“What books have you read?” is one of the most common questions I get. So here’s a running list of them!
A note: all links go to Amazon, but please support a local bookstore if you can. I also didn’t include most of the fiction books I’ve read.
What I’ve read in 2021
“Experiencing God Directly” – Marshall Davis
“Mary Magdalene Revealed” – Meggan Watterson
What I read in 2020
“A Year with Thomas Merton” – Thomas Merton
“When Things Fall Apart” – Pema Chodron
“The Comedians” – Kliph Nesteroff
“Time Off” – John Fitch, Max Frenzel
“Oneing: Liminal Space” – Various Writers (link goes to Center for Action and Contemplation)
“The Secret of Magic” – Deborah Johnson
“The Gospel According to Jesus” – Stephen Mitchell
“What is the Bible?” – Rob Bell
“The Hermetica 101” – Matthew Barnes
“The Lion Tracker’s Guide to Life” – Boyd Varty
“The Art of Possibility” – Rosamund Stone Zander & Benjamin Zander
“Talking with Strangers” – Malcolm Gladwell
“Practical Mysticism” – Evelyn Underhill
“The Road to Character” – David Brooks
“The Art of Happiness” – Dalai Lama & Howard Cutler
“A Wrinkle in Time” – Madeleine L’Engle
“The Art of Loving” – Erich Fromm
“Selected Poems” – Walt Whitman
“The Coddling of the American Mind” – Greg Lukianoff & Jonathan Haidt
“Building a Story Brand” – Donald Miller
“The Dichotomy of Leadership” – Jocko Willink & Leif Babin
“All the Light We Cannot See” – Anthony Doerr
“Misquoting Jesus” – Bart Ehrman
“Sex. Comedy. God.” – Pete Holmes
“Everything is Fucked” – Michael Manson
“Gnostic Philosophy” – Tobias Churston
“The Three Questions” – Don Miguel Ruiz
“Madeleine L’Engle Herself: Reflections on a Writing Life” – Lindsay Lackey (Compiler)
“To Kill a Mockingbird” – Harper Lee
“The Five People You Meet in Heaven” – Mitch Albom
“Start Finishing” – Charlie Gilkey
“I Hope I Screw This Up” – Kyle Cease
What I read in 2019
“Smile at Fear” – Chogyam Trungpa
“Into the Magic Shop” – James Doty
“Proof of Heaven” – Eben Alexander
“Stillness is the Key” – Ryan Holiday
“The Three Marriages” – David Whyte
“The Molten Phrase” – ET Crisler (out of print)
“You Are Not So Smart” – David McRaney
“The Gift of Fear” – Gavin De Becker
“The Book of Five Rings” – Miyamoto Musashi
“Biography of Silence” – Pablo d’Ors
“Leaders Eat Last” – Simon Sinek
“Meditations of the Heart” – Howard Thurman
“The Third Door” – Alex Banayan
“On the Brink of Everything” – Parker Palmer
“The Obstacle is the Way” – Ryan Holiday
“The Artist’s Journey” – Steven Pressfield
“The Untethered Soul” – Michael Singer
“Care of the Soul” – Thomas Moore
“New Power” – Jeremy Heimans & Henry Timms
“Book of Mercy” – Leonard Cohen
“Do the Work” – Steven Pressfield
“To Stop a Warlord” – Shannon Sedgwick Davis
“21 Insights for 21st Century Creatives” – Mark McGuinness
“The Antidote” – Oliver Burkeman
“The Discomfort Zone” – Marcia Reynolds
“The Way of the Superior Man” – David Deida
“Braving the Wilderness” – Brene Brown
“If Life is a Game, These are the Rules” – Cherie Carter-Scott
“The Inner Voice of Love” – Henri Nouwen
“Can’t Hurt Me” – David Goggins
“Beneath the Wheel” – Herman Hesse
“Rework” – Jason Fried & David Hansson
“Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” – Robert Pirsig
“Smarter, Faster, Better” – Charles Duhigg
“Man’s Search for Meaning” – Viktor Frankl
What I Read in 2018
“Made for These Times” – Justin Zoradi
“How to be Free” – Joe Blow (Anonymous)
“Think and Grow Rich” – Napoleon Hill
“As a Man Thinketh” – James Allen
“Steal Like an Artist” – Austin Kleon
“The Divine Dance” – Richard Rohr
“Growing Influence” – Ron Price & Stacy Ennis
