As part of my annual review process each year, I go through my reading notes and pick the very best books I read each year to share with you! 

When I finished grad school in 2014, I decided to be a more dedicated reader. Since then I have read 463 books (and decided not to read thousands more). I started this reading quest by looking at reading lists of people I respect like my friend Derek Sivers and Ryan Holiday. Sometimes I add books to my queue after hearing the guest on podcasts (like this year’s #1 book), sorting through various reading recommendation newsletters, from friends who know what I like to read, and from books I read in preparation for interviews.

Here are the top 10 books I read in 2021:

10. Conflict = Energy: The Transformative Practice of Authentic Relating by Jason Digges

This is the book that I have used more than any other in my personal life and my coaching practice this year. A playful way to train ourselves to be better at relating to each other: listening, connecting, and expressing ourselves authentically. Check out the fabulous interview with Jason on my podcast. 

9. Effortless: Make It Easier to Do What Matters Most by Greg Mckeown

If you have already become an essentialist by reading Mckeown’s previous book Essentialism, Effortless will help you shift your thinking away from the broken model of working hard to get results. For people that feel like they are on the edge of burnout or never have enough time (I feel this way sometimes) – There is a better way! Actionable advice for making the most essential activities the easiest ones – instead of pushing harder, find the easy path.

8. Electric Body, Electric Health: Using the Electromagnetism Within (and Around) You to Rewire, Recharge, and Raise Your Voltage by Eileen Day Mckusick

A totally new way to outlook at biology, healing, electricity, and vibration – that is backed by decades of research and results. Eileen Day McKusick is a researcher, inventor, writer, educator, and practitioner who has been studying the effects of audible acoustic sound on the human body since 1996. She is the originator of a unique sound therapy method called Biofield Tuning that uses tuning forks to detect and correct distortions and static in the human biofield (human energy field/aura). I had a great interview with Eileen on my podcast. I have personally had several biofield tuning sessions and they are remarkable!

7. Turning Pro: Tap Your Inner Power and Create Your Life’s Work by Steven Pressfield

Turning Pro is such an appropriate book for 2021 because so many people are leaving their traditional jobs and starting their own endeavors – this book speaks to the experience and struggle of what it takes to do what you were meant to do in this lifetime. Great book to pair with his other book The War of Art

6. Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford

I read this because I watched Marco Polo on Netflix and wanted to learn more about the historical accuracy of the series. This book covers more than just Ghengis Khan – it follows his descendants up to Kublai Khan and how they each expanded the Mongol empire.  Fantastic tactical, social, and economic analysis for why the mongols achieved such rapid success. In nearly every country the Mongols conquered, they brought an unprecedented rise in cultural communication, expanded trade, and a blossoming of civilization.

5. Skip the Line: The 10,000 Experiments Rule and Other Surprising Advice for Reaching Your Goals by James Altucher

I love the idea of approaching life from a place of “Anything is Possible”. But how do we train ourselves to actually KNOW this from our lived experience? This book gave me renewed enthusiasm for designing experiments and different way to learn and push the edge of my comfort zone and create the experience of anything is possible. Great to pair with The 3rd Door and Become an Idea Machine

4. Real Magic: Ancient Wisdom, Modern Science, and a Guide to the Secret Power of the Universe by Dean Radin

I’d like to change peoples view of magic – magic isn’t magic, it’s just fundamental to the nature of the universe – otherwise it wouldn’t be possible. I’m all about using “magic” for practical purposes, like growing our business, healing ourselves, and creating a beautiful experience of life. As a trained scientist and logical thinker, I love to have data and evidence to back up magical experiences.

Dean Radin is the chief scientist at the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS), this book turns a critical eye toward such practices as telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, and psychokinesis. Are such powers really possible? Science says yes.  

 This book pairs well with Rupert Sheldrake’s Science and Spiritual Practices: Transformative Experiences and Their Effects on Our Bodies, Brains, and Health and Joe Dispenza’s Becoming Supernatural: How Common People Are Doing the Uncommon

3. The Overstory: A Novel by Richard Powers

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2019 – this book unfolds in concentric rings of interlocking fable that range from antebellum New York to the late 20th-century Timber Wars of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. This is the best book I have encountered that understands the magic of trees – how they relate to humans, each other, the planet, evolution, and beauty.

2. The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival by John Vaillant

The true story of a man eating tiger in 1997 -The ancient, tenuous relationship between man and predator is at the very heart of this remarkable book. I learned not just about the biology and psychology of tigers, but about the history of eastern Russia and Manchuria, and how native people throughout history have engaged with tigers.

And Drumroll…..The Very Best Book I read in 2021:

1. The Immortality Key: The Secret History of the Religion with No Name by Brian C. Muraresku 

Referred to as the “The Best Kept Secret in History”, this book uncovers evidence that Christianity and Western civilization has its roots in psychedelics and ancient mystery teachings. I discovered a strange coincidence that the site of this ancient pilgrimage – the Athenian spiritual capital of Eleusis, was also scheduled to become the European cultural capital in 2021 (now moved to 2023) – a fitting place, given the current psychedelic revolution.

From the Amazon description: “Before the rise of Christianity, the Ancient Greeks found salvation in their own sacraments. Sacred beverages were routinely consumed as part of the so-called Ancient Mysteries – elaborate rites that led initiates to the brink of death. Athens’ best and brightest flocked to the spiritual capital of Eleusis, where a holy beer unleashed heavenly visions for two thousand years. Others drank the holy wine of Dionysus to become one with the god, achieving immortality. In the 1970s, renegade scholars claimed this beer and wine – the original sacraments of Western civilization – were spiked with mind-altering drugs. In recent years, vindication for the disgraced theory has been quietly mounting in the laboratory. The constantly advancing fields of archaeobotany and archaeochemistry have suggested the use of psychedelic drinks in antiquity. And with a single dose of psilocybin, the psycho-pharmacologists at Johns Hopkins and NYU are now turning self-proclaimed atheists into instant believers.”

Other posts in the 2021 Annual Review Series:

• 2021 Adventure and Travel Review
• Top Derek Loudermilk Show Podcast episodes from 2021
• Top 10 Books I read in 2021
• 2022 Goals and Plans

Bonus:

Our third book of coaching exercises – Activate Your Life Volume III – was published in October and we had the thrill of having all 3 volumes top the bestseller chart at the same time! There are some fabulous new exercises in this volume. Would love for you to check it out.