40 Books That Will Change Your Life | The Ultimate Reading List

Reading to change the way you think. 
40 Books That Will Change Your Life.

Reading offers so much. It unravels mysteries, provides escape, and deepens our understanding of people, places, and ideas.

Yet, as much as I hate to admit it, reading is not a popular activity among the teenagers and young adults of the 21st century. Young people are disliking reading more and more. The National Literacy Trust found that in 2019, only 26% of all children under 18 years spent time each day reading. This happens to be the lowest national percentage recorded since 2005.

Many young people have a hard time getting themselves to read (or do anything mentally rigorous, for that matter). They only read when they have to (for school, a job, etc.). It’s hard to find young people intentionally choosing to invest in themselves and caring about society enough to educate themselves willingly. Sad reality, I know.

We’re living in a weird time period, where middle-aged and older adults are pumping out more books than ever, but the only people that are reading them are that same demographic (when they need it the least).

It is predicted that when our generation (Gen Z) becomes middle-aged adults, book publications will be at an all-time low. Simply because we haven’t developed a keen interest in the intellectual rigor of thinking critically, whether it’s over someone else’s ideas or our own. Another way to put is: we are collectively getting dumber and dumber.

Books are invaluable. Each book has precious life invested into it; full-on days that the author spent crafting it. Books carry so much knowledge, experience, and perspectives that took the authors lifetimes to accumulate, but that you can pack into you brain in just a few hours.

Reading gives you access to another person’s thoughts, their very thought process, and allows you to enter into that thought-dialogue on your own timing. Reading is basically an opportunity for you to strip another person’s mind naked and roam through it. That’s a lot of power.

In all seriousness, books have the power to change your life. Reading is such a transformative activity. It is sadly not endorsed enough in schools, families, or friend groups. People think that you have to be an introverted nerd who always has their nose in a book in order to read (and like it). Talk about stereotypes.

But that’s not necessarily true. All kinds of personalities can read…because all kinds of people write these books. Authors come from all kinds of backgrounds and expertise. There is a book (if not a whole genre) for everyone.

If you are anything like me, you like to know the benefits of everything before actually doing it. So, here’s why you should read:

  • It strengthens your brain
  • Aids in sleep
  • Reduces stress
  • Increases empathy
  • Alleviates depression
  • Builds vocabulary
  • Lengthens life span
  • Prevents early cognitive decline

That said, to make this whole “mental-transformation” process easier for you, I have created an ultimate list of the 40 books that have radically changed my thinking and pushed me to change things about my life. These books fall under multiple genres, but my top three areas of focus will be: Self-growth/Nonfiction, Spirituality/Christianity, and Fiction/Literature.

Self Growth/Nonfiction:

  1. When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
  2. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
  3. Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert
  4. Atomic Habits by James Clear
  5. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
  6. The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin
  7. The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg
  8. Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter
  9. Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
  10. The 4-Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferris
  11. Living Forward by Daniel Harkavy and Michael S. Hyatt
  12. The Game of Life and How to Play It by Florence Scovel Shinn
  13. Your Mind and How to Use It by William Walker Atkinson
  14. Time Management: From the Inside Out by Julie Morgenstern
  15. The Life Triumphant by James Allen
When Breath Becomes Air: Kalanithi, Paul
40 Books That Will Change Your Life
Personal Favorite 🙂 Image Source: Amazon.com

Spirituality/Christianity:

  1. The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel
  2. Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
  3. The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren
  4. Battlefield of the Mind by Joyce Meyer
  5. The Mind of God by Jay Lombard
  6. An Alter in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor
  7. One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp
  8. The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer
  9. Be Real by Warren W. Wiersbe
  10. God: A Human History by Reza Aslan
Mere Christianity (C.S. Lewis Signature Classics) 
40 Books That Will Change Your Life
Personal Favorite 🙂 Image Source: Amazon.com

Fiction/Literature:

  1. Night by Elie Wiesel
  2. Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels
  3. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
  4. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
  5. The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay
  6. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
  7. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
  8. The Awakening by Kate Chopin
  9. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
  10. The Great Gatsby by Francis Scott Fitzgerald
  11. The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer
  12. Scythe by Neal Shusterman
  13. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
  14. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
  15. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Fugitive Pieces: A Novel: Michaels, Anne
40 Books That Will Change Your Life
Personal Favorite 🙂 Image Source: Amazon.com

Conclusion

I hope you’ve enjoyed this list of incredible, world-renowned books. I wanted to throw in my personal favorites from each category to highlight the ones that have impacted me the most, in honor of these authors’ extraordinary talent and hard work. By no means are they better than the rest, but, for various personal reasons, they have resonated with me on much deeper levels.

Any book on this list is going to be a great read. I assure you. This is not just my opinion alone, for these books have been propagated by many others, professionals and nonprofessionals alike, and have stood the test of time. Start anywhere on this list. It doesn’t matter which category or which book. You will simply fall so in love with it that you go back for more. Reading tends to do that. And before you know it, you will have checked off every single one…or so I hope. Happy reading!

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