What are some Books for Improving the Self?

Are self help books actually useful? If not what philosophy and/or fiction should I read to improve myself?

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They are helpful.
The problem is most of them are bullshit and the good ones can be condensed to a few pages.

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

Almost 2000 year old book by a badass general who expanded the Roman Empire. He meditated daily and wrote down his thoughts in a book. It's full of wisdom on how to lead a happy and worthwile life, brah.

>badass general
Would be more impressive if you clarified that he was the emperor to be desu

I intend to pick up his writings soon.

I really enjoyed The Art of Zen and Motorcycle and Maintenance. It's more of a book to just read to enjoy the read in my opinion. But there is some beginner philosophy stuff in some of the chapters. My biggest take away was about breaking down your problems/ and peoples emotions into pieces to try and understand them.

The end is kinda odd tho, so be warned

easy to do that when you're an emperor and you were pretty much born in that

It's not like the book is supposed to teach you how to become an Emperor.

They can help, but there is one part that is crucial that 99% of self help book readers don't get. That is: APPLY WHAT YOU READ. As in, make actual changes to your behavior in your day to day life.

Just like reading SS and then going to the gym only once wont do shit, just reading self help books wont change anything. You still have to put in the effort.

>Are self help books actually useful?
No.

Read Goethe, Schiller, Schelling, Fichte, Hölderlin, Humboldt, Wieland, Herder, Hegel, Kant.

But most of all Goethe.

>implying becoming the emperor is the easy part

kek

Why only germans, friend? Are they actually the First ones that come to your mind?

No. Wisdom is seldom learned from books, rather own mistakes.

It is my current obsession, especially Goethe.

Others I have found influential are Næss, Hamsun, Linkola, Swedenborg, Eliade, Guenon, Schoun, Jung, Zerzan, Kaczynski, Mishima, Philip Sherrard, Heidegger...

I would also recommend reading Rudolf Steiner's writings on Goethe as well as the writings of Oswald Spengler as supplements.

I read like 5 self help books after a breakup before i realised i was just filling a hole

none of the advice was useful to me because i never did any of it properly. i just wanted to feel better about myself easily

Yukio Mishima's book about bodybuilding is good but pretty weird

Zhuangzi helped me I wouldn't call it a self help book tho

Go to Veeky Forums, really, you'll find better help, if the not-entitled dicks show up

Siddhartha

I really recommend Philosophy For Life And Other Dangerous Ideas by Jules Evans.
It isn't a self-help book but rather a journalistic investigation of various philosophical principles and modern examples of individuals that live by them.
So it isn't about improving the self but rather igniting a sense of moral duty and principles that are useful for a human being to possess when engaging with the world.

Regarding the whole concept of self-improvement, I believe it to be somewhat fallacious. Modern neuroscience has confirmed that there is actually no inherent self within us so the whole prospect of improving the self is trying to upgrade a transient and ephemeral entity. I think philosophical principles that are more generalized for the human in engagement with the world is a better way to go.
In the same vein, I would like to suggest A Guide To The Good Life: The Ancient Art Of Stoic Joy by William Irvine - really solid book about the application of Stoicism.

Getting Thing Done

literally the only self-help book worth a damn. It literally changed my life. This is not an exaggeration. Stay of away from books that are filled with anecdotes and empty platitudes

>Asking for books
>On fit
>Off topic posting

Saged, repoted.

I would suggest "My twisted world" by Elliot Rodgers. It's an inspirational read

No. Everything you need to know about how to do better, you already do. You just are looking for someone to pat you on the back while you do what is already known. Self help books ALL boil down to the same shit, said in whatever way resonates with you.
>just go for it
>with a game plan
>be positive
>believer in yourself

its a good read

you said kant

why do you need to read a book for that?

>identify your problems
>research them
>fix them

thats all you need to know

His military exploits as emperor aren't the impressive part

Anyone could benefit from listening to Alan Watts lectures. He was a real cool dude.

How to win friends and influence people.

>>>>>>If you apply what you read

Start with these.

1-The secret & think and Grow Rich
2-Cultivating unshakable character by Jim Rohn
3-Comedy Writing Secrets by Melvin Helitzer
4-Body Language by Allan Pease
5-Persuasion Skills by Rintu Basu (Richard Bandler's books are the base, but are good only to get an idea about frames and patterns and other things)
6-The Art of War by Sun Tzu
7-Book of Tells by Peter Collett
8-Overcoming Fear.

Quite a lot to read, but useful.

Also, information is power, but only if you use it.

>reading philosophy or fiction for self improvement
C'mon! Read big to get big

The secret and think and grow rich are ABSOLUTE TRASH

Here you go OP
>7 habits of highly effective people- first half is great, second half is again filled with non-actionable advice and then last part gets good again.
the good books
>No More Mr. Nice Guy- Kill the last bits of beta in you
>Book of Pook- Become confident, change your thoughts and slay. Basically become chad
>Starting strength- obviously
>what every body is saying- body language book. will help you realise when someone is mirin
>Enchiridion and meditations- Some useful bits of stoicism i.e. how to not waste time over something you cant control, very sane thoughts in the book
>Mastery by george leonard- how to gitgud at stuff
>48 laws of power- useful for workplace politics
>feeling good by david burns- althought its for depression, this book has GREAT advice on how to think and get shit done

now OP stay away from these trash books which only give the illusion of being good
>the secret, Think and Grow Rich- absolute trash tier. "HAVE IMMENSE DESIRE AND IT WILL COME TO YOU HURR DURR" these are the bookswhich give self help genre the bad name
rich dad poor dad- just read a summary. book is too long and too much self promotion and not much useful info
the big leap- nothing concrete, just things in air, no actionable advice

now there are some books like psychocybernetics (they say all self help is based on this), gettings things done which i havent read but seem to come in the good category. good luck op

Scott Adams and Cernovich

Starting Strength

>Shitting on a Roman Empreror for being a Roman Emperor.

