The Power of Beliefs: How Strengthening Seven Core Beliefs Predicts Greater Success and a Better Life

by Shawn Achor

The internationally bestselling author of The Happiness Advantage and Big Potential illuminates how harnessing our beliefs can influence our success in the real world.

Same world. Different beliefs. Different outcomes.

The greatest predictor of your future is the beliefs you hold about the world. In this extraordinary book, world-renowned researcher and author Shawn Achor illuminates how beliefs change the math about what is possible and probable in our lives. And by changing the math, beliefs change our path.

Drawing on two decades of research, as well as his work with NASA, the NFL, and over a third of the Fortune 100 companies, Shawn has discovered that the predictive power of beliefs has increased significantly. Beliefs about ourselves, money, the world, politics, faith, and work do more than shape the lens through which we see the world. They shape what happens next. Scientifically speaking, beliefs don’t just reflect reality. Beliefs bend reality.

Unfortunately, our beliefs can be empowering or they can be destructive. During what Achor calls the Great Drift, we have seen the staggering rise of the Four Horsemen of the Modern World: burnout, anxiety, loneliness, and depression. We are underperforming our true potential. But there is hope. Stunning new research in this book reveals the seven most predictive “core beliefs” that alter our future health, success, wealth, and education. Scientifically, these core beliefs take the cap off our potential, enrich us, strengthen us, and heal us.

Shawn explores the six main ways of changing your and others’ beliefs using research-based strategies he has tested everywhere from Wall Street to impoverished schools in Africa, from Camp Pendleton to Camp David:

• The Disaster Elevator: change what part of the brain processes the world.
• The Memory DeLorean: change the memory.
• Stopping Negative Mantras: change the language.
• Creating a Neural Tribe: change the sources.
• Starting the Wave: change the contagious actions.
• Common Texts, Common Action: change the texts.

The Power of Beliefs shows how seven core beliefs predict your present, bend the probability of future success, and, in the modern world, are the key to creating a better life for you and for others.

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Self Help, Personal Development

208 pages, Hardcover

Published May 5, 2026

About the author

Shawn Achor is an American educator, author, and speaker known for his advocacy of positive psychology. He is best known for his research reversing the formula of success leading to happiness—his research shows that happiness in fact leads to success. Achor spent 12 years studying what makes people happy at Harvard University. He later authored The Happiness Advantage and founded the Institute of Positive Research and GoodThinkInc. His TEDx talk "The Happy Secret to Better Work" is one of the 20-most viewed TED talks.

Reviews

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to Netgalley and Crown for the pre-release copy of The Power of Beliefs by Shawn Achor. Below is my honest review.

I'll be honest here: I don't read a lot of non-fiction. It's just not my jam. But the description of this one seemed interesting to me, and I'm glad it did.

This talks about the science behind how beliefs (of the more generic definition, not really religious, though that's touched on a brief bit) can have actual real massive effects on our lives. It identifies core beliefs that, when strengthened and reinforced, will have a positive impact on our happiness and healthiness, and their negative counterparts that cause burnout, loneliness, etc.

My favorite part is that they all were easy to understand AND he provided some simple ways to strengthen them, even giving examples of how those tiny pebbles can make big waves.

I'm going to implement a few of them and see how it goes.

Worth a read, if just for some ideas to create some positivity and happiness growth in your life and mental health.

Four stars!

[Demetri Papadimitropoulos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Belief as Maintenance
Shawn Achor’s “The Power of Beliefs” is less about wishing harder than about rebuilding the conditions under which hope can survive.
By Demetris Papadimitropoulos | May 3rd, 2026


A solitary figure, an empty chair, and a room crossed by angled color – an image of belief becoming practice in the quiet interval before private thought turns outward toward connection, memory, and shared life in Shawn Achor’s “The Power of Beliefs.”

