As extension to the previous blog post about 3 self-improvement books you must read, I’d like to add on 3 more books I recommend you read to gain deeper insight into life. Here are the 3 self-improvement books you must read part 2.
1. Millionaire’s Fastlane – MJ Demarco
This book is about having a completely different mindset for achieving your financial freedom. As opposed to the popular practice of going to our 9-5 job, the author emphasizes the need to build a system which transcends our limitation of only being able to work 12 hours a day, limitation in generating products (ie food businesses can only make so many foods per day), and the feeling of forever being trapped in this loophole, not being able to spend the time on what we actually enjoy doing. The author also brings up a key term, “money tree,” which he emphasizes is the one thing we must build in order to reach the financial freedom we all long for. He shares his personal experience of having built his own website that attracts lots of clients and how he was able to make money by simply having these clients click on his Ads (the so-called “Pay-per-click” way of making money). Like this, he says that we need to be producers of something that will work for us while we are sleeping, without being limited by how many hours we can work, and without the limitation of being confined in a specific region (e.g. his website reaches clients globally).
Another one of his tips which I found profound is your ability to lend out a big sum of money to those who need them once you generate this “money tree” successfully (perhaps to those that want to start off their business, or for deposit as part of home-buying, etc.). From lending them out, the lender becomes entitled to a monthly interest, wherein he is guaranteed all the money back with the monthly interests which he did not have to work for at all. Moreover, the author mentions real estate and renting out your property as a good source of passive income, but he doesn’t seem to hype the idea up as much.
Overall, it was a good book to read as a source of motivation, especially for those who may be hesitant about starting something of their own such as a business. Even if you are not in this particular state, it’s a useful book that gives you insight into how millionaires and billionaires generate the money they do. You obviously realize that they are not following the conventional ways of making money and aren’t working the classic 9-5 jobs at all. But the patterns seem to be that they all started at the bottom going through a series of trials and errors and failures in order to develop that system or “money tree” that ultimately generates them millions and billions of dollars. One other takeaway from this book is that nothing comes easy, and neither does money. As the author says, there may be FAST ways of making money, but there aren’t easy ways of making money, and I found this statement quite profound. The book definitely is a good addition to Rich Dad and Poor Dad.
2. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck – Mark Manson
I’m not going to be summarizing the whole book especially because this book has a long list of great quotes and statements which I couldn’t agree with more. But what did stand out from the book was that we need to learn to give f*cks about what we truly care about, and maturity comes from being able to do exactly that without giving fucks about literally everything (which we all used to do at one point). Another thing is that if we continue to long for and chase after positive experiences, it reinforces the idea that we are not satisfied with where we are now and this process itself becomes a negative experience. What we ought to do instead is to learn to be happy and grateful where we are now and also to accept the negative experiences as a natural part of our lives. Accepting these negative experiences will become a positive experience, quite paradoxically.
This book personally made me think a lot about how I’ve lived my life in the past and it also challenged my ways of thinking, transforming some of them for the better. I’d say this book is worth reading multiple times especially if it has enlightened you quite significantly the first time you read it. I am just about to read it again myself!
3. Songs of Jesus – Timothy Keller
This book is more of a devotional book than anything. It hones in on one of the books in the Old Testament of the Bible called, “Psalms”. Each page consists of several verses of the book, author’s comments about these verses, and ends off with a prayer. Now, the book introduces King David’s thoughts, struggles, and experiences and you get to really see what kind of a person King David was. For instance, as opposed to what we might assume about biblical figures (e.g. holy, wise, perfect), King David was just like any other human beings who often become weary, exhausted, helpless, angry, and vengeful. The book demonstrates how God doesn’t just use those who are well-prepared and close to perfect, but He also uses those that are most in need, that are broken, and that are even persecuted by others. On top of this, this daily devotional book allows you to develop a healthy habit of praying and meditating each day (I’ve shared that prayer & meditation is one of the best ways to get smarter, so check that one out). I’d like to recommend this book if you want to learn more about King David in the Old Testament and want to develop a healthy habit of praying or meditating each day.
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