Everyday is a new opportunity change and take control of your life. Whether you are unhappy at work or looking to change your career path altogether, change can be daunting. However, if you want to be happy and live your best life, you’ve got to take that next big step. But don’t worry—you’re not alone. There are a number of resources available today that can make your transition as smooth as possible. To learn more, here are seven inspirational books to help you take back control of your life.
1. Mindshift by Dr. Barbara Oakley
Professor and author Dr. Barbara Oakley helps readers learn to retrain and reinvent themselves during a time of rapid technological change in her book, Mindshift: Break Through Obstacles to Learning and Discover Your Hidden Potential. It can be hard to follow your passions, especially when you don’t know exactly what they are. Oakley shows that instead of following your passions, broaden them. Backed by research, Oakley aims to help you discover talents and develop new skills in order to reinvent yourself in an ever-changing world.
2. The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss
Tim Ferriss’ best-selling book, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere and Join the New Rich, is a blueprint for success and reinvention. In it, Ferriss shares how to ditch your current 9-to-5 job in order to make an incredible living, working less. He shares his own story of going from a 40-hour-a-week $40,000 annual salaried job to making $40,000 a month working four hours a week. He shares his tips and tricks for reinventing your work life and living a life of luxury with the nouveau riche.
3. Your Self Sabotage Survival Guide by Karen Berg
Sometimes it feels like the people around you are getting ahead and you’re still stuck in the same spot. However, there’s a way to change this. Author, inspirational speaker and spiritual director Karen Berg’s Your Self Sabotage Survival Guide: How to Go From Why Me? To Why Not? will help you do just that. Her book provides a “tough love” approach to developing the right mindset in order to achieve your dreams and get ahead. The book helps you identify how exactly you’re self-sabotaging and how to eliminate this mindset in order to reinvent yourself.
4. Pivot by Adam Markel
Whether you’re unemployed, in transition or looking to completely change the direction of your career, inspirational speaker and author Adam Markel will help you do just that through his book, Pivot: The Art and Science of Reinventing Your Career and Life. In the book, Markel asks readers: “What would you do in your life if you knew you could not fail?” Then, Markel helps lay out a roadmap to help you achieve your dreams without putting your finances or future at risk.
5. The New Old Me by Meredith Maran
Post-divorce, with little in her savings account and the loss of her best friend, Meredith Maran went on a journey to reinvent herself. In her memoir, The New Old Me: My Late-Life Reinvention, Maran describes her personal journey as she moves from her old life as a freelance writer in San Francisco to securing a 9-to-5 job in Los Angeles. Her story shows that no matter what age you are or circumstances you’re under, change and success are always doable.
6. Third Calling by Dr. Richard Bergstrom and Leona Bergstrom
It’s not easy figuring out what to do with your life and what will make you happy down the line. Every life stage come with its own set of opportunities and challenges. In Dr. Richard Bergstrom and Leona Bergstrom’s Third Calling: What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?, the authors go through the typical “first calling,” including growing up, going to school and for some, getting married, then the “second calling,” developing careers, raising children and caring for elders. But what happens at the “third calling”? The Bergstroms explain how it is actually a time of opportunity, growth and pursuing passions.
7. Repacking Your Bags by Richard Leider and David Shapiro
Everyone’s looking for that “good life,” and in Richard Leider and David Shapiro’s Repacking Your Bags: Lighten Your Load for the Good Life, they’ll help you find it. The book provides a practical guide for how to understand what’s weighing you down and how to rearrange and let certain things go in order to live your best life. Leider and Shapiro address four areas of baggage, including place, relationship, work and purpose and how you can reshuffle and reinvent yourself no matter what age you are or where you are in life.
Rose Leadem
Rose is a writer and artist living in New York City. She writes for magazines, startups and websites, including Entrepreneur Magazine, Frontrunner Magazine, Homepolish and more.