Zen and the Art of Making a Living: A Practical Guide to Creative Career Design
By Laurence G. Boldt

This is one of those rare books that puts things together from so many different areas and does it so well that it might take reading dozen of other books to get the job done otherwise. The book is long, but its breadth lends itself to being used like a reference book, bit by bit when things come up. Its own description as “the most innovative, unconventional, and profoundly practical career guide since What Color Is Your Parachute” is an understatement. Combining practical and varied information on finding the right job with philosophical guidance, historical perspective and cultural insight, this book provides knowledge and inspiration to propel you toward a life of fulfillment through — and beyond – work.

Purchase at:

What Happy People Know: How the New Science of Happiness Can Change Your Life for the Better
By Dan Brown

A great and easy to read look at how to deal with negative things in our lives and move toward happiness. Full of great explanations for why we get stuck and how we can get out, including many practical actions we can take.

Purchase at:

Now, Discover Your Strengths
By Marcus Buckingham & Donald O. Clifton, Ph.D.

Based on decades of research by the Gallup Organization, this book shows how focusing on enhancing people’s strengths is a much more effective approach toward satisfying experience than working with weaknesses. The book is mainly about the world of work, but what it has to say has bearing on all areas of life. Of particular interest: each copy includes a code that allows you to take the innovative StrengthsFinder test online to help you learn about your own best potentials.

Purchase at:

The Appreciative Inquiry Handbook
By David L. Cooperrider, Diana L. Whitney, and Jacqueline M. Stavros

A complete guide to planning, designing and completing Appreciative Inquiry initiatives, from short introductions to long-term undertakings. Provides lots of information to help you understand AI and how it works, as well as many tools to assist you in its actual practice.

Purchase at:

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
By Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

A landmark in its focus on what works well for people, it practically founded the field of Positive Psychology. Flow is that feeling of being “in the zone” that comes only from using our abilities in ways that are intrinsically satisfying. It is the place where we do our best, feel our best and get the best results — and it is accessible by everyone. Grounded in scientific research, this book explores the phenomenon itself, the conditions in which it arises, and how we can cultivate it for ourselves.

Purchase at:

Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention
By Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Building on his work on flow, the author explores what lies behind discovery and invention by studying interviews with a number of people internationally renowned in fields from the arts to the sciences to business. Learning from what has worked well for these successful people, we’re able to understand better how we can foster for ourselves the conditions that encourage creativity and success.

Purchase at:

The Thin Book of Appreciative Inquiry
By Sue Annis Hammond

A brief but solid introduction to the ideas and practice of Appreciaitve Inquiry.

Purchase at:

Who Do You Think You Are?
By Dr. Nick Isbister and Dr. Martin Robinson

Tapping very much into positive psychology and the appreciative perspective, the System of Identifying Motivated Abilities has been used for decades to help people and companies find out what motivates them and how they can use that knowledge to achieve more satisfying, productive experiences. Based on SIMA, this book guides the reader through a detailed, customized self-assessment that can point the way to a more enjoyable job and better life experiences in general.

Purchase at:

The Systems Thinking Playbook: Exercises to Stretch and Build Learning and Systems Thinking Capabilities
By Dennis Meadows & Linda Booth Sweeney

Systems theory is a field that tries to explain how things work in general, drawing parallels across different areas to show that similar structures create similar dynamics no matter where they occur. This kind of knowledge is sometimes difficult to understand and even more difficult to internalize because it involves questioning assumptions, but with assumptions out of the way, opportunities for creativity and learning arise naturally. Filled with fun and interactive exercises, this book makes systems theory come alive, with real learning fostered through play.

Purchase at:

An Introduction to General Systems Thinking
By Gerald M. Weinberg

Understanding how systems work in general, one ends up uncovering assumptions and opening the way to sharp thinking, creativity and learning. This book is considered a classic in the field, providing a general introduction to how certain principles of thinking can help point the way in working with problems and systems to achieve novel, effective solutions.

Purchase at: