Ask HN: What was the one book that you read and it actually changed your life?

I'll give you a much higher life-changing-amplitude if you relax the one-book constraint. One book and I can give you something that might impact your life a few months, but that you'll likely forget afterwards. Allow me to suggest ten books (which I promise will all be focused on one specific area, and you promise you'll study seriously), and I'll give you something that will make a much higher, and long lasting, impact.

The Toyota Way - one of the most important books I've read to help understand why companies are dysfunctional.

I knew corporate America (and even many startups) were so dysfunctional, but I didn't know what could replace it. The Toyota Way shows a bright path to the ideal. And makes me realize how far we are from that.

I read the 4 hour work week when we (wife and myself) were already travelling and working on our own companies (this was when it just came out first by the way); we both scaled down to working max 1 day a week, found that that made us create more and more projects. Found out we really do not like not working.

What kind of company did you start?

omnivore's dilemma - fantastic look at modern day industrial food supply chain and consequences/alternatives. perfect amount of science, business, psychology analysis applied to a topic that affects all of us 3+ times a day

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

Never really been one to enjoy popular books on philosophy (Alchemist was overrated, Monk who sold his Ferrari cliched, The Secret just boring ...IMO) and picked this up at a used book store. The book truly put a new perspective on life for me.

Perhaps it was a combination of the time when I read the book: Undue stress, massive imposter syndrome, that feeling of not moving ahead in life, and the oh-so-messed-up quarter life crisis, but this book was an absolute eyeopener for me.

Find your own meaning in life, and live your own philosophy instead of aping a "master" (spiritual or otherwise) because a "master" is someone who has shaped his own philosophy and that will almost NEVER completely apply to you. In the book, when the titular Siddhartha realises this and starts off on his own journey, something clicked within me and I started making genuine attempts to get past my (mostly) self-imposed problems in life. Can easily say this book helped me get through confusing times and come out better on the other side

Truly a life-changing book for me, and no wonder it's been popular for over half a century!

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The Art of War, The War of Art (except the final bits of the book) and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance come in a close second, each having shaped the way I look at decision making processes and influenced my general life strategy