Belief, in Shawn Achor’s “The Power of Beliefs,” is not a scented candle placed beside the stubborn furniture of reality. It is not positive thinking in a blazer, not manifesting with better citations, not the old self-help command to smile until the universe straightens its tie. Achor is most precise when he treats belief less as wish than as mechanism: something that changes what the mind notices, what the body prepares for, what a person attempts, and what other people help sustain. The book’s boldest phrase is that beliefs “bend reality.” Its wiser claim is smaller, sturdier, and more interesting: beliefs bend the path by which reality is met.

That distinction keeps the book balanced on its narrow ridge. On one side is an insight one can watch happen in a corridor, classroom, kitchen, or staff meeting: hidden convictions shape attention, behavior, memory, stress response, friendship, work, faith, and endurance. On the other is the mud where hope becomes blame, where hardship is quietly returned to the sufferer as a failure to believe well enough. Achor usually keeps one boot on the ground. He does not claim that gratitude excuses harm, prayer guarantees the requested outcome, illness yields to optimism, or an internal sense of control should become self-blame with cleaner stationery. Those cautions are not decorative. They are the difference between hope and scolding.

Achor organizes the book around what he calls “The Great Drift,” his name for the fraying of the places where people rehearse meaning together: community, religion, work, ritual, and face-to-face life. Into that fraying, he places a set of assumptions that wear away agency: behavior does not matter; everyone else is elsewhere having a better life; one is unimportant, depleted, alone, stuck in meaningless work, and cut off from anything larger. His answer is a set of counter-beliefs built around agency, gratitude, worth, contribution, belonging, meaningful work, and transcendence.

This could have become a color-coded cubby system for human pain. Each ache gets its opposite. Each wound gets its laminated affirmation. What saves it from becoming a closed cabinet is that Achor is better than the symmetry he builds. The most convincing pages do not simply announce that belief is powerful. They show how a conviction becomes reachable, or unreachable, in daily choreography: hospital corridors, dining halls, escalators, inboxes, phones, family videos, staff meetings, book clubs, and rooms where no one quite knows whether it is safe to sound hopeful aloud.

The book’s finest miniature is the broken hospital door. During Covid, a motion-sensor door stops opening automatically, and exhausted surgeons, nurses, and administrators spend two days treating it as unusable. People detour through elevators and hallways because everyone accepts the new lesson: behavior no longer works on this door. Then a lost patient pushes it open. The sensor was broken; the door was not. It is a small story, almost a joke, and also a perfect demonstration of the book’s argument. Once people believe their actions cannot matter, they stop trying even the obvious handle.

Achor’s best examples work this way. The hospital door explains apathy without embalming it in theory. A dangerous family hike on Franconia Ridge, ending with Achor, his wife Michelle, and their eight-year-old son Leo huddled overnight in a freezing emergency hut, becomes a chapter on anchor points and the startling speed with which beliefs can change. The “Memory DeLorean” turns family photos and videos into a practice of rewatching the evidence the brain forgets. The “Disaster Elevator” asks an anxious person to write feared outcomes from worst to least-worst, not because the list fixes the crisis, but because the act of weighing possibilities recruits the part of the brain that can think instead of merely sound the alarm. These names are glossy. One can hear the slide click in the next room. But several of them earn their polish because the metaphor leaves the reader with something to try.

The prose has the rhythm of a speaker who knows when the room is about to drift: story, joke, study, pivot, takeaway, callback. Achor’s sentences are mostly clean, medium-length, and built for recall. His diction is plain without being slack, energetic without panting. When he reaches for imagery, he tends to choose figures that explain mechanisms: hills that look steeper when one feels alone, fireflies that succeed by lighting together, waves moving through stadiums, anchors deepened by repetition, shared texts synchronizing groups. The language is built for memory, and occasionally built so well that one can see the bolts.

Its readiness to be underlined is the prose’s main cost. Achor likes memorable refrains: beliefs change the math; beliefs change the path; same world, different beliefs, different outcome. The repetition helps the book lodge in the mind. It also gives certain passages the shine of a conference-room screen. The prose is rarely dull, but it sometimes arrives having already met the audience, shaken hands, checked the microphone, and located the nearest branded water bottle.

Then Achor does what saves him from too much polish: he lets himself look foolish. He misunderstands a Seahawks roster situation and accidentally comforts players who have not, in fact, been cut. He nearly sets his childhood bedroom on fire trying to make electricity visible because “Ghostbusters” had given him ideas, a reminder that cinema plus wires is not always education. He accidentally sends a shirtless photograph of himself to a men’s Bible study group, then panics and blames his toddler daughter, a maneuver unlikely to be endorsed by any major faith tradition. This self-deprecation lets the book breathe. Achor is earnest, but not airless. He is not presenting himself as a completed specimen of optimism. He is anxious, jealous, embarrassed, spiritually searching, sometimes frightened, and occasionally ridiculous. The voice earns trust because it lets the author be caught in the act of being human.

The design favors steadiness over surprise, which is both its method and its wager. Part I makes the case for belief as a measurable force, moving through placebo and nocebo effects, home-field advantage, AI, money beliefs, stereotype threat, probability, possibility, cognitive dissonance, anchor points, and post-traumatic growth. Part II develops the seven core beliefs. Part III offers six strategies for strengthening them, from the Disaster Elevator and Memory DeLorean to shared texts and neural tribes. The book moves from problem to names to exercises, which is exactly the journey it wants the reader to make. It is not formally adventurous, but it is intelligently built for use. The architecture does not astonish; it steadies the hand.

Its most durable move is to carry belief out of the weather system of private mood and into the scaffolding of daily life: dinners, meetings, texts, praise, rituals, repeated phrases, shared books, and the people who teach us what is normal to hope for. A lesser book would have remained inside the individual brain: your mindset, your choices, your success, your morning routine, your attractively lit mug of resolve. Achor keeps widening the frame. Beliefs are shaped by fans in stadiums, friends in classrooms, spouses who put down their phones, nurses who begin meetings with gratitude, families who watch old videos together, employees who send praise, readers gathered around a common text, congregations and spiritual circles that make transcendence socially palpable, and neighbors who risk the tiny civic flamboyance of waving first. We do not simply hold beliefs. We inherit them, rehearse them, forget them, revive them, transmit them, and catch them from other people.

That is why the chapters that linger are less about achievement than relation. “I matter” is not treated as a mirror affirmation but as something built through importance, attention, dependence, and appreciation. A stranger on an escalator tells Achor that one of his books saved his life at the exact moment Achor is privately convinced he matters less than his more visible peers. The timing is almost too neat, but life occasionally allows itself a heavy-handed editor. The scene works because mattering arrives not as self-esteem but as message: someone else has to carry it across the room.

“I have something to give” is more careful than the usual abundance sermon. Achor does not insist that everyone has enough. Some people plainly do not. His better point is that even when a person lacks enough money, time, energy, certainty, or institutional power, they may still have something: a word, a gesture, an hour, a skill, a kindness, a witness, a hand on the shoulder, a text that says I remembered. That distinction keeps the chapter from insulting the very people it wants to encourage. It also keeps the book’s optimism from turning acquisitive. The goal is not to convince the reader that scarcity is imaginary. It is to ask whether scarcity has been allowed to describe more of the self than it should.

“I am not alone” may be the richest of the seven beliefs because it links connection not to sentimentality but to perception and physiology. Hills look less steep with support. Stress softens when another hand is present. Teams perform differently when members believe they belong to one another. Achor’s fireflies, lighting together in the dark, could have been too sweet by half. Instead, the image clarifies one of the book’s central claims: some forms of flourishing are not merely improved by company; they are structurally impossible without it.

The chapter on “There is something greater than me” is one of the book’s more interesting risks. Achor knows some readers will welcome it as the obvious center of the matter, while others will feel a science-facing book has wandered into church with its shoes still wet. He tries to define the belief broadly enough to include God, faith traditions, nature, fate, karma, energy, or any coherent meaning structure larger than the self. The result will not satisfy everyone. But the chapter matters because it makes explicit what is often implicit in the rest of the book: belief is not only cognitive. It is devotional, communal, ritualized, and often inherited. Achor is at his best here when he refuses the transactional version of prayer. He writes about miscarriages, fear, and not receiving the outcome he wanted. Prayer, in his telling, does not bend the world into obedience. It helps the person praying remain connected, accompanied, and morally oriented when control has run out.

The book is most credible when its optimism lowers the lights and lets qualification do its work. Achor distinguishes possibility from certainty, and that distinction saves the argument from a great deal of foolishness. A child who believes he will definitely play in the NBA may be living inside an unqualified fantasy; a child who believes there is a possibility, and that his behavior can alter the odds, may be living inside a useful path made of practice, discipline, friends, and continued effort. A cancer patient’s belief does not guarantee remission, but it may alter treatment adherence, courage, connection, and the quality of the time ahead. Prayer does not guarantee the answer one wants. Gratitude does not make danger acceptable. Internal control does not mean every bad outcome is secretly one’s fault. Here the book is not hedging. It is becoming responsible.

The seams show when the catchiest phrase is asked to carry more than a phrase can responsibly hold. “Beliefs bend reality” is terrific and dangerous. Much of the time, Achor means something precise: beliefs shape perception, action, memory, stress response, motivation, and social reinforcement. But the phrase can sound larger than that, and the support beneath it is not all of one kind. The notes draw on peer-reviewed psychology, medical studies, workplace research, author-linked interventions, business reporting, popular books, institutional surveys, and Achor’s own earlier work. Many of these sources are useful; they are not interchangeable. A study, a corporate case, a workplace statistic, a personal anecdote, and a prior consulting intervention can all illuminate a pattern. They do not prove the same thing in the same way.

“The Great Drift” carries the same overfilled suitcase. It is a strong lantern for the book’s concerns: loneliness, religious disaffiliation, remote work, social media comparison, workplace disengagement, civic thinning, anxiety, depression, burnout, and the loss of shared rituals. But a lantern is not a map. These problems are related, not identical. The frame helps the reader see connections; it also makes jagged terrain look more navigable than it is. Reality does not always arrange itself into seven negative beliefs waiting politely for seven positive replacements.

Still, the book keeps its shoes on by returning, again and again, to something a reader might actually do. The conclusion wisely refuses to make the chandeliers tremble. Achor does not ask the reader to transform everything. He hopes for one lived change: a family watches videos on Wednesday nights; a team begins meetings with gratitude; someone stops repeating “I’m so busy”; someone joins a book club or Bible study; someone rereads the book because ideas recede unless returned to. This modesty is not a retreat from the argument. It is the argument in its most usable form. Belief survives by maintenance.

Among its neighbors, “The Power of Beliefs” shares territory with Carol S. Dweck’s “Mindset,” Kelly McGonigal’s “The Upside of Stress,” Vivek H. Murthy’s “Together,” and James Clear’s “Atomic Habits,” but Achor’s emphasis is his own: he is asking how a life becomes believable to the person living it. That is a subtler question than how to become happier, richer, more productive, or more successful. It is also more haunting. A life becomes unbelievable not only through catastrophe, but through attrition: one ignored message, one missed dinner, one sour phrase repeated too often, one memory left unrehearsed, one room where nobody looks up.

That question gives the book its quiet force. Beneath the studies, strategies, percentages, and cheerful names, this is a book about the moment people begin to disappear from their own lives. They stop pushing the door. They stop eating with classmates. They stop asking for help. They stop noticing the good that is already present. They stop believing their work matters. They stop offering what they have because it is not enough. They stop feeling accompanied. Achor’s answer is imperfect and sometimes too neatly packaged, but it is not shallow. He understands that despair is often procedural before it is dramatic. It enters through repeated language, neglected memory, missing rituals, bad sources, absent praise, and rooms where no one looks up.

My final rating: 84/100, corresponding to 4/5 stars on a whole-star Goodreads scale. The score fits the experience: sturdy virtues, visible seams.

“The Power of Beliefs” is not a flawless book about belief. It is a generous book about rebuilding the conditions under which belief can survive. Its best image may be neither the brain scan nor the corporate workshop nor even the mountain. It may be that ordinary door in the hospital corridor, declared broken by exhausted people until someone finally pushes it open. Achor’s book is most convincing when it does not promise that every door will open. It asks something humbler and harder to refuse: before walking the long way around, try the handle.


Early compositional studies for “The Room Before the Ripple,” testing how figure, table, empty chair, window-light, and negative space could hold the review’s central tension between isolation and possible connection.


The first full underdrawing establishes the room’s quiet geometry – the seated body, the waiting chair, the table plane, and the spare interior architecture before belief enters the image as color.


Cover-palette watercolor tests translate the book’s vivid oranges, teals, violets, creams, greens, and rose tones into softer washes of interior light, shadow, and emotional atmosphere.


A focused study of angled light and faceted color explores how the book-cover palette can become psychological architecture rather than decoration or literal symbolism.


Border tests develop a quiet notebook-like margin – part frame, part record, part ritual – so the finished image feels held by reflection rather than ornament.


The first wash begins to fuse drawing and atmosphere, letting the room, figure, empty chair, and cover-derived color fields breathe into one suspended emotional field.


A restrained object study clarifies the symbolic economy of the final image – notebook, turned-over phone, mug, and empty chair as small signs of attention, choice, and relation without explanatory clutter.


A gathered process sheet brings together thumbnail, underdrawing, posture study, palette, border, and first wash, showing the final image as an accumulation of small choices rather than a single decorative flourish.

All watercolor illustrations by Demetris Papadimitropoulos.

[Neil Pasricha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first met Shawn Achor in Abu Dhabi years ago when we were both invited to speak to the Royal Family of the United Arab Emirates. I got there a few days early as requested—doing dress rehearsals, long dinners with the organizing team, meeting various extended family members—but Shawn was the rock star. He flew in, crushed it onstage, dropped research studies like he’d memorized all of Google Scholar, and then immediately flew out. I was like: Who was that masked man!? We became friends over the years and he was kind enough to blurb ‘​The Happiness Equation: Want Nothing + Do Anything = Have Everything​’ after selling a million copies of his wonderful book ‘​​The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work’. And then: Where did he go? Why did Shawn sort of just ... disappear? I got my answer on Page 79 of this book. Shawn shares that after his second child Zöe was born three months early—spending 50 days in the NICU!—he “made a decision to take my foot off the gas at work so I could be home with my young kids. For the next six years, I said no to all media, stopped doing international talks, and didn’t write another book until this one.” Six years!? Completely unplugging! Wow, I thought I was doing a decent job when I deleted the Instagram app off my phone. But this guy just … stopped posting completely. Superdad! But, you know, Shawn’s also still Shawn. Still an amiable son of an English teacher and neuroscience professor, with multiple Harvard degrees, and a witty research-centric form of writing that is precise and uniquely warm. That’s what makes his new book such a jaw-dropping wow. I know I will be handing out copies of this book for years because the research it presents is solid, the advice simple, and the power to alter a life astonishing.

The whole thing begins with a bizarre observation Shawn made while being presented with different drug options for Zoe while she was in the incubator. He was reviewing a 2002 study where 180 patients who had suffered with severe knee osteoarthritis for years were offered a free knee surgery … but, unfortunately, only two thirds were actually going to get it. One third was going to receive a “sham surgery” where an incision would be made on their knee under anesthesia, leaving a similar scar, so the patients would have no way of knowing if they really got the surgery. (Crazy study! Who approved this!) Annnnnnnd: