Last Updated on April 1, 2022 by Stephanie
I hope that you have already set your reading goal for the new year! Readers are leaders! If you haven’t set a reading goal yet or don’t know why a reading goal, or really just reading in general, is so important, check out this post. My goal for this year is 75 books, so I am super excited and will definitely share more as the year goes on. If you missed it, I’ve already posted “5 Books That Will Inspire You to Get Crap Done” as well! I will only post books that I myself have read and feel like they can help others in some way or another. If you’re looking for books to read this year, this is a great start.
1 – Becoming by Michelle Obama
This book was awesome, and I did not know the majority of anything about Michelle Obama before I read it. I thought her health initiatives were awesome, but I never knew what prompted her to start them. I didn’t know at all what she did before becoming the first lady. She is a very inspirational woman and it was a very interesting read for anyone.
2 – Deep Work by Cal Newport
All right, this was interesting. I am very aware of our distractibility in this world right now. This is absolutely a major focus of mine for the coming year, turning away from my distractions. In Deep Work, Newport does an awesome job at laying out what deep work is and how we have gotten away from it as a society.
Do you feel like you go through a day doing a million things but getting absolutely nothing done by the end of the day? Chances are, you were doing a lot of small surface-level things of little importance. Our brains are becoming trained to work in these small little spurts because we are constantly being bombarded with distractions. Unfortunately, we are also lacking the self-discipline to resist those distractions. Deep Work explains a lot of this and helps you develop steps to get yourself into that deep work state. Put this on your list of books to read this year if you are looking to get crazy productive.
3 – I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai
Malala Yousafzai is one of the greatest living humans. Her name should be a household name that all people in the world should know. This is an eye-opening book that will open you up to the harsh realities of many other places in the world. We learn about Malala’s home, her father’s influence on her love of education, and her inner strength and morality.
It was such a refreshing piece of literature. To see a young woman questioning real problems and genuinely not understanding why they exist is not uncommon. However, Malala’s questioning does not come from being young and naive. Her questioning of the wrongs and the problems come from her great moral sense and beliefs.
There is good in the world, and you see it in Malala Yousafzai.
4 – Elastic Habits: Good Habits That Adapt to Your Day by Stephen Guise
This was actually my first read of 2021, and it very much helped kick start my journey of betterment that year. The basis of this book is to really get you in the habit of… well… habits. Small habits, done consistently, can make a world of difference in your life. Oftentimes what makes us give up is when we mess up once or twice. We fail to reach our target and then say that we never can, so we abandon the habit altogether. Guise’s plan is to create “elastic habits” that work with your day. Creating a mini, a medium, and an expert variation of your habit will ensure success. The mini habit is essentially one that is so easy for you to accomplish, that at the end of the day when you realize that you didn’t do anything, you can do it quickly and feel like you accomplished your habit!
5 – Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
In education and the world in general there is a lot of talk about diversity and various movements happening. It is always a good idea to gain some perspective. Coates’ memoir is a letter to his son about the state of race in America. As a White woman in this country, my eyes were absolutely opened by the perspective given in this book. He talks about his life as a black man in this country, explaining to his son the harsh realities of things that happened to both him and his friends. His perspective on events in this country was one that I had never considered, and it made me think twice about a lot of what has been happening these last couple of years.
What Are Your Thoughts?
Have you already read any of the books on this list? Are they already on your list of books to read this year? I hope I convinced you to put at least one of them on your list. Let me know in the comments below which ones interest you! If you want an awesome reading challenge. Head over to my post about the 30 book challenge and grab this freebie!
If you are already into your reading year, check out these awesome book logs in my shop! Using a pdf annotating app like GoodNotes5, you can keep track of up to 100 books. Review them, track how you read, keep up with who you’ve lent books to, and more with this great book log. Click on the image below to see more.
