I assume if you are interested in productivity and business, you have heard of Atomic Habits and The 5AM Club.

Today I am going to talk about the lesser-known or newer ones that have really sparked a change in my mindset and made me take some action.

There’s a chance you listen to productivity podcasters so maybe you’ve heard of a few of these authors, but it's chance we’re going to have to take to share life-changing information.

Side Note: Nothing is sponsored, I am not an Amazon affiliate, links are just here for your convenience.

The Art and Business of Online Writing (Nicolas Cole)

This one is pretty niche to what I do and dream of doing for the rest of my life, but I believe it is severely underappreciated.

This is the first book I have ever took a highlighter and post-it’s to, because I NEEDED the information. I devoured every line of this book, took copious notes in OneNote, and truly believe in the practices outlined.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who even occasionally considers writing as a career in any form.

Side Note: Cole also has another book, on ghostwriting, that is just as phenomenal (probably more so), but since I am only 3/4ths of the way through it (started it last night), it feels like cheating to add it.

Outlive (Peter Attia)

If you are one of those people who, like me, finally grasped the mind-body connection recently, this book is going to be a lifeline for you.

Outlive is not just about aging, despite what it may seem on the surface. It has a lot of practical advice about health and balance and taking care of yourself in the simplest terms possible. This book really changed my mindset from “I keep exercising but I am not losing weight,” which would make me give up, to “I keep exercising and I am getting stronger,” which is why I have been going for two and a half months without losing consistency for the first time in years.

Regardless on if you find health-related content interesting or not, it impacts how you perform, and it is worth your attention.

Honorable health mention: Why We Sleep (Matthew Walker). If you haven’t read it, you need to. If you have, then you know I am right.

Building a Second Brain (Tiago Forte)

I used to be one of those people who bought a new planner every other month or so, convinced that THIS was the one that would allow me to really stick to my planning and organization.

Then I transitioned from buying planners to making them in bullet journals, but those were hard to maintain for me, with too much manual design involved.

Then I read this book, and finally I gave in to the idea that MAYBE I can do digital planning. So, for a week I started playing around with OneNote, using it to track all my projects at work and personal aspirations and goals and tasks.

It has been world-altering for me. While Forte’s book goes into so much more than using your digital tools for planning, just this small shift has unlocked so much of my own potential. I am more creative, more of my actual brain is freed up, I am never without a space to write something down, and I am coming up with new ideas constantly.

I highly recommend reading it, even if you already use digital planning, because the potential you can unlock is truly limitless with your second brain.

There are a few other top recommendations that have really changed things for me, including Million Dollar Weekend, Freelance Your Way To Freedom, the entire You Are A Badass series, and almost anything by Adam Grant, but like I said, I was trying to stay away from the obvious gimmies.

If you haven’t read the books on my list though, and are really trying to change your life or get something to “click”, I highly recommend everything mentioned here. I am a completely different person than I was six months ago, and it is because of the information mentioned in this article.

Featured