Self-help books gained huge popularity in the past number of years due to several reasons, such as giving readers the motivation they need to take up new challenges or helping the readers feel inspired to make a change in their lives. Many of us lose hope or give up on our dreams and plans, but as soon as you search for books to read for self-improvement and find the right book for you, then life might start taking a new turn. There are many self help books to read but only a few of them are actually worth reading. Benefit from our blog post on the best self help books to read according to Good Reads book ratings.
Self Help Books to Read
Here is a list of self-help books to read to change your lifestyle, adopt new ways of thinking, contemplate your life, or simply enjoy reading a great book on self-development and improvement:
- Atomic Habits
- How to Win Friends and Influence People
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
- The Power of Habit
- The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up
- The Four Agreements
- You Are a Bad Ass
- The Power of Now
- Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
- The Gifts of Imperfection
- Deep Work
- Think and Grow Rich
- The 5 Love Languages
- 12 Rules for Life
- Rich Dad, Poor Dad
1: Atomic Habits

“You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”
Atomic Habits by James Clear is one of the best self-help books to read because it teaches you the importance of building systems in contrary to setting goals.
What we absolutely love about this book is its light mixture of science with human nature and psychology, making it one of our top self-help book recommendations for those looking to change their daily habits, hence, their identity.
Atomic Habits by James Clear helps people improve their time-management skills, and understand the role of our daily habits in their personal development on all levels. Reading quotes from Atomic Habits will definitely encourage you to get the book!
Key Takeaways:
- Allocate time for incorporating new habits, even during challenging periods
- Overcome a deficiency in motivation and willpower
- Shape your surroundings to facilitate easier success
Information on Atomic Habits:
- Rating: 4.37/5
- Pages: 319
- Publishing Date: 2018
2: How to Win Friends and Influence People

“Arouse in the other person an eager want. He who can do this has the whole world with him.”
If there is one phrase I would describe this book with, it is “Emotional Intelligence” at its finest. Reading this timeless masterpiece teaches you how to deal with people in various situations regardless of how difficult they are by giving you examples from real life.
Understanding the other person’s perspective is necessary to get what you want from them without forcing them to do it or even asking them, and the author Dale Carnegie teaches you how to get the other person to say “Yes!” to what you want in no time. This’s why How to Win Friends and Influence People is one of the best self help books to read for readers of all interests.
Dale Carnegie’s principles remain as pertinent as ever, enduring through the complexities and competitiveness of the modern age, to assist you in reaching your fullest potential.
Key Takeaways:
- Learn the six ways to make people like you
- Learn the twelve ways to win people to your way of thinking
- Learn the nine ways to change people without arousing resentment.
Information on How to Win Friends and Influence People:
- Rating: 4.22/5
- Pages: 288
- Publishing Date: 1936
3: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

“If I really want to improve my situation, I can work on the one thing over which I have control – myself.”
“The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” is one of the books to read to improve yourself and it’s a transformative book written by Stephen R. Covey. It offers profound insights and practical guidance for personal and professional growth. Covey presents a holistic approach to effectiveness, emphasizing the development of character and principles as the foundation for success.
The book is considered to be one of the most famous self help books to read because it is structured around seven key habits that empower individuals to lead purposeful and fulfilling lives. Covey explains the importance of proactivity, encouraging readers to take responsibility for their choices and responses. He highlights the significance of beginning with the end in mind, urging readers to clarify their goals and align their actions accordingly.
Key Takeaways:
- Learn proactivity
- Begin with the end in mind
- Seek win-win solutions
Information on the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People:
- Rating: 4.15/5
- Pages: 372
- Publishing Date: 1988
4: The Power of Habit

“If you believe you can change – if you make it a habit – the change becomes real.”
The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg is one of the best self help books to read about habits, how they form, their influence on our lives, and how to change certain habits that we have.
It also explains how our brains form habits based on the old mechanism of routine and reward, as our brains are magnets for rewards. What’s amazing about the Power of Habit is that Duhigg gives scientific evidence to his claims and explanations in regard to the brain and how it deals with habit formation and even elimination.
The real-life examples provided in this book make it one of the best books to read for self development in terms of shaping your daily routine and understanding how your brain works and deals with habits.
Key Takeaways:
- A habit loop starts with a cue, continues with a routine, and gets fulfilled with a reward
- Change bad habits by substituting for the routine part of the loop
- Learn how to strengthen your willpower
Information on the Power of Habit:
- Rating: 4.13/5
- Pages: 375
- Publishing Date: 2012
5: The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up

“The space in which we live should be for the person we are becoming now, not for the person we were in the past.”
From its title, you can tell that The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo is different from all other self-help book recommendations on our list for one key reason.
The book draws a connection between one’s life and their cleaning routine or tidying-up habits, and the author explains how it’s best that you surround yourself with things that you love or need rather than surrounding yourself with things that stress you out; this applies to both your professional life and personal one.
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up helps and motivates you to get rid of the things you hate or don’t need in your life, leading you to surround yourself with the things you either truly love or need.
Key Takeaways:
- Understand why you can’t keep your house in order
- When cleaning, finish discarding first
- Learn the importance of tidying by category
- Discover how to store things for a shiner environment and life
- Learn the connection between tidying up your house and your life and how they affect each other
Information on the Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up:
- Rating: 3.87/5
- Pages: 213
- Publishing Date: 2010
6: The Four Agreements

