex ways privilege shows up in out society.

There are some fascinating stories about the hidden factors for success as manifested for hockey players, Jewish lawyers, computer billionaires, Asian math students, and his own families history in Jamaica. All the stories are fascinating and make you think harder and look below the surface of success stories yet I get the feeling that just like Mr Gladwell points out the complexities of success that the real truth is more complex than the author would have you believe. I'm sure he has chose the stories that support his thesis and left out the ones that don't.

Yet it is enlightening to read about the cultural causes for airplane crashes or the role that the economy's of Asian countries with rice paddies play in education or the long term causes of cultural history on violence in Harlan County.

The story of the charter KIPP school in the South Bronx (where I grew up) and the lessons of the negative role that summer vacation has on the education achievement of poor kids is also very interesting.

So overall I enjoyed the book and while I may agree that some of the cases he cited may be true and of course success in rarely a one person deal I don't think it explains away all the Horatio Alger type stories or that all success stories can fit into the patterns Mr Gladwell cites.

Take Aways:
* "No one who can rise before dawn three hundred and sixty days a year fails to make his family rich"
* Cultural legacies are powerful forces (Positive or Negative)
* Virtually all success stories ...so far involves someone or some group working harder than their peers"
* Being good at math is not so much ability as attitude. You master mathematics if you are willing to try. (Like most things in life)
* True expertise in a subject, field or activity take 10,000 hours ( That is a lot of hours)
* There are two main parenting philosophies that are usually divided along class lines. Middle Class - "Concerted Cultivation" , Poor - "Accomplishment of natural growth". One is hands on and one is hands off.

Books of 2008 - Selection of Books I Read

Here are a eclectic selection of some of the books I read in 2008 and I recommend you check them out or get them as holiday gifts:

(Click on book picture to go directly to amazon.com.)

Recommended Books - Nov 25th

Just ran across two books that I'm going to pick up for my holiday reading. I read the reviews of them and I recommend you check them out.

A story of a 101 year old George Dawson an African-American in Texas. His life has spanned 3 centuries. He lived through segregation in the South. This book reminds me of Angela's Ashes. What's so remarkable is both the upbeat title and the fact that he was an illiterate who started school at age 98 and is working towards his GED. An amazing person and story. This is a book I must read.


A novel that carries the message that life always has a second verse or second chance.

http://www.recoveringcharles.com/splash.html