Look at your fucking life bro. Like you're literally able to infect anything with your negativity. Glad you're in this thread.

highly underrated post, thanks user

It really helped me see things in a new way. A truly valuable piece of writing

Forgot to mention Book of Pook. Even Dump Machine's Method. Golden

When I mentioned 'The secret and think and grow rich', indeed, didn't realize all the hype it has in it. But rather, focused on it for setting goals.


Would also recommend this

youtube.com/watch?v=4t_mhnMZ4qA


Thanks for your suggestions, user, will look into them.

1611 KJV heathen.

i dont know why everyone harps on this shit so much. it wasn't that good.

>How to Win Friends and Influence People
Something like 40 years old, but super relevant.

>7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Make this your mantra, this book applies to anything, including working out

>Richest Man in Babylon
I loved this one, and it gives some unique insight into money, and success, finally put together in book form in 1920's but the stories are as old as time.

the Tao Te Ching or Dao De Jing is a great book to read, although you need to check out a couple of different translations and choose one you like. i think this one is ok:
ln.edu.hk/econ/staff/daodejing(22 August 2002).pdf

not to be pompous but it is better reading it in chinese because if you know the chinese and read the translations it is quite apparent how much the translators change or add meaning to what is quite a simple text.

I have read a good number of self help books during my commutes. They were almost all bad. Don't want to shill for the guy, but the books by Brian Tracy are very straight forward and offer clear instructions on how to apply what he's trying to teach you. Especially the book "Goals!" has been very valuable to me. Goals give your life purpose, working towards them is fulfilling and motivating and reaching them will give you a sense of accomplishment. You want to be able to be proud of yourself and have the confidence that you can overcome the obstacles in your way. His other stuff is also pretty good, but it can get repetitive.

Other than that, I recommend reading up on decision making / decision theory and especially the idea of expected value ("when faced with a number of actions, each of which could give rise to more than one possible outcome with different probabilities, the rational procedure is to identify all possible outcomes, determine their values (positive or negative) and the probabilities that will result from each course of action, and multiply the two to give an "expected value", or the average expectation for an outcome; the action to be chosen should be the one that gives rise to the highest total expected value"). This concept can and should be applied to most of our decisions.

No need to read the entire book or even the first chapter.

The first chapter is basically an extended thank you to his family and friends, and the book is incredibly repetitious.

Read like 3 chapters and you should get the gist of it

Decent fap material when he describes listening to his sister fucking some guy

>Wants to improve self

>Can't find the inspiration from within

I have some bad news user

habits of highly effective people- first half is great, second half is again filled with non-actionable advice and then last part gets good again.
Habit is a big one. I would recommend to read every book you can find regarding habits. Even if it is bad you'll profit fom it by comparing the advice with the other books.

>>No More Mr. Nice Guy- Kill the last bits of beta in you
Not going to kill the last bits of beta in you but it is a good start. Probably the best start.

>>Book of Pook- Become confident, change your thoughts and slay. Basically become chad
Great read. Not a book but just forum posts by a user named Pook. Has more value than 90% of other self help books. I've read it probably 20 times already, just to remind myself of his thoughts.

>>what every body is saying- body language book. will help you realise when someone is mirin
Fuck mirin. It will teach you to read people, and be overall more likeable.
laws of power- useful for workplace politics
Not just useful in the workplace, like the body language book.

>now OP stay away from these trash books which only give the illusion of being good
I read a lot. And in my opinion even the bad books have value. You just need to work with it. Take notes, do your research, compare the advice to other books, try it yourself. At the end you will know what works and what is bullshit. But you need to bother about the information you read.
I will read the books you mentioned and form my own opinion.

>psychocybernetics
Can confirm.
It's only 40% hyperbolic shit, the rest actually makes you do exercises during and IMMEDIATLY after the chapter.

How about the RedPill?
They recommend all these books as well.

I'll second your recommendation of A Guide to the Good Life. I'm reading it now and like that it gives easily applicable advice and sums up the philosophy nicely.

Seems like a good place to start for stoicism in general.

They are worthless. They are literally run of the mill feel good nonsense. Don't waste your money on them.

Gorilla Mindset by Mike Cernovich.

How to think, how to act, how to succeed.

A waste of precious time.
The Red Pill has nothing to offer. All of the good advice is already available in books.
The Red Pill just rewrites the advice you find in the Book of Pook for example. The rest of the time they circlejerk to clickbait bullshit or some bullshit mentioned in another subreddit.

this

>How to win friends and influence people
it might be old, but its really eye opening, great book if you are a bit autistic

How about the older posts on IOI-s, shit tests and such?

This is pretty accurate. Can confirm for most of these books

Goddamn. I mean I suck with women and have missed out on much of what other people have experienced in terms of sex and relationships. Still, though with that attitude it is no surprise it went the way it went with him.