“Inside the Body of God” – Karen Curry Parker
“Turning Pro” – Steven Pressfield
“For One More Day” – Mitch Albom
“The Barbarian Way” – Erwin Raphael McManus
“Ideas, Influence and Income” – Tanya Hall
“The Power of TED” – David Emerald
“Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions” – Richard Erdoes
“The Artisan Soul” – Erwin Raphael McManus
“Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual” – Jocko Willink
“The Heart of the Enlightened” – Anthony De Mello
“The War of Art” – Steven Pressfield
“12 Rules for Life” – Dr. Jordan B Peterson
“The Pilgrimage” – Paulo Coelho
“Hardwiring Happiness” – Rick Hanson
“Conversations with God” – Neale Donald Walsch
“Love YourSelf Like Your Life Depends On It” – Kamal Ravikant
“Wild at Heart” – John Eldredge
“The Devil and Miss Prym” – Paulo Coelho
“The Code of the Extraordinary Mind” – Vishen Lakhiani
“Born to Run” – Bruce Springsteen
“Extreme Ownership” – Jocko Willink & Leif Babin
“The Witch of Portobello” – Paulo Coelho
“I Heart Creativity” – Courtney Feider
“Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It” – Kamal Ravikant
“Feeling is the Secret” – Neville Goddard
“The Gnostic Gospels” – Elaine Pagels
“The Daily Stoic” – Ryan Holiday & Stephen Hanselman
“Dinner with Buddha” – Roland Merullo
“Beyond Belief” – Elaine Pagels
“Attached.” – Amir Levine & Rachel Heller
“Breakfast with Buddha – Roland Merullo
“Living Buddha, Living Christ” – Thich Naht Hanh
“Loving What Is” – Byron Katie
“Christian Mystics” – Matthew Fox
“The Celestine Prophecy” – James Redfield
“Leadership and Self Deception” – The Arbinger Institute
Previous Readings by Category
Personal Growth / Psychology
“Unbeatable Mind” – Mark Divine
“The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck” – Mark Manson
“The Ego is the Enemy” – Ryan Holiday
“A Million Miles in a Thousand Years” – Donald Miller
“The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” – Stephen Covey
“Notes to Myself” – Hugh Prather
“The Power of Habit” – Charles Duhigg
“Believe It and Behave It” – Kate Harvie
“Phil the Logger” – Brandon Wright
Business/Entrepreneurism
“Heretics to Heroes” – Cort Dial
“Start with Why” – Simon Sinek
“Tribal Leadership” – Dave Logan et al
“Play Bigger” – Al Ramadan et al.
“American Icon” – Bryce Hoffman
“Pyromarketing” – Greg Stiesltra
“Make the Noise Go Away” – Larry Linne
“Made to Stick” – Chip & Dan Heath
“The Complete Leader” – Ron Price & Randy Lisk
Spiritual/Mystic
“The Book of Joy” – Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Douglas Abrams
“The Book of Awakening” – Marc Nepo
“Writing Down Your Soul” – Janet Conner
“Outwitting the Devil” – Napoleon Hill
“Awareness” – Anthony De Mello
“A Hidden Wholeness” – Parker Palmer
“The Power of Now” – Eckhart Tolle
“The Way to Love” – Anthony De Mello
“The Divine Arsonist” – Jacob Nordby
“Prayers of the Cosmos” – Neil Douglas-Klotz
“The Alchemist” – Paulo Coelho
“Warrior of the Light” – Paulo Coelho
“The Magician’s Way” – William Whitecloud
“The Last Shaman” – William Whitecloud
“The Four Agreements” – Don Miguel Ruiz
“The Fifth Agreement” – Don Miguel Ruiz & Don Jose Ruiz
“The Mastery of Love” – Don Miguel Ruiz
“The Mastery of Self” – don Miguel Ruiz, Jr
“The Art of Stillness” – Pico Iyer
“The Five Levels of Attachment” – don Miguel Ruiz, Jr
“The Fifth Mountain” – Paulo Coelho
Creativity/Innovation
“Blessed are the Weird” – Jacob Nordby
“A Whole New Mind” – Daniel Pink
History / Biographies
“In the Garden of Beasts” – Erik Larson
“Education of a Wandering Man” – Louis L’Amour
Other