64 books like The 48 Laws of Power

I love this book because Ray is a master at building, evaluating, and improving systems and has taken the time to share his insights to help others do the same.

The principles he’s identified and described can simultaneously assist any investor to construct a better portfolio and any person to live a more successful and fulfilling life. This book offers a unique opportunity to learn from one of the most insightful people in history. 

Carl Jung has two quotes that I love. First, “the gold is in the dark.” And second, “I’d rather be whole than good.” Both recognize that we’re complicated, contradictory, and gloriously messy beings. Debbie Ford’s book was the first time I felt I could actually do something with the profound wisdom of Jung. One particular exercise pretty much “cured” me immediately of some long-standing resentment I had with a former boss. Even though the language is sometimes a bit too woo-woo Californian hippy for me, it’s a book with some deeply useful exercises to help you become more whole, kinder to yourself, and ultimately more wholly you.

Originally written as a tennis coaching text – the wisdom of this approach transcends the world of tennis and carries an important message about how changing our thinking can release the latent potential in us whatever we are doing.

The focus is on the importance of self-talk – what our outer self is telling the inner self and in doing so chimes beautifully with what we know about our unconscious mind. We know that more than 90% of our behaviour is driven by our unconscious and it hears everything we say to ourselves – so consider the impact of critical self-talk and the potential damage to our confidence and performance.

The book is summarised in the formula: Potential minus Interference = Performance

We achieve at our best when we manage the ‘Interference’ we impose on ourselves!

I loved this book. It was a thought-provoking guide to navigating life's challenges and complexities. I especially loved the way Jordan Peterson drew on psychology, philosophy, and personal anecdotes to impart practical principles for finding meaning and purpose.

Each rule serves as a roadmap for self-improvement, urging you to confront challenges, take responsibility, and strive for a meaningful existence. Jordan Peterson's insights are both profound and accessible, providing me with a framework for personal growth in a world often marked by chaos.

Whether exploring the nature of truth or the importance of standing tall, this book is a compelling and enriching read.

This book makes me jealous as the author has an incredible ability to communicate the densest of topics (Cryptography) in an engaging, wonderful way.

It draws you in and you find yourself transported to battlefields and war rooms of the past. I’ve always taken cryptography for granted - I type https into my browser and navigate to a site and all’s well. I know things are reasonably secure - but why?

It turns out that RSA, the algorithm that underpins things like SSL and SSH, is a landmark of human achievement and did something that millennia of mathematicians and scientists could not: provide secure, end-to-end encryption. A wonderful story.

My mentor Peter Block taught me that the ultimate act of being an adult, the ultimate act of taking responsibility for your own freedom, was making choices. Some choices of course are easy—I’ll have a double espresso, please—but plenty are difficult. You don’t have all the data, it’s too close to call, and you can feel the combination of anxiety and guilt that can come with committing. This book adds some structure and discipline to how to make the best possible choice, and by doing so makes it easier to be more courageous and bold.

Moon realizes that certain words are particularly helpful and powerful in making conversations better (all conversations, not just coaching ones). It’s one short word per letter (“Difference”, “Might”, and “Yet” are three of my favourites), and this feels like a collection of twenty-six precise tools that can help any type of discussion more elegant, more curious, more filled with potential and more useful.

James Kerr, in his book Legacy reveals the simple secrets of success behind some of the world's elite business, sports, and military organizations. He explores ethical leadership, trust, and individual initiative and what drives the best teams to extraordinary results; a relentless focus on trust, ethical behavior, and leadership styles, excellence, a collective commitment to an 'uncommon cause,' a high degree of autonomy, with clear, candid and compelling communication, an emphasis on individual accountability, integrity, and genuine humility, underpinned by a climate in which 'leaders create leaders'.

The book is extremely insightful. It is about leadership, decision-making, and self-mastery. The lessons of this book can be perfectly applied to personal life and business environment.

Trust-based leadership — know thyself, keep to the truth. If you succumb to peer pressure and do things because others want you, you will be cut off. Be genuine, stay true to yourself, and be honest… show more.

In this groundbreaking biography, David Maraniss captures all of football great Vince Lombardi: the myth, the trusted man, his game, and his God. His leadership of the Green Bay Packers to five world championships in nine seasons is the most storied period in NFL history. Lombardi became a living legend, a symbol to many of trusted leadership, discipline, perseverance, and teamwork, and to others, of an obsession with winning. In When Pride Still Mattered, Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Maraniss captures the myth and the man, football, God, and country in a thrilling biography destined to become an American classic.

Everyone has their own opinions on who an Ethical leader and Visionary leader is, to me a great leader is someone who builds trust, credibility, and respect for both you and the organization and guides you to success. I feel Lombardi is both a visionary and an ethical leader. The reasons… show more.

There’s a section right at the start of this book where the author tries to quantify the value of things he’s learned over the years, and the result is startling.

Think about this for yourself, just in terms of the code you’ve written - how much do you think that’s worth? Your ability to learn things is your key to thriving in this industry, but how well can you recall those things when you need to?

That’s the point of this whole book: learning to take notes and assemble them into your own personal database. This book led me to Obsidian, which I use relentlessly, and also to Notion, which I also use relentlessly. Writing things down gives me peace of mind and helps me focus and I highly recommend you do the same.