What one book that you have read has had the most positive impact on your life.?

Question

It can be either fiction or nonfiction. Also, please tell me briefly what the book is about and who the author is.

Answer 1

I have read thousands of books, but the one that had the biggest impact on my life was "How to Enjoy Your Life in Spite of it All" by the late Ken Keyes Jr.

This book explains in very simple terms the reasons why people are unhappy or happy, and then provides what the author calls "pathways" to happiness. These are 12 mantras, or sayings, that cover almost all of the kinds of thoughts that lead to unhappiness. As you memorize them and say them to yourself, you get something like a map of your unhappiness zones. The book explains each "pathway" in considerable detail, so that you will understand very clearly how and why the thought patterns that pathway resonates with is making you unhappy. At any moment you can do something like a brain scan by going through the twelve pathways to discover the immediate cause of your unhappiness at that moment.

Using this book as a tool over many, many years, I became first less unhappy, and then actually happy.

This is not a sophisticated book. It won no literary prizes. My sophisticated friends thought I was loony to read it. But it is not a typical self-help book either. There is a lot of meat to really think about. There is a technique that requires the reader to memorize 12 "pathways". Then there are years of practice to tease out the thoughtways that you are using to make yourself unhappy, and to re-evaluate them. If the technique did not pay off with instant understanding every time you used it, you wouldn't go through the effort to keep using it. I did and it had the sort of impact few books could ever have.

Answer 2

A Day No Pigs Would Die, by Robert Newton Peck.

A boy growing up in Vermont, a very poor family of dirt farmers. The father butchers hogs for a living, and ends up having to slaughter the kid's pet pig. Then the father dies.

Great book, and a good sequel, it's based on his real childhood. It's a lot about the strength of the human spirit in the face of adversity. The kid is only 13 when he has to take over the farm.

Answer 3

HOW TO WIN FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE PEOPLE written by DALE CARNEGIE.

Millions of copies of this book were sold during its release and until now, it's still very saleable because it is all about human relations.

Sales people worldwide find it very informative about human engineering which is the key factor for success in the selling fields.

Personal relationships can also be improved through the implementation of the lessons that this book imparts.

And anyone, for that matter, who wants to be a very likable person with as many friends as his heart can hold, will greatly benefit from this book.

Answer 4

Dicey's Song by Cynthia Voigt is the book that has taught me that no matter how bad things get, you can survive them. It's a book about a thirteen-year-old girl who's mother is mentally ill and knows that she has to get her kids to safety before she snaps. They're half way to the woman's mother's house when the mom stops the car, gets out and doesn't return. The girl takes her three younger sister, thirty dollars and begins to trek over 200 miles to her estranged grandmother's home. It's really a great story. It was also the Pulitzer Prize winner of 1983.

Answer 5

Burying My Heart At Wounded Knee. I don't remember who the author is. I read it over 30 years ago. It is about how the white settlers marched the Cherokee Indians off of their homeland and on to a reservation. So sad.

Answer 6

The HOLY BIBLE has made the most impact on my life and help me change my ways for the betterment of my family and I.
This about the sinful nature of mankind and what GOD has done to redeem all mankind from destruction.
"All scripture is given by inspiration of GOD is profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of GOD may be equipped for every good work" 2ND Timothy 3:17
The New American Standard Bible Updated Edition

Answer 7

The Holy Quran
Author: God/Allah

The Holy Quran is the holy scripture of the Muslims as sent down from Allah/God to mankind Via Gabriel and revealed to Mohammad the last messenger and prophet to mankind as a guidance and source of light. It contains stories, rulings, theological issues, stories of the prophets, parables, examples and many other things that benefit the human kind and for its salvation to heaven

Answer 8

'Oh the places you go' Dr. Susses. The man is a genius. He captured real 'life' issues, gave remarkable input, entertained and amused. Read it, seriously. It is the perfect coffee table book. Simple, direct and yet room left for interpretation. Seriously, I am not being sarcastic. You won't be sorry. I recommend it to people of all sizes, ages shapes and color.

Answer 9

Conversations with God - by Neale Donald Walsh

The book is basically the author conversing with God and God answers but is not really a religious book as such - he wrote numerous volumes after the first book but i highly recommend it - it is very philosophical and is a great book

Answer 10

I don't read very much, but I did enjoy the book, The Power Of Positive Thinking. by Norman Vincent Peale. first printing was in 1952.

This book teaches you to change your thinking and create your own happiness.

One big reason why I enjoy this book is that my copy was my grandmothers.