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10 Books to Help You Become the Leader This World Needs
Matt Karamazov
October 08, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 30 minutes
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Tonight’s newsletter features three of my absolute favorite books of all-time (Meditations, Long Walk to Freedom, and Napoleon: A Life), as well as seven others that will help you develop yourself into the leader this world needs (and your community, organization, and family deserves).
As always, just skip around and pick out whichever books look interesting, but below I’ve got my completes notes from all of them, as well my full summaries.
I’m about to send this month’s Patreon book notes update as well, which is where you can find my notes from the 1,317 books I’ve read since 2014.
Just like Marcus Aurelius and his Meditations, I never intended to publish them, so now I’m going back and updating and expanding the earliest ones so that they’ll be even more valuable to you.
It’s an ongoing project, but you can find all my book notes here.
I’ve also got a gift for all Premium Members of The Reading Life, who will each receive a free digital copy of Olivia von Holt’s book, The Reward of Risk.
The Members’ page is right here for fast access and you can upgrade here, but all Premium Members receive a total of three free books (with more being added soon).
So far I’ve got The Reward of Risk, by Olivia von Holt, Maybe You Should Give Up, by Byron Morrison, and As a Man Thinketh, by James Allen.
Anyone who refers five or more people to The Reading Life will receive a free copy of all three books too.
Oh yeah, and Olivia has excellent taste in books, and you should totally follow her on Instagram too. Now, let’s get into tonight’s 10 books!
In This Issue of The Reading Life, We’ve Got:
We’ve got lots to learn today, so let’s hit the books!
“Make developing new habits a regular part of your life. Always be working on developing a new habit that can help you. One new habit per month will amount to 12 new habits each year, or 60 new, life-enhancing habits every five years.
At that rate, your life would change so profoundly that you would become a whole new person, in a very positive way, in a very short period of time.”
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“If you desire to lead at the highest level, you must always serve at the lowest.”
In this book, one of the global thought leaders on the topic, John C. Maxwell explains how leadership isn’t about how far you can go yourself, but rather about how far you can advance others. It may sound a little “Hallmark” to some people, but that doesn’t make it any less true.
There’s tons of great stuff in here about identifying the strengths and values of the people you seek to lead, and then being a resource for them to help all of you to get there as fast - and ethically - as possible. In other words, the stuff most people think they already know, yet all of us could spend a lifetime learning and properly employing.
This is one of the first leadership books I had ever read, and it immediately changed the way I thought about so many different areas of my life. I can’t even express what kind of a positive impact Maxwell’s books have had on my development, and if you’re in any sort of leadership position, aspire to be in one, or even just want to get the most out of yourself every single day, I highly recommend his books.
“At some point you have to recognize what world it is that you belong to; what power rules it and from what source you spring; that there is a limit to the time assigned you, and if you don't use it to free yourself it will be gone and will never return.”
Ryan Holiday has read this book more than a hundred times, and I can absolutely see why. I’ve only read it twice, but whenever I come back to my notes (which is often), I’m struck again and again by its power and force. The term “life-changing” is thrown around a lot on the internet, but this book is literally life-changing.
Meditations was originally kept as a private journal by the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, who never intended to publish it. But as will become clear as you read through my notes, the entire world has been strengthened and improved because it was published.
Marcus Aurelius was the last of the “Five Good Emperors,” and he’s also considered (rightly) to be one of the most important Stoic philosophers, right up there with Seneca and Epictetus. Those are the three that come to my mind anyway whenever I think of Stoicism.
Meditations is even more astonishing when you think of the time period Marcus lived through, which was characterized by constant wars, invasions, plagues, revolts, struggles…just on and on, and Marcus’s book is his impeccably honest attempt to understand himself and make sense of the universe with all this going on around him.
I honestly can’t recommend this book highly enough, and I can’t even imagine a world without it. To think that it was almost lost to the endless abyss of time is unfathomable to me, and I’m just extraordinarily grateful every time I think about it that it wasn’t.
“Over and over I have taught those under my supervision that we are all given a certain potential unique to each one of us.
Our first responsibility is to make the utmost effort to bring forth that potential in service to our team. For me, that is success. Then perhaps when circumstances come together, we may find ourselves number 1.
If that happens, it is merely a by-product of the effort we make to realize our own competency - our full potential. Success may result in winning, but winning does not necessarily mean you are a success."
Legendary basketball coach John Wooden was a master when it came to seeing potential greatness and infinite self-worth lying dormant inside the players on his teams, and his leadership style - that you can learn to adapt for yourself - was perfectly suited to drawing excellence from the teammates entrusted to his care.
For Wooden, there was a standard that ranked above winning, and he believed that if you give every single thing you have within you to be your very best, then you're already a success no matter what.
Doing your best is all that can ever be asked of you; it's literally everything, and although winning may be a natural byproduct of that supreme effort, it could never be the sole reason for a team's or a person's existence.
Disciplined, intensely focused on executing the fundamentals, self-controlled, team-focused, and unselfish, they would have been winners no matter what, and this is because of Wooden's exceptional leadership style.
John Wooden also possessed an immense moral strength that was given expression in many of the actions he took as a coach and leader. For one thing, when racism was still a significant presence in collegiate sports, he refused to enter basketball tournaments that his black players weren't allowed to participate in.
They were a team, and if they couldn't all play, then none of them were going to be there. It was this strict, incredibly demanding coaching style, combined with this gentleness, and a strong, enduring belief in human potential and infinite human worth that made John Wooden such a spectacular role model. One that we would all do well to emulate in our own lives.
“No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite. Man's goodness is a flame that can be hidden but never extinguished.”
This is an absolutely phenomenal memoir by one of the most inspirational civil rights leaders ever, Nelson Mandela, who later won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work fighting racial oppression in South Africa under apartheid.
Mandela later went on to become president of his country, but not before spending 27 years imprisoned on Robben Island for conspiring to bring down the racist regime that kept his country - and its people - divided.
It kept his family divided too, as many times Mandela’s young daughter would be brought to visit him in prison and would often try to get him to come back with them, being too young to understand why he could not.
As far as I’m concerned, this is one of those books that absolutely everyone should read, no matter who they are or where they come from.
It’s never been more important, since today, racism is basically a psy-op to keep people busy fighting each other for no good reason instead of using that energy and focus to get rich and change their lives. Mandela’s memoir is an urgently needed reminder that we’re not different people with different languages, but rather one people with different languages. We have no real enemies on this earth.
Reading this was the same kind of experience as reading the Mister Rogers biography, The Good Neighbor, by Maxwell King. I felt myself being changed by that book, and that’s exactly what happened while reading Long Walk to Freedom as well. I was literally never the same. And I will keep recommending it to everyone, everywhere, forever. It’s that good.
“He convinced his followers they were taking part in an adventure, a pageant, an experiment and a story whose sheer splendor would draw the attention of posterity for centuries.
He was able to impart to ordinary people the sense that their lives – and, if necessary, their deaths in battle – mattered in the context of great events. They too could make history.
It is untrue that he cared nothing for his men and was careless with their lives. He lost a friend in almost every major battle, and his letters to Josephine and Marie Louise make it clear that these deaths, and those of his soldiers, affected him.
Yet he could not allow that to deflect him from his main purpose of pursuing victory, and he would not have been able to function as a general if it had, any more than Ulysses Grant or George Patton could have done.
Napoleon certainly never lacked confidence in his own capacity as a military leader. On St Helena, when asked why he had not taken Frederick the Great’s sword when he had visited Sans Souci, he replied, ‘Because I had my own.’”
It’s difficult to imagine how someone so active, so energetic, so alive could now be still. There have been more books written with the word Napoleon in the title than there have been days since his death in 1821, but in a very real, visceral sense, this book brought him back to life, at least in my imagination.
Most everything I thought I knew about Napoleon – which, admittedly, wasn’t all that much – turned out to be either wrong or incomplete, and in this 800-page biography that I inhaled in a week I found myself swept up in the larger-than-life majesty of Napoleon’s life and campaigns.
It’s actually astonishing how many of the institutions and laws and reforms that exist today come directly from him. Meritocracy, equality before the law, property rights, religious toleration, modern secular education and so much more were ushered in during Napoleon’s reign, and he championed all of it.
It took almost every nation in Europe banding together in order to defeat him, and they had to adopt many of his reforms themselves in order to do it.
Napoleon’s single-minded focus, the fierce love and dedication he was able to inspire in his soldiers, his grand ambition and stunning boldness are all painted in vivid detail in this book, and by contrast, his last days hit me as being so…tragic.
I actually had a hard time reading the last 50 pages because I hated to see him brought down to earth. It’s still hard to imagine that someone like that ever truly perished from the earth, but I’m grateful to have been able to read his story.
“Those who have accomplished great things in the world have been, as a rule, bold, aggressive, and self-confident. They dared to step out from the crowd, and act in an original way. They were not afraid to be generals.
There is little room in this crowding, competing age for the timid, vacillating youth. He who would succeed today must not only be brave, but must also dare to take chances. He who waits for certainty never wins."
Weakness of will is the only thing stopping you from achieving everything you've ever wanted to achieve in this life.
The opportunities for great achievement and relentless goal attainment are abundant today, but it's the will to achieve that's scarce, the will to keep going that's lacking, and the will to drive forward no matter what that's going to be the difference-maker between your outstanding success and dismal failure.
Too bold? I don't think so. All the leading researchers in the field of psychology and personal success know that willpower is the single greatest predictor of all eventual achievement. It is the thing to focus on if you want to make damn sure that you live your one and only life with no regrets, and capture everything you came here for.