“Taking things personally makes you easy prey for these predators, the black magicians. They can hook you easily with one little opinion and feed you whatever poison they want, and because you take it personally, you eat it up. You eat all their emotional garbage, and now it becomes your garbage. But if you do not take it personally, you are immune in the middle of hell. Immunity to poison in the middle of hell is the gift of this agreement.”
The Four Agreements discusses the idea that we have an “inner judge” in our brains that is developed by society, our parents, and any authority figure that judges us. The book explains the negative effects of this inner judge and presents the “four agreements” as a successful mechanism to deal with this judge.
If you’re suffering from internal or external judgments then we recommend the Four Agreements as one of the best self help books to read in 2023 to free yourself from the “inner judge” constructed by society and authorities.
Key Takeaways:
- Agreement 1: Be impeccable with your word
- Agreement 2: Don’t take anything personally
- Agreement 3: Don’t make assumptions
- Agreement 4: Always do your best
Information on the Four Agreements:
- Rating: 4.18/5
- Pages: 152
- Publishing Date: 1997
7: You Are a Bad Ass: How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life

“You are responsible for what you say and do. You are not responsible for whether or not people freak out about it.”
You Are a Bad Ass is one of the fun books to read for self improvement because of its exciting tone, making it a great choice for readers who love to read self-help books that excite and motivate them.
One of the things that are discussed in You Are a Bad Ass is positive self-talk and how important it is to speak kindly to yourself just like you are speaking to a friend or a person you care about. Almost all self-help books encourage you to avoid self-hate and self-rejection because they will ruin your life and slow down your success or healing journey.
Key Takeaways:
- Avoid procrastinating
- Increase your self-love and stop the self-hate
- Set goals that align with your true vision of yourself
Information on You Are a Bad Ass:
- Rating: 3.95/5
- Pages: 254
- Publishing Date: 2013
8: The Power of Now

“Life is now. There was never a time when your life was not now, nor will there ever be.”
The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle is a great self help book for beginners and advanced readers, especially those who enjoy learning about the mind and how powerful it can be. Sometimes, the mind is too powerful, it takes over your life and you lose control over it because it controls you. However, the danger lies in losing one’s power to the mind in the wrong direction, hence, it becomes destructive.
The Power of Now is truly one of the best self help books to read because it’s very realistic in its consideration of today’s problems, such as negativity and negative self-talk, leading many individuals to hate themselves. Reading this masterpiece helps you regain power over your thoughts and separate your thoughts from your identity as a person.
Key Takeaways:
- You are not your thoughts
- All you have is now
- Accept what you can’t control
Information on The Power of Now:
- Rating: 4.15/5
- Pages: 229
- Publishing Date: 1997
9: Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking

“I worry that there are people who are put in positions of authority because they’re good talkers, but they don’t have good ideas. It’s so easy to confuse schmoozing ability with talent. Someone seems like a good presenter, easy to get along with, and those traits are rewarded. Well, why is that? They’re valuable traits, but we put too much of a premium on presenting and not enough on substance and critical thinking.”
This book by Susan Cain examines the psychology of extroverts and introverts and how people view and value them in our society, connecting both of them to a unique culture that determines how people deal with introverts and extroverts differently.
We had to include the book Quiet in our list of the best self help books to read because of the popularity of introversion and extroversion between people, and how almost everyone acts based on one of them.
The book discusses the pros and cons of each one while explaining the poor treatment introverts sometimes receive just because they choose to value their own company over the company of others.
Key Takeaways:
- Know the difference between introverts and extroverts
- Living your life as an introvert in today’s society
- Understand the value of both personality types
Information on The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking:
- Rating: 4/5
- Pages: 333
- Publishing Date: 2012
10: The Gifts of Imperfection

“Perfectionism is a self-destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect, and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame.”
Brene Brown who’s the author of The Gifts of Imperfection wrote one of the best self help books to read for those struggling with perfectionism. This book teaches you to come to peace with being imperfect in addition to understanding the importance of compassion in human relationships.
Moreover, this book is one of the self help books for beginners who want to get a glimpse of the definition of love and its practice in human relationships, showing the readers that love is best exemplified through practice, not words and sayings.
Key Takeaways:
- Discover the secrets of living a wholehearted life
- Know when to hold on and when to let go
- Learn about becoming an authentic human being
- Learn how to look at the hard stuff in life realistically
Information on The Gifts of Imperfection:
- Rating: 4.25/5
- Pages: 137
- Publishing Date: 2010
11: Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World

“Two Core Abilities for Thriving in the New Economy 1. The ability to quickly master hard things. 2. The ability to produce at an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed.”
Before we explain to you how the book Deep Work is one of the highly appreciated self help books for self improvement, we must give you Cal Newport’s definition of “deep work”; he defines it as the ability to produce professional activities in a state of distraction-free concentration that pushes your cognitive abilities to their limit.
Deep Work presents to the readers numerous examples from successful persons, like JK Rowling and Bill Gates who applied the method of deep work and came up with astonishing results. If you want to get into the state of deep work and learn more about self-isolation to increase your productivity then you should definitely read Deep Work by Cal Newport which is one of the best self help books for self development and improvement.
Key Takeaways:
- Learn how to master difficult tasks fast and produce high quality work
- Have a sense of meaning thanks to deep work and be “in flow”
- Strengthen your ability to focus for longer periods of time
Information on Deep Work:
- Rating: 4.19/5
- Pages: 296
- Publishing Date: 2016
12: Think and Grow Rich

“Both poverty and riches are the offspring of thought.”
The reason why we chose the above quote from Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill is that poverty and wealth are a state of mind before they are a reality you live in. Your mind can trick you into living a poor life or being poor because you don’t think highly of yourself or believe that you deserve to be rich and have money. Changing your mentality is the first step to changing your reality regarding your financial status.
Having some form of financial literacy is highly connected to your self development and success, which is why Think and Grow Rich is one of the best books to read to improve yourself and get closer to your ideal life.
Key Takeaways:
- Learn the principles of visualization, affirmation, and goal setting
- Change your mentality to change your reality
- Know the secrets behind getting what you want in life even if it’s not related to money
Information on Think and Grow Rich:
- Rating: 4.18/5
- Pages: 233
- Publishing Date: 1973
13: The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts

“Our most basic emotional need is not to fall in love but to be genuinely loved by another, to know a love that grows out of reason and choice, not instinct. I need to be loved by someone who chooses to love me, who sees in me something worth loving. That kind of love requires effort and discipline. It is the choice to expend energy in an effort to benefit the other person, knowing that if his or her life is enriched by your effort, you too will find a sense of satisfaction—the satisfaction of having genuinely”
The five love languages are acts of service, receiving gifts, quality time, words of affirmation, and physical touch. The Five Love Languages is considered to be one the best self help books to read for everyone because it teaches you how people receive and give love and what their chosen ways say about them.
For example, if a person doesn’t feel loved by someone who keeps giving them gifts, then their love language isn’t receiving gifts but rather something else like receiving words of affirmation or spending quality time with their loved one.
Do you know your own love language? If you do, then it’s great, but if you don’t know it, then we added The Five Love Languages as one of our self help book recommendations because it’s will help you significantly in your love life.
Key Takeaways:
- Learn the five love languages and discover which one applies to you
- Understand the difference between receiving love and giving love depending on your needs and your partner’s
- Practice learning a new love language that you didn’t know about, in addition to the resiliency of human nature and its tendency to accept new love languages
Information on The 5 Love Languages:
- Rating: 4.27/5
- Pages: 232
- Publishing Date: 1990
14: 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos

“Don’t underestimate the power of vision and direction. These are irresistible forces, able to transform what might appear to be unconquerable obstacles into traversable pathways and expanding opportunities. Strengthen the individual. Start with yourself. Take care with yourself. Define who you are. Refine your personality. Choose your destination and articulate your Being. As the great nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche so brilliantly noted, “He whose life has a why can bear almost any how.”
12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson is one of the most recommended self help books to read in 2023 for anyone searching for meaning and principles to live by. The book’s principles are connected to society, religion, psychology, and many others.
The readers of this book split into two groups as some of them absolutely loved it and others completely hated it or didn’t really enjoy it, so it depends on what you’re looking for and your personal preferences.
Key Takeaways:
- Know the connection between your beliefs and actions
- Have a vision in life and trust it
- Appreciate what you already have and avoid undervaluing what you don’t
Information on 12 Rules for Life:
- Rating: 3.93/5
- Pages: 409
- Publishing Date: 2018
15: Rich Dad, Poor Dad

“It’s more important to grow your income than cut your expenses. It’s more important to grow your spirit that cut your dreams.”
Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki teaches you what school and your parents didn’t teach you about money and financial freedom. It’s an eye-opening book for all those working a 9-5 job thinking it will make them rich one day.
The book opens with two dads talking to their sons; the rich dad and the poor dad. It shows the difference between how these two types of fathers raise their children; the rich raises his children to make money work for him, whereas the poor teaches his children to work for money and this makes all the difference.
Rich Dad, Poor Dad is one of the most recommended self help books to read for everyone at any time because it introduces you to several principles that will bring financial freedom and literacy if you follow them in life. Take a look at Rich Dad, Poor Dad quotes that are related to personal finance.
Key Takeaways:
- The rich don’t work for money, they make money work for them
- Financial education is key to achieving financial success
- It’s important to distinguish between assets and liabilities
- Real estate is one of the best investment opportunities
Information on Rich Dad, Poor Dad:
- Rating: 4.12/5
- Pages: 195
- Publishing Date: 1997
This’s the end of our blog post on some of the most well-known and recommended self help books to read for everyone looking to transform their lives. Keep an eye on Read & Blog for more helpful blog posts related to books and reading, as we have so much to share with you!