Pod Insights The $100 MBA Show I Read 50 Books Per Year. These Are The Only Ones You Need To Read To Be Successful. About this episode You can read all the business books in the world and still feel stuck. That’s the frustrating part. So many promise big breakthroughs, but most just leave you with more noise, more notes, and no real shift in how you think or move. If you’re tired of wasting time on books that sound smart but change nothing, this episode will hit home.
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1:02 Speaker 01 Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App's bank partners. Bitcoin services provided by Block Incorporated brand. For additional information, see the Bitcoin disclosures at cash.app/legal/podcast. I've read over 50 books a year for over 10 years. And I want to be honest with you, most of them are a waste of time. I don't think you should read most business books. They got catchy titles, they have 10-step frameworks, they have tactics that would work maybe in 2016, but they kind of stop working by the time you finish a chapter. But there are some books that can genuinely change how you think. Because it's not teaching you tactics, it's teaching you how humans work, how people decide, how people operate, and how history repeats itself.
1:48 Speaker 01 Business is not one skill, in my opinion. It's a sum of many skills, combined together to make you money. Today, I'm going to share with you 13 books that changed the way I think and helped me build two multimillion-dollar businesses. And in my opinion, they're worth more than any kind of trend report or marketing playbook. They really change who you become. They're going to make you better, not only at one thing, but at everything you do. This is not only a reading list. This is what you need to master the game of business, and in a lot of ways, life as well. So let's go.
2:26 Speaker 01 Welcome back to the $100 MBA Show. I'm your host Omar Zenhome, where I deliver practical business lessons three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, to help you start, grow, and scale your business.
2:39 Speaker 01 I got a quick favor to ask. If this show has helped you in any way, leave me a quick review. You could do so wherever you listen to podcasts. This helps me and my team reach even more people who need the same no-fluff, practical business advice that you're getting from the show. It only takes a few seconds, but it makes a huge difference. Thanks for being a part of our journey to help others on their journey. Before we begin, two quick things. Number one, welcome to the studio. We're here in our new studio in Sydney, Australia. I'm here with Josh, behind the camera, who's running video and helping us produce all our new episodes. We're upping our game so that you can up your business game as well with each lesson. Number two, the books I'm going to share with you today,
3:21 Speaker 01 some of them I read on my Kindle, some of them I like to read on physical, and I also like audiobooks as well. So I'll give you some recommendations on which format to use for each book, because some of these are really good for that format, like for audio or for Kindle. I'll explain as we go to each book. Let's start with book number one, The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. This book is really, really important, not because it's going to teach you some sort of marketing tactic, but it tells you how to plan for the future, because you cannot predict the future. It's very, very hard to predict what's going to happen tomorrow, next year, and part of business is being able to do that, being able to build your business for today, but also for tomorrow and the years to come. What makes this book so important is that it highlights
4:06 Speaker 01 that the events that change everything in the world, the financial crashes, the pandemics, the technology shifts that happen like AI, the moment that it reshapes the industries overnight, a lot of these moments are hard to predict. They come outside the range of what you thought was possible. So how do you prepare yourself? And that's what this book is all about, is that a lot of times we think that the unlikely is never going to happen, but the unlikely happens all the time. These rare things- Things that happen in life are so impactful because people are just not prepared for it. And a lot of people just roll the dice in life and not prepare for these black swan events. Now, when I say prepare, I'm not talking about worrying and having a bunker.
4:47 Speaker 01 I'm talking about the fact that you can capitalize on these moments that a lot of people do not expect. Whether it's COVID, which is a black swan, or the 2008 financial crisis, that's a black swan. Or even the internet when it launched back in the day, that is a black swan event. Where people just didn't see this coming. In my opinion, this book is a must read because you need to be prepared for all the contingencies in your business. Not to worry, but to feel secure that you have prepared. Some of you know I love playing poker and if you play poker, you know that pocket aces is the best hand. But pocket aces, even though it should win most of the time, statistically, it is the best hand every single time. But seldomly, it will lose and that's a black swan event.