Luck exists, but volume and perseverance negate luck. We create a substantial portion of our own luck by being tenacious, relentless, and irrepressible. This book, An Iron Will, is a classic from all the way back in 1901(!) that will help you become exactly that: irrepressible.
“Employees, collaborators, and consultants work for you not because they are beneath you, but because they believe in you. You become an incredibly important Who in their life, giving them a mission to be part of, a way to provide for themselves and their families, and a way to build competence and confidence. The more people you are a Who for, the more successful you will become.”
Whatever your limitations, there is someone out there who can help you move beyond them. The best way to solve a problem is to find someone who already knows how to solve it, and that's pretty much the "one-sentence summary" of this incredibly valuable business book.
Instead of asking, "How can I solve this problem for myself?" a better question is to ask, "Who can I get to help me solve this?" Asking the former is just asking for burnout, frustration, and inferior results.
Because the truth is that there are people out there who are experts at doing the things you either hate to do, are bad at, or both, and they are more than willing to help you achieve your goals.
It's a mindset shift more than anything - retraining your brain to see potential and opportunities for collaboration and ease, rather than slugging through your daily tasks thinking you have to do everything yourself. You are limited in what you can do alone, but together, there's almost nothing we can't do.
“People always ask me, ‘What’s the secret to being a successful CEO?’ Sadly, there is no secret, but if there is one skill that stands out, it’s the ability to focus and make the best move when there are no good moves.”
Ben Horowitz is the cofounder of Andreesen Horowitz, a prestigious venture capital firm in Silicon Valley, and this book is his leadership “manual” for situations where there’s no clear right answer or best move to make.
People think starting a business is hard (and it is), but running a business will destroy you. Ben’s book will help make sure that (hopefully) doesn’t happen, and he explores the idea that hard things are hard because there’s no clear, best way of dealing with them.
There’s no “formula” to follow when competitors are trying to poach your best people, nobody in your organization knows how to talk to each other, you have to lay off friends who’ve been with you since the beginning, and all the rest of it. What do you actually, you know, do in situations like that?! Who prepares you?!
The Hard Thing About Hard Things is wonderfully direct and honest, though, and it’s even funny at times. It’s a book that fills in the gaps that business school never covered, and even though you may never arrive at a clear, perfect, and certainly not easy answer, this book will help you think more clearly about whatever comes up and how you should respond.
“It may take years for us to actually transform into the person we see ourselves as; but once we truly believe that is the person we are meant to be, eventually we find a way to embody that identity.”
Doing the Impossible is one of Patrick Bet-David’s earliest books, and I think of it like the Tao Te Ching of self-improvement books: a short read that you can finish in an hour, but could think about for the rest of your life.
It lends itself to multiple re-reads, and I suggest returning to it several times a year. I do the same thing with James Allen's classic, As a Man Thinketh, and of course, the Tao Te Ching as well.
If you're ready to step up and into who you know you could be, this book is the one you should read next.
You see, too often, we forget how capable we really are. We need to believe in ourselves the same way that Patrick Bet-David believes in us, and arm ourselves with the tools, tactics, and mindset we need in order to extract the absolute most from our virtually limitless potential. That's what Doing the Impossible is about.
All that being said, if you wish to turn the impossible into the imaginable and then the actual - then this is the book you need by your side.
“A visionary is someone who is not living in the here and now. He or she has already seen at least five moves ahead and is living in that reality.”
I tend to think of Bet-David as kind of like the Iranian Jordan Peterson – just an incredibly motivating, well-put-together guy with a big important message who is impassioned about delivering it and who has positively impacted millions of lives.
He’s a wildly successful entrepreneur, businessperson, and mentor, and he runs the YouTube channel Valuetainment, which has more than 3 million subscribers.
The overarching theme of this book is the necessity of thinking several moves ahead if you want to succeed in business, especially if you want to make a bigger impact than just earning a comfortable living. There’s nothing wrong with having a goal like that – something I love Patrick for emphasizing – but if you do decide to set bigger goals, you need to develop a work ethic to match.
Your discipline has to be as unshakable as your dreams are large, or you’re just not going to get there.
Here’s a guy who developed himself into an extremely capable and well-connected entrepreneur (he literally escaped from Iran as a child and spent two years living in a refugee camp) and now uses the knowledge that he’s earned to help empower others in a big way.
This book will help you outwork, out-improve, out-strategize, and outlast your competition, and it’s written by someone who’s actually done the work himself; he’s done exactly what he’s telling his readers to do, and that kind of accountability and authenticity is something you hold onto for dear life once you’ve found it in a person.
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OK, that’s it for now…
More excellent book recommendations coming your way soon!
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With that said, I hope you enjoyed this edition of The Reading Life, and enjoy the rest of your week!
Until next time…happy reading!
All the best,
Matt Karamazov
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