This slow summer may be the perfect time to catch up on a little reading—for self-edification, and to boost your coaching business. In this impressive list of must-read books for health coaches and clients, we’re sharing our favorite titles that span across 7 categories:
- Healthy Lifestyle
- Nutrition Philosophy and Science
- Habits and Behavior Change
- Personality Types and Self-Discovery
- Building a Business
- Stress and Busyness
- Communication, Mood Psychology, and Trauma
Add this to your favorites list along with our previous book recommendations here, here, and here. Now, pull up a comfy chair and get your Amazon app or favorite retailer ready to roll.
Healthy Lifestyle
1. The 4 Season Solution
Ideal for:
- Coaches who are passionate about nature, ancestral health, circadian rhythm, and balance.
- Clients who feel stuck, unfulfilled, purposeless, crazy-busy, and are lacking connection.
2. The Genius Life
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients interested in neuroprotective lifestyle solutions, human potential, disease prevention, gut health, increased health span, and circadian biology.
3. The Primal Connection
Ideal for:
- Coaches with a passion for nature, ancestral health, evolutionary biology, and balanced living.
- Clients with broader health goals, a curiosity for ancestral health, and a need for meaningful connection and life balance.
4. The Healthy Deviant
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in sociological factors behind modern-day health struggles, and who want to help clients craft healthier identities.
- Clients who wonder why health is so confusing, and how to break free from social/societal norms.
Nutrition Philosophy and Science
5. The Obesity Code
Ideal for:
- Coaches who seek the truth about calorie counting, or take interest in intermittent fasting, metabolic health, and insulin resistance.
- Clients who have spent decades dieting with little success, are confused about calories, struggle with obesity, or have a family history of diabetes and obesity.
6. Nutrition and Physical Degeneration
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in ancestral health, health habits of indigenous populations, the dental-health connection, modern-day fertility and dental challenges, nutrient-density, or the consequences of a westernized diet.
7. The Salt Fix
Ideal for:
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Coaches who are confused about optimal salt intake, work with keto/low carb dieters, teach extended fasting, or work with cardiovascular conditions.
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Clients who are confused about optimal salt intake, have a history of restricting salt, have blood pressure or heart-health concerns, practice fasting, eat a keto or low-carb diet.
8. The Paleo Thyroid Solution
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in thyroid health, autoimmune disease, adrenal fatigue, the hormonal-body-fat connection, and functional medicine.
- Clients struggling with thyroid imbalances, adrenal fatigue, hormone-related conditions.
9. The New Evolution Diet
Ideal for:
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Coaches intrigued by evolutionary biology, paleo diet principles, the basic tenants of health in the modern world.
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Clients interested in scientific explanations, nutrition philosophy, and lifestyle change for overall health and disease prevention.
10. Sacred Cow: The Case for (Better) Meat
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in paleo or vegan advocacy, global warming, sustainable and regenerative agriculture, world hunger, the red meat-health connection, and issues with the modern food system.
- Clients who are confused about: if red meat is healthy, if they should eat plant-based, if meat is harming the environment, global warming, nutritional guidelines.
11. The Wahls Protocol
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in mitochondrial health, nutrition for autoimmune disease (especially multiple sclerosis), neuro-nutrition, a plant-heavy approach to paleo, keto dieting and intermittent fasting for autoimmunity.
- Clients who suspect/struggle with neurological conditions, have a chronic autoimmune condition (especially MS, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, fibromyalgia)
12. Just Medicine: A Cure for Racial Inequality in American Health Care
Ideal for:
- Coaches wanting to better understand the unique and crucial challenges and obstacles BIPOC clients face within the medical industry.
- Clients who have struggled to receive proper health care and/or diagnoses, or who otherwise seek to understand the inequities built into the American health care system due to issues like implicit bias and lack of accessibility.
13. Gut and Psychology Syndrome
Ideal for:
- Coaches who are passionate about gut health, the gut-brain connection, children’s health and development, nutrition for learning and mood disabilities, how modern foods affect the brain and gut.
- Clients who struggle with mood or attention disorders, unresolved gut issues, asthma, children’s disease/allergies/disabilities/mood disorders.
Habits and Behavior Change
14. Tiny Habits
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in personal development, and how to support clients through habit formation, motivation, and consistency.
- Clients who get overwhelmed easily, take on an all-or-nothing mentality, struggle with motivation/consistency, and who take interest in self-optimization and productivity.
15. Better Than Before
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in catchy strategies of habit formation and a wildly popular framework for understanding how humans perceive and approach habits.
- Clients who struggle with consistency or motivation, and who want to learn more about their unique approach to habits, behaviors, and life satisfaction.
16. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Ideal for:
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Coaches and Clients who take interest in personal growth, professional development, goal setting, productivity/prioritization.
17. The Healthy Habit Revolution
Ideal for:
- Coaches with an interest in what the latest research says about habit formation and human needs psychology, and how rewards affect motivation and success.
- Clients who want to understand why some habits come easier than others and why they “fall off the wagon.”
18. The Motivation Myth
Ideal for:
- Coaches who seek simplicity and a practical approach to personal/professional achievement and positive behavior change.
- Clients who like no-nonsense explanations and strategies for personal motivation and goal-setting/attainment.
Personality Types and Self-Discovery
19. The Four Tendencies
Ideal for:
- Coaches who appreciate personality typing and behavior philosophy, and who wonder why some clients take on challenges more readily or consistently than others.
- Clients who put others first, are frustrated with their ability to follow-through on goals, and who enjoy personality typing to foster self-awareness and behavior change.
20. The 5 Personality Patterns
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in self-actualization, interpersonal communication, limiting beliefs, and how personalities affect a person’s motivation and life experience.
- Clients who feel like something’s missing, are stuck in patterns of self-sabotage, or need help with relationships/communication.
21. The Road Back to You
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients interested in personality typing, spiritual discovery, and Christianity.
22. Switch
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in motivational conflict, the psychology of change, how anxiety/fear affects motivation and goal-setting, personal/professional development.
- Clients who seek to understand what’s holding them back, how to move past fear, why they resist change or taking risks, how to make meaningful life changes.
Building a Business
23. Change Maker
Ideal For:
- Health Coaches who want to learn from an industry expert how to find your place in the health/fitness coaching world, give your ideal client what they want/need, and take your business growth to new heights.
24. This Is Marketing
Ideal for:
- Coaches who seek to learn marketing wisdom that’s centered on empathy and connection to attract clients and grow their business in a meaningful (proven) way.
25. Eat That Frog!
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients who procrastinate on important tasks, feel overwhelmed by to-do’s, and seek solutions for time-management and productivity.
26. The Coaching Habit
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients who are interested in effective communication to help with work-related stress in leadership roles or managing/delegating to others.
27. Marketing Made Simple
Ideal for:
- Coaches who want a simple proven approach to crafting clear brand messaging that speaks to your ideal client’s values.
28. Blue Ocean Strategy
Ideal for:
- Coaches who feel like they’re competing in a crowded niche, and who seek a strategy to take their niche into an untapped market.
29. Deep Work
Ideal for:
- Coaches who feel like days pass without accomplishing important work, and who feel like they have too many plates spinning in the air.
Stress and Busyness
30. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients who feel like they’re spread too thin, have a never-ending to-do list, and struggle with work-life balance.
31. Stress Less, Accomplish More
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in a no-nonsense approach that combines meditation, mindfulness, and manifestation into simple 15-minute sessions for high-impact and reduced stress.
- Clients who are overstressed, underslept, and feeling like meditation is just out of their reach.
32. Drop the Ball
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients interested in a woman’s experience climbing the leadership ladder while struggling to do it all.
33. Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients interested in how modern-day chronic stress contributes to modern-day afflictions ranging from anxiety to heart disease.
Communication, Mood Psychology, and Trauma
34. Nonviolent Communication
Ideal for:
- Coaches who want to master interpersonal communication, compassion, and authenticity.
- Clients struggling with relationships and interpersonal communication.
35. Loving What Is
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in how an individual’s perspective can cause their own suffering, and a simple proven framework to experience transformative insights.
- Clients struggling with relationship conflict, chronic anxiety, or emotional pain.
36. Legacy: Trauma, Story, and Indigenous Healing
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients interested in the long-term effects of colonization on the Indigenous peoples of America, from the perspective of a Nehiyaw writer tracing her own roots of cultural dislocation and generational trauma. She explores how this has contributed to chronic health conditions faced by Indigenous populations, and how their traditional methods are key to finding the way back.
37. Stoicism and the Art of Happiness
Ideal for:
- Coaches interested in ancient wisdom, cognitive behavioral therapy, Greek philosophy, and a simple perspective shift that changes how one faces life challenges.
- Clients interested in an ancient philosophy that offers harmonious solutions for accepting the stressors of life.
38. Your Heart, My Hands
Ideal for:
- Coaches and Clients seeking inspiration from an underdog story of unparalleled odds and triumphant impact that resulted from sheer dedication, kindness, and perseverance, or who have been faced with challenging odds and circumstances unique to the immigrant experience.