5:30 Speaker 01 And what you learn by playing poker a lot is that black swan events happen all the time. So you gotta be prepared to sometimes take the losses. Ooh, I love this next one. The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen. Here's a question that you should really, really think about. Cause it terrifies every successful business owner. What if you're doing everything right, exactly what you're supposed to be doing? But your business still gets crushed, still gets killed and goes out of business. That's the central argument of the Innovator's Dilemma. Great companies fail, not because they're badly managed or they don't do a good job. It's because they're managed really well. They continue to do what works for the business. But unfortunately, what works today, not going to always work tomorrow.
6:12 Speaker 01 This book is all about what you need to do to work on your current business. But also work on your second business, which is the business you will become. And I find this fascinating because what I have found in business and in life. And the fact that you'll notice that we're in a new studio is that if you don't change, if you don't evolve, if you don't become something new, it's very, very easy for you to die as a business. You become stale, you don't become relevant anymore. And this book is all about how do you continue to do what's working in your business, but also in a The masters at this are Apple, Apple computers. They are in the habit of constantly cannibalizing their current products. They innovate and replace their old products as fast as possible.
6:56 Speaker 01 So for example, when the iPhone came out, they cannibalized their best selling product, which is the iPod, right? The iPod instantly got killed by the iPhone when they came out with the iPhone. Now, why do they do this? Because if they don't do it, their competition will. So they rather innovate and take over their product line and start selling more of the new product line, given the fact it's the latest thing, the latest technology. It's what the customers want now. The next book is Influence by Robert Cialdini. Influence is one of the OG books on persuasion, on communication, on how to work with other people. This falls under the umbrella of everything in business, sales, marketing, communication in general. Essentially, every sale you make in your business, every negotiation you win, every
7:40 Speaker 01 partnership that you build with a vendor, or even somebody that's going to market your business for you, it all depends on understanding how and why people agree to things. How do people actually get on your side? And Cialdini spent years studying the philosophy of persuasion and understanding how to influence people and distills it into this book. I actually find it incredible that we have access to this book. It's like an absolute game changer. And it's the reason why it's got like over 7,000 reviews on Amazon, because it's a book that has lasted the test of time. I mean, this book came out about 15, 20 years ago. So it's one of those classics that will constantly teach you new things about how to win people over. There are classic rules that if you follow them, you will succeed in business.
8:24 Speaker 01 Things like reciprocity, commitment, social proof, authority, liking and trusting somebody, scarcity, all these things are taught in depth in this book. And these are not manipulation practices. These are understanding how human beings operate and understanding how you can operate knowing how people operate, if that makes any sense. The point here is that you need to understand how to win when people aren't on the fence, when people are not sure about you, how to make sure that you quickly build a relationship with them so they understand that you have their best interests in mind. This book gives you an operating system of how human decision-making is done. And whether you know this or not, this is happening. This is happening in front of you.
9:08 Speaker 01 And if you are aware of it, you could take advantage of this operating system. You can take advantage of how people just exist and how they work when it comes to making decisions. Now, I highly recommend that you read this book to understand these invisible forces. A lot of this sounds a little bit vague, but he makes it super clear. So you understand with every human interaction you have in business, that you can understand how to win them over, how to make sure they win and you win. My next book is Super Communicators by Charles Duhigg. I had the pleasure of meeting Charles. We had him here on the podcast. You should check out that episode. We'll link to it in the description. But most people think they're good communicators. They think, hey, I've been talking all my life. I should know how to talk, right?
9:51 Speaker 01 No, I used to think I was a great communicator, given the fact that I've published over 2,800 episodes of this podcast, but I had a lot to learn through this book. In this book, Duhigg's research shows that people who connect the most effectively are the ones that do something very specific that you can learn, that you can actually learn, so that you can connect with other people at a very deep level. And that connection is everything. When you feel like you're connected to somebody and they feel like they're connected to you, you immediately gain their trust. After reading this book, I started asking myself a lot of practical questions that allowed me to connect with people a lot faster. Questions like, is this a practical conversation that I'm having with this person? Or is this an emotional one? Or maybe it's a social one? Asking these questions allow me to know how to respond in a way that they will be receptive.
10:37 Speaker 01 Most miscommunication happens not because the words that you're saying are wrong, but because the two people that are having the conversation are having two different conversations without realizing it. Sure, you can think of a conversation maybe with an intimate partner. That happens a lot, don't worry. But the question that he puts in front of you is that are you thinking about the type of conversation you're having before you have it? Before you engage in this conversation? Because your approach is going to change completely. Now, this book has helped me so much in business because Is the mother of all skills. I'm communicating constantly, whether it's on the podcast, whether it's me negotiating deals, whether it's me figuring out if I want to invest in a company, or even hiring or bringing on new people on my team.
11:18 Speaker 01 How do I communicate the right way to make sure that they feel heard, but also that I feel like I'm getting my message across and connecting with them at a deep level? The next book is The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene. Robert Greene is one of my favorite authors. Robert, if you're watching this, please come on the show. I love him so much. He's one of my top five favorite authors. And he doesn't mess around. When he goes into a topic, he goes deep. As you can see, he is super deep. This is a very thick book. Usually it takes me about a week or two to finish a book. This book took me about three months, not only because it's a lot of pages, but because it's very thought provoking. You will read a line, you will read a chapter and have to put it down and think about how this relates to your life.
11:59 Speaker 01 Now, if Cialdini teaches you how to decide and Charles Duhi teaches you how to connect, Robert Greene really teaches you how people behave. And this is really a must read for any human being, because if you don't understand who these people are that are around you every day, how they operate, how they speak, why they speak this way, how they feel, how they think, it's going to be very hard for you to succeed in life. In this book, you're going to learn about the people around you, your friends, your family, their hidden motivations, their defense mechanisms, the patterns of behavior that play out every time they interact with you, every partnership, every negotiation that you have in business. It really pulls the curtain and also pulls back from history,
12:41 Speaker 01 psychology, philosophy, and teaches you how people just are very, very basic. Okay. And there's a set of rules and there's a set of patterns that you can observe that he explains in detail in this book. Most people spend their entire lives trying to acquire painful lessons about how people work. I know I did through painful trial and error and messing up and breaking relationships up and all that kind of stuff, right? So I'm encouraging you to skip the trial and error and pick up Robert Greene's book, The Laws of Human Nature. Hey, if you're getting value from today's episode, hit subscribe, not only to support the show, but because we have an upcoming episode that I don't want you to miss.
13:19 Speaker 01 We're going to go really deep on how Netflix grew to a $366 billion beast. I'm going to share with you all the secrets that the CEO shares publicly, and I've dug it all up so that you can go ahead and implement the same strategies in your own business. The moment I learned some of these stuff, I was able to make some significant changes in my own business and saw some major, major results. So hit subscribe so you don't miss that episode when it comes out. My next book recommendation, it's actually a few books. It might seem a little odd, but just hang with me for a moment. All right, I'm talking about religious texts. I know this sounds strange, but you might think, Omar, what does religion have to do with building a great business? Well, the fact of the matter is religion has influenced
14:03 Speaker 01 how people think, operate, believe for centuries. These are not just spiritual documents. They are one of the most comprehensive records of human philosophy, ethics, psychology, social organizations that have ever been assembled. These religious texts, whether the Bible, the Quran, the Torah, or the Vedas, these books have shaped most of human life, the way people live their lives. And still till today, even when people are not practicing, these philosophies, these traditions are still embedded in our societies. I've always been fascinated about how humans work. And even though I majored in education in my university days, I minored in comparative religion because I was fascinated by this idea of religion,
14:46 Speaker 01 about people having faith, about people following a doctrine. And I got to be honest, those years of studies serve me to today. Right? Not because I agree with everything that's in these texts, but because I understand why people believe what they believe. And it's a very powerful tool in business to understand where people are coming from. You can't serve people at a high level without understanding what they value. And that's really what religious texts share with you. What people value most really shapes who they are, directly or indirectly, shapes their philosophy and spiritual life, their tradition. And what they love and don't love. I recommend studying these texts and I actually recommend studying all of the texts that you can get your hands on.
15:29 Speaker 01 Not just the religion that you follow or grew up in, but because you'll realize that most people are the same, right? Most people believe in pretty much the same values and the traditions, the rules that might differ. But at the end of the day, people have a moral compass that they follow based on what they were handed down from their parents or what they sought after. Now I gotta warn you, some of these books are a little bit difficult to read, even with a great translation, especially some of the older texts like the Torah. It's a little bit old language and you're gonna have to figure out the gist and the meaning of what's being said in these verses. And that's enough for you to understand what people value. The next book is On The Shortness Of Life by Seneca. Seneca wrote this book roughly 2,000 years ago, right?
16:13 Speaker 01 And as you can see, it's a tiny book. You can actually read this in one sitting. It's not too bad at all. It's, you know, less than 100 pages, about 85 pages. And it's kind of like the opposite of this book. But the point here is, is that this book will teach you so much about what's important, what you need to value. Now, even though the book is called On The Shortness Of Life, the core argument of this book is that life is not short. We make it short by wasting it on the wrong things. Pretty deep. Most people, they spend most of their valuable years on busyness that creates no meaning. Sticking to a job just because it's safe or being in a relationship just so they're in a relationship, even though it's not fulfilling. Seneca argues that time is the only resource you cannot recover, you cannot renew.
16:59 Speaker 01 You can always buy more clothes, you can always make more money, you can always buy a bigger house. You just can't buy more time. In fact, money can be lost and be earned again, but time that is spent is gone forever. So whatever you decide to do today, this week, this month, you gotta make it something that counts. Because once that month is over, or whatever time period, it's gone forever. And the entrepreneur who internalizes this genuinely feels motivated because they feel like, hey, the time is now. I will die, so I might as well go for it. I won't be in my 30s or my 40s. Or whatever age you are, again, you gotta take advantage of the time that is in front of you. And when you have that kind of urgency, and this book will light a fire under you, you take action.
17:42 Speaker 01 You prioritize taking action because you understand that time is fleeting. I gotta be honest with you, this short book that took me about two hours to read, taught me more than any online course. Not because it's filled with great tactics and tips, but it reshaped my mind. It rewired my mind to really take advantage of every day. Today's episode is supported by Rosetta Stone. I absolutely love Rosetta Stone because it's helping me learn Italian faster than I can ever imagine. Why do I want to learn Italian? Well, who doesn't love Italy? But of course, Nicole's family is Italian and I love to have some quick Italian conversations with her mom. And Rosetta Stone just came out with Rosetta Stone Sapphire, their biggest launch in over a decade.
18:25 Speaker 01 One of the coolest features is chat missions, which turns conversation practice into a game. With chat missions, you're put in interactive scenarios and given three objectives. A mission to accomplish, like asking how much something costs, ordering a cold brew coffee, or getting a wifi password. Along the way, you get real time corrections and feedback to help you sound more natural and confident. It's a supportive way to build confidence before putting your language skills to use in real life. I've been using Rosetta Stone for over two years and I actually can have some small Italian conversations with Nicole's mom now. Just the other day, she asked me, when are you traveling? And I said, dopo domani mattina, which means after tomorrow morning. She was incredibly impressed I was able to answer in Italian. How could you put a price tag on a happy mother-in-law?
19:09 Speaker 01 If you want to take your language skills to the next level, don't wait to try Rosetta Stone Sapphire. The $100 on the ratio listeners can get 20% off the Rosetta Stone Sapphire subscription when they sign up today. This gets you access to Rosetta Stone Sapphire in 25 languages. Support for today's episode comes from Square. You probably know Square is the thing you tap your card on at your favorite coffee shop, restaurant, salon, or local store. But for the person running that business, Square is a whole lot more than a way to get paid. Square brings the tools you need to run and grow your business together in one system. From payments on appointments to staff, inventory, sales, and customer relationships. Whether you're selling lattes, cutting hair, detailing cars, running a restaurant, or starting something new, Square keeps your business tools working together so you can focus less
19:54 Speaker 01 on managing the moving parts and more on what's next. And right now, listeners can get up to $200 off Square hardware when you sign up at square.com/go/mba. That's S-Q-U-A-R-E.com/go/mba. Visit Square to get started because running a business is complicated enough. Your tools don't have to be.
20:17 Speaker 01 The next book on the list is "The Obstacles Away" by Ryan Holiday. One of my other favorite authors, Ryan Holiday. This book has gotten me through some tough times. This book really helped me through a particularly tough time when I was trying to grow up in our ninja software company. We were stagnant, we were just not moving the needle. And I realized that that obstacle, that challenge, is what I needed. I needed to get through that challenge to become who I needed to become so that I can be the entrepreneur I need to be to pull off the numbers and the success that I wanted. Now, if you know anything about Ryan Holiday, he is a big student of Stoicism. Most of his books are rooted in that philosophy. And I recommend this book because Marcus Aurelius's "Meditations," which is a great book, is one of the most important books you can ever read.
21:02 Speaker 01 It's actually the private journal of an emperor. You know, this book is a little bit hard to read. It's difficult. And I would say you'd get more out of this book if you're a casual reader, somebody that is not going to have a Latin dictionary next to them while they're reading a book. Holiday's taken a lot of the core principles of Stoic philosophy and made it practical in modern life. The central idea of this book is that the obstacle is not in the way, it is the way. Now, what does this mean? Well, like I mentioned, I was struggling in a period of time in my business at WebinarNinja. Now, we were doing okay, we were roughly $300,000 to $400,000 in revenue, but I was really trying to hit that million-dollar revenue mark, and I just couldn't hit it. I was hitting a ceiling.
21:43 Speaker 01 And in this moment, I read this book, actually read this book on my honeymoon. And when I read it, I realized that I need to go- Through this challenge because if I was good enough to have a million dollar revenue business, I would have it already, but I don't because I'm not somebody who could pull it off. I need to become that person first. I gotta embrace the obstacle. I gotta embrace the challenge, learn from it so that I can transform myself and be the person that can pull off a million dollar business. Once you read this book, you will stop feeling derailed by difficulty. You will start to embrace. You'll actually relish in the obstacles that are faced in your business. You will learn to use it. You know, one of my favorite parts of the Rocky movies, if you know anything about me,
22:28 Speaker 01 I love Rocky. Rocky is one of my favorite stories. It's actually one of the best love stories out there. But my favorite part of Rocky is the training montage, when he's suffering, right? Because it makes it all worth it. You understand that that's what it takes to become a champion. Now, I want to move on to some books about money, about time, and changing the way you think about how these things work together. Now, one of the best books on money that I've read is a book by Morgan Housel, and it's called The Psychology of Money. This book is not about spreadsheets. It's not about budgets. It's not about how to save money on lattes. It's about how people think about money, how people actually believe money is going to help them, hurt them, how they use money, how they spend money.
23:10 Speaker 01 And you're going to start understanding why you think the things you think about money. You're going to start analyzing the scripts that are in your head. What I love about this book is that most business books, most money books, tell you about what to do with money, what to invest in, how to save, all that kind of stuff. This one tells you why you do what you already do with money. And the answer is almost never rational. One of my favorite chapters is one of the first chapters is called "Nobody's Crazy." You might think people are crazy for buying Lotto tickets, but in their world, it's their only way of getting rich. It's the only option they have of having a dream. And you can't really judge the way people think, especially when it comes to money, because everybody's circumstance is different.
23:52 Speaker 01 The point is, you need to look at your circumstance. You gotta look about what you believe about money and why you believe it and analyze it and maybe start changing it. Our relationship with money Is shaped by when we grew up. Time period, it could be like a depression or maybe a recession in the economy. It's also based on what we expect, how we grew up in our family, what we were taught by our parents, the emotional associations we've built over the decades when it comes to money. Things like, you know, rich people are mean or they're greedy. These are things maybe they've fed to us. And maybe that's a big reason why you haven't aspired to grow your business. Because you feel like if I grow my business, I might be rich. I want to be one of these nasty people like Scrooge McDuck. That's a Scrooge.
24:33 Speaker 01 No one really understands what scripts are going on their mind until you start questioning them. And one of the things that you learn in this book is that when it comes to money, investment, business, no one does any of those things rationally alone, right? There are some emotions involved when it comes to money. It's a very, very, I would say, a hot topic, especially when, you know, people have these discussions with family, with friends. A lot of people don't want to talk about it because it strikes a lot of emotions. It brings up a lot of emotions that maybe they don't want to feel. This book is well-written, it's short chapters, clear language, great stories, and even cliffhangers of stories, moving on to the next chapter. Morgan House has done a great job with this book because most money books are pretty boring. And this is actually quite interesting.
25:18 Speaker 01 It's actually a page-turner, in my opinion. I couldn't put this book down. I encourage you to read this book to understand your own financial behavior as well as how to change it. You know, I realized I had some scripts in my own head that I didn't fully recognize. You know, some of the things like I grew up as a young kid from an immigrant family. My parents immigrated from Egypt to the US. We didn't have a lot of money. And somewhere along the line, I really believe that, you know, I didn't deserve to be wealthy. I just thought that I should just maintain the financial level of what my parents had, and that's safe and that's what I know. And I had to challenge those thoughts so that I can break free from those ideas and not only make more money, but also be more in my life and do more interesting things. This book is one of the most influential books I've ever read in my life. It was a real gut punch for me.
26:03 Speaker 01 It's called 4,000 Weeks by Oliver Berkman. 4,000 weeks, that's roughly how long a human life lasts. Now, the subtitle of this book is "Time Management for Mortals." If you're a productivity junkie, if you're somebody who's like, "I want to optimize every minute of the day so I can get more done and be more efficient, be more successful," you need to read this book, okay? Because that was me, and it's still me to some degree. But what I find about this book that is so, so interesting is that it's so counterintuitive and it's so uncomfortable in some moments that you can't help but love it, right? It makes you feel things that you never felt before. And now, what I mean by that is that every productivity book out there, every productivity hack, or system, or video you see on YouTube,
26:47 Speaker 01 you know, it's all about trying to get more done, try to get more done, how to get more done with less time, all that kind of stuff. And Oliver Berkman believes that this is a flawed premise, that you should not be optimizing to get more done. You should be optimizing to get more of what's important done. You cannot get everything done. In fact, more work begets work. Let's say, for example, you reply to every single email to your inbox today, even the spam ones, all right? What's gonna happen? You're gonna get more emails, right? Because you have replied to all of them. Instead of saying, "Hey, these are the only ones that are most important for me to reply, the only ones I can ignore." So, the point here is that you have to understand that every action has a consequence, and you need to take action on things that actually are going to be aligned
27:32 Speaker 01 with the goals in your life, what you want to get done. It really forces you to focus. So, the first thing this book convinces you of is that you cannot get everything done. Drop this idea. You're not an infinite being with infinite time. No, okay? There's a path that you could take that will have a more meaningful impact on your life. And it's not about doing more. It's about choosing ruthlessly what matters most and letting go of everything else. That letting go is what's most important, is saying no to most things and saying yes to the most important things. Now, I found that focus and this Philosophy has really helped me in my life and my businesses because I get to choose my sacrifices. I get to say to myself, hey, these are the things I'm going to cut out of my life.
28:16 Speaker 01 So therefore I can be able to succeed in the things that matter to me. So for example, when Nicole and I were trying to grow our company, Webinar News, our software company, so that we can be big enough to be acquired, which we did in 2024, we decided that we're going to focus on only three things. Three things and everything else will be sacrificed. Everything else, we're going to choose to sacrifice because these three things are the most important thing. Number one is family, our personal relationship, our intimate family, like parents and siblings and close friends. Number two was our health because without your health, you got nothing. Can't get up in the morning, can't get to work. It's going to be very hard for you to succeed. So your health is a priority. So exercise, eating well, that was part of number two. Number three is the business. We wanted to go all in and make sure that we focus on the business so that we can have no regrets.
29:00 Speaker 01 Say that we tried our best and we don't leave anything behind. Keep all the chips on the table and luckily it worked out. Now, what's good about this is that you are empowered to choose your own sacrifices. You choose what you're going to not focus on. And I find by doing this, you have a clear directive. You're not confused about what you should be doing and not doing. It's very clear. If it's not one of those three things for us, it was three, then I just don't do it. It's an easy note. So you, the entrepreneur who's chasing growth at all costs, this is a must read. This is necessary reading because it's going to make you question things you need to question. Like what are you building this for? Why? What is this mean for you? What's the meaning behind it? Right? And is this life, this sacrifice, this process of growing your business worth it?
29:45 Speaker 01 And what is it going to cost you in exchange? If you're happy with that exchange, go for it. The next book is How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis. I've recommended this book on the show so many times. I reread this book three or four times minimum. And I got to say that this is a very enjoyable read, but it's going to teach you a lot about what it takes to be successful in business. Felix Dennis is a media empire mogul. He was worth over $750 million and he started with nothing. He was Absolutely penniless. He never went to university, no college degree, no connections, no inherited wealth. He's the guy that's behind Maxim magazine and a lot of PC magazines
30:26 Speaker 01 and cashed out before magazines were a thing of the past. He wrote this book in his 60s, and he did not hold back. He had nothing to gain other than helping you. He has no upsells, right? He's not trying to sell you a course through this book, and he actually makes fun of some of the gurus that do that in the opening chapters. This book is actually pretty funny. He's actually a funny guy and cracks some really good jokes throughout the chapters. The lesson that changed my thinking permanently when it comes to business is the concept of ownership. It's not one of the most important things. It's the only thing that matters in business, how much you own of anything, whether that's an investment, whether it's your own business, whether it's even your own time. How much do you own of your life? If you want to build real wealth, you must own whatever you're building. This is 50 years of experience
31:10 Speaker 01 distilled into one book. No alternative motive, nothing else like it. I gotta say, this book is really fun to read, like I mentioned, but I gotta say that the reason why I love this book so much is because it's so honest about the lessons he's learned along the way as an entrepreneur. I find it fascinating that we can spend $10, $15 and grab somebody's life experience and everything they learned for that amount of money. It's incredible return on investment. The next book is The Courage to Be Disliked. This book is written as a dialogue between a philosopher and a student, and it's an easy read because it basically reads like a screenplay, and it pulls from the work of Alfred Alder, which is a contemporary of Freud,
31:51 Speaker 01 if you know a little bit of psychology and history. This is one of my favorite books, and it's, I think, sold over 10 million copies up to date. It says 3 million on the cover, but I think it's now 10 million. It's insane how impactful this book is. What is this book about? Well, it's about your past does not determine your future, but the way you interpret the past does, and how you choose to interpret it will affect your future. For entrepreneurs, the chapter that matters the most is about the courage to choose your own path even when the people around you disapprove. This is essential because you have to Understand, and we'll talk about this in a future episode. Only you knows what's best for you.
32:33 Speaker 01 Everybody that gives you advice around you is giving advice through their own filter. For example, your mom might give you advice. She loves you. She wants what's best for you. But she is giving you advice based on her own experience in life, based on what she knows. And that might be different from what you know and your experience. So understand that times you're gonna go down a path. I would say often in your journey as an entrepreneur. You're gonna go down a path and people are not gonna like it. They're gonna actually really resist it. They're gonna really hate it. They're gonna say, hey, you changed. Why are you like this? Why are you dressed this way? Why are you doing these different things? Why are you not going out with the guys anymore? These are signals that people just don't like who you've become. But you have to remember, you have to change in order for you to get different results in your life. And if you want better results, you gotta give them something better.
33:18 Speaker 01 And better is a form of change. Building something real almost always requires disappointing someone else. And this book teaches you how to make peace with that. Last, but of course not least, The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. I read this book about 15 years ago. I reread it recently because it's still impactful today. Here is one sentence that will make you want to read this book immediately. Most of us live two lives, the life we live and the unlived life we would love to live. And between these two lives stands something called the resistance. Resistance is a phrase that Pressfield has coined. And it's the invisible force that stops you from doing the work you know you should be doing.
34:01 Speaker 01 I'm talking about procrastination, self doubt, distraction, perfectionism. All these are forms of resistance. Now, don't let this title fool you, The War of Art. Business is an art. Success is an art, right? And there are gonna be moments where you're just not gonna feel like doing something. You gotta do it if you wanna move forward. You gotta go past how you feel and do it anyway. And here's the crazy thing about the resistance. It's most powerful precisely when the work in front of you is most important. When you need to get it done. This is when it really comes and shows you its fangs. The solution is not to wait until you feel like it. That's not the solution. The solution is to sit down and do the work anyway. Is to look that resistance in the eye and say, you're not taking me down today.
34:46 Speaker 01 I'm gonna do what I gotta do regardless of how I feel today. Because what's gonna happen is as you start doing it, you're gonna start feeling better about it. You're gonna feel more confidence, you're gonna feel proud of yourself. And you're gonna start doing it regardless every day. Because every day you do this, it gets easier and easier every single day. Like any professional, you're gonna have to grind out some moments. Some things are not just a walk in the park. Some things are not always fun. Sometimes you just gotta do what you got to do. And that's the difference between a professional and an amateur. An amateur does it sometimes, sometimes ignores it, sometimes is great at it, sometimes just kind of phones it in. No, a professional does it right every single time, regardless of what's happening in their life, in their mind,
35:29 Speaker 01 in what's going on in their business, they show up. This is a short book, but it has changed so many lives. I highly recommend it if you're building any kind of business, any kind of product. You're writing, you're reading, you're creating a YouTube channel, you're creating a piece of art, you know, which is any kind of business, in my opinion. You could read it in a weekend and it will make all the difference. So here's a list one more time. The Black Swan, because the future is unpredictable and you need to build for that. Number two, The Innovator's Dilemma. Innovate and evolve, or you will die. Next, Influence, because understanding how people decide is the foundation of every sale of every transaction in your business.
36:11 Speaker 01 Next, Super Communicators, because connection is a skill that most people are doing wrong. Okay, I want you to get it right. Next book, The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene, because knowing what drives people changes everything for you. The next one was a cheeky one that has several books in there, but religious texts. Because understanding what people believe is how you serve them at the highest level. Understanding their value system. Next book, On the Shortness of Life by Sonica, because time is the only resource you cannot recover. On the same kind of Stoicism topic, the obstacle's the way. Because your challenges are not the interruptions in your journey. They are the journey. That's what makes you who you are and who you'll become.
36:53 Speaker 01 The psychology of money because no one does business or makes money with just a rational mind. 4,000 weeks because a finite life demands finite choices and most people are making too many choices. They need to just choose what's important. How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis because 50 years of experience with no agenda deserves your full attention. It's a lot of fun and it's going to teach you a lot about what it takes to become wealthy. The courage to be disliked because building something requires real disappointment of people around you. How to handle that? How to navigate that internally, externally is really going to help you. And lastly, the war of our because work does not do itself, right? You have to do it despite the fact that there is this thing called the resistance that's going to hold you back.
37:38 Speaker 01 It's real and you need to be aware of it and you need to beat it every time it shows its face. That's the list. No shallow tactics, no frameworks that come, become out of date, you know, two weeks later. This is the type of knowledge, these are the type of books you need to read to really become something new, something that you need to become to achieve the things that you want. I hope this episode was helpful, I hope this list was helpful. By the way, if you want to take a look at the books that I've read, get a summary and get a review of each book. I've read a lot of books and I've put them on our website. Go to 100mba.net and on the navigation you'll see book reviews and you can click it and listen to my book reviews, my must read episodes over the years.
38:21 Speaker 01 If you want to continue learning, I want to recommend an episode that we recently published so you can just scroll back in whatever app you're using. It's called 10 Low Cost Purchases Under $200 That Changed My Business. Some of these purchases are less than a cup of coffee and have given me an incredible return on investment. I didn't want to just keep these to myself. I wanted to share them with you so that you can benefit too. So go ahead and check out that episode and if you made it to the end of the episode, you're my kind of person, you're a completionist or somebody that actually cares about learning and growing. I love it. I'm cheering for you. If you found today's episode helpful and you want more practical business lessons to help you start, grow, and scale your business, the best thing you could do is subscribe to this podcast. Hit subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast app, the one that
39:02 Speaker 01 you're using right now, whether it's Apple or Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. By hitting subscribe, you get our next episode automatically, and it's the best way to support the show. It's absolutely free, and it's a way for you to commit to growing your business. And now that you've subscribed, I'll check you in the next episode.
39:27 Speaker 02 Mazda has been named Consumer Reports' safest new car brand. It starts with our approach. Every Mazda comes standard with proactive safety features, so you're more aware of what's around you, more focused on the road ahead, and ready before problems ever start. Mazda, more of what matters most to you. Go to MazdaUSA.com to learn more. Consumer Reports does not endorse or promote any product.
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