Hal Elrod: Hey, it’s Hal Elrod, and I’m going to share with you the six books that will change your life this year. I’ve got them sitting right in front of me. I’m going to go through them one at a time for you, and I’m going to save my favorite for last. So, make sure you watch until the end.

First book, Your Best Year Ever by Michael Hyatt. You may or may not know this, but I ran a live event for six years called Your Best Year Ever Blueprint, before I knew about Michael Hyatt’s work. And so, that was my whole world for six years. It was studying how do you set yourself up to win in the next 12 months. This is the best book I’ve ever read on the topic. And it doesn’t matter what part of the year you’re in. It could be June. Read this book and apply this to the next 6 months of your life, 12 months of your life. It’s the most effective book at setting you up in terms of not just the logistics, like, here’s how you set goals and here’s how you make a plan. That’s crucial. And this book does it better than any other.

But what it does is it handles the internal limitations, the self-imposed limitations, the obstacles that we encounter, the psychological, mental, emotional. It helps you deal with all of those. It does all the pre-work so that you move through all the things that can hold you back and really hit the next 6 to 12 months running. Again, whatever time of year it is, this is the best book on setting your goals, making your plan, setting yourself up for success. I read this last year, and I read it again this year. Alright, Your Best Year Ever by Michael Hyatt. Highly recommended.

Next book, Love Dare. The Love Dare, this is my favorite book on relationships, on marriage. What I love about it is there are 40 days and 40 dares. So, essentially, it’s set up where every single day you read like a two-to-four page chapter with a really profound lesson, and then you’re given a dare, which is essentially an action step. It’s do something in alignment with this lesson for your spouse, so that they actually get to experience the benefits of what you just learned, and so do you, because you’re putting it into practice. So, for example, one of the chapters is on thoughtfulness. And so, the dare is simply, “Hey, at some point today, send your spouse a message letting them know that you’re thinking about them just so they feel that love from you.” Nothing fancy, but it’s actionable.

And then at the end of the chapter, after the dare, is a journal prompt so that you can journal what impact that lesson and that action made in your life, in your relationship, on your significant other, etcetera. So, my favorite book, in fact, it’s so good that I just bought it this morning. I bought another book by the same author called The Love Dare for Parents. So, it’s 40 things that you do for your kids over the course of 40 days. So, I’m excited about that. So, this is my favorite book, literally, I’ve ever read on marriage. It’s called The Love Dare, and it is by I don’t know, but it’s the only book called The Love Dare. So, go find out.

Wealthy and Well-Known, this is my favorite book on personal branding. And you can see how this thing is so folded up, but favorite book on personal branding, and favorite book really if you’re an entrepreneur. Because you might think, “Well, do I need a personal brand. What’s a personal brand? I don’t know.” If you are a professional, even if you work at a company or if you’re an entrepreneur, especially, your personal brand is how you’re perceived by other people through how you show up, through the value that you add, the knowledge that you bring, so on and so forth. This is the Bible, if you will, on personal branding. It’s by Rory and AJ Vaden. They run the company Brand Builders Group, and they work with some of the biggest personal brands in the world. And I’ve been working with them for many years and love these two. Wealthy and Well-Known, highly recommend it.

Third book, this is if you are a parent, Building Better Families by Matthew Kelly. This is, again, literally maybe the best book, literally-maybe, do those go together? I don’t know. The best book that I’ve read on building a better family, on really creating your culture, your values, how you show up for your kids, for your significant other. So, Love Dare was just about your spouse. This is really about the family dynamic and how to make sure that your family is thriving. Building Better Families by Matthew Kelly, highly, highly recommended.

All right. We got two more. I’m saving the best for last. At best being subjective, but you know. The AI-Driven Leader by Geoff Woods. There are so many books out there on AI. Geoff Woods maybe wrote the best one. I haven’t read them all, so I can’t really say it’s the best one, but it’s my favorite. It’s The AI-Driven Leader: Harnessing AI to Make Faster, Smarter Decisions. What I love about Geoff Woods, and I had Geoff on the podcast a year or so ago talking about this book when it first came out, and that’s how I discovered it. And I actually was not into AI at that time. I was like I don’t like AI. I think it’s going to do more harm than good for humanity. I was in that camp.

Actually, I’m still in that camp, but it’s not going anywhere, right? AI is not going anywhere. So, Geoff really breaks down some first principles, some fundamentals of how to utilize AI, not to replace your thinking, which a lot of people, too many people are doing, but as a leader, how do you use AI to complement your thinking as your thought partner to bring out the best in you, to get more done, to leverage your team, so on and so forth. I highly recommend. If you are a leader or a business owner, an entrepreneur, whatever you define yourself as, The AI Driven Leader, one of the greatest books out there on AI.

You ready? My favorite book that I read in 2025 that will set you up for a great 2026, it is The Illusion of Money by Kyle Cease. Now, this is one. If you’re like me, do you buy more books than you can possibly read? Like, I buy… My wife loves this, by the way. But I buy on Amazon. I’m like, “Ooh, I need that one. I need that one. I need that one,” right? Like, every week I’ll have like three books arrive, and I read like a book a month. So, I got three books coming a week. So, 12 months, I’m reading one a month. You can do the math, right? So, this is a book that I bought a few years ago. I’ve actually been a fan of Kyle Cease’s for since 2007. If you don’t know who Kyle is, he’s one of my favorite thought leaders out there.

He was a stand-up comedian. He was actually rated the number one stand-up comedian on Comedy Central, like in 2009, I think. And I discovered him back then. I bought his DVD. That’s how like he had a DVD, right? I bought his comedy DVD. I loved it so much, I gifted it to my sister, I think some friends, and then Kyle had a profound shift where he went from being a standup comedian, and he was in some big Hollywood movies, to feeling like he was best suited to use his gifts of humor and his insights and communication abilities to bless people spiritually in their life. And so, he made a huge, profound shift. It’s called The Illusion of Money: Why Chasing Money Is Stopping You from Receiving It. But this is really a spiritual book disguised as a book on money.

It’s really about doing the inner work. And I’m telling you, I actually recommend the audiobook on this one. So, I read the physical book that I’m holding in my hands, but my friend, who I recommended this to, Jeremy Reisig. You know Jeremy, probably. He’s our Chief Growth Officer at Miracle Morning. I recommended this book to him, and he got the audiobook, and we were talking. He goes, “Hey, did you do the physical book for Kyle’s Illusion of Money, or did you listen to the audiobook?” I said, “Oh, I have the physical book.” He goes, “Dude, he’s a stand-up comedian. Like, how are you not listening to the…” He goes, “It’s so funny. You have to listen to audio.”

And so, this book is as profound. It’s actually more profound than it is humorous but listening to the audiobook. So, I’ve read the book, and I’m listening to the audiobook, and I’m actually re-listening to it again. So, it’s my third time through this book that I’m telling you I love this book by Kyle Cease, The Illusion of Money. Highly, highly recommend it.

So, real quick, I’m just going to go through the six one last time. Your Best Year Yet by Michael Hyatt will set you up to really have a breakthrough in your personal and professional goals. And again, you don’t have to wait until the end of the year or the beginning of the year to read this book. Whatever time of year it is, get this book and apply it to the rest of this year and kicking off the new year.

The Love Dare, favorite book I’ve ever read for relationships. It’s one page or one chapter a day, short chapters, followed by a dare, followed by a journal prompt. Love the format. Love the content. This is transformative in my marriage, The Love Dare.

Wealthy and Well-Known. If you want to become wealthy and well-known, you want to build a personal brand, this book by Rory and AJ Vaden is the best one out there, in my opinion.

Building Better Families, phenomenal book for a mom or a dad. If you have kids, you have a family, this will set you up for success in your family.

The AI Driven Leader, my favorite first principles book on AI. So, not the latest trend, the latest fad. It’s how do you approach AI as a leader to get the most out of it and have it amplify your abilities, not replace them.

And last but not least, The Illusion of Money by Kyle Cease. Love it. Recommend it. Can’t recommend this enough. I’ve been texting people this audiobook saying, “You got to get this. You got to listen to the audiobook.” So, if you want to get the print book, you can, but I highly recommend getting the audiobook of The Illusion of Money. Again. I’m on my third read through.

That is it. What are your favorite books that you read either this last year or previously, and you want to share them because you feel like they will make a big impact in my life, or anybody listening? So, if you’re watching this and there’s comments, if you’re on YouTube, please, in the comments below, let me know if you’ve read any of these books. And if you haven’t, let me know what your favorite books are that you’d recommend that I read. And I’ll read all these comments and get back to you.

So, last but not least, please subscribe to the podcast on your favorite platform, whether that is YouTube, but not all the episodes go on YouTube. YouTube or Apple Podcasts or Spotify, wherever you listen to podcasts, please subscribe. And if you’ve been a listener for a while and you’ve gotten a lot of value from the podcast, please take a minute to leave a review. It would mean a ton. Rate the podcast. Leave a review. I really appreciate you. Thank you so much. Sending you so much love. And may one of these six books transform your life this year and beyond. Love you. Talk to you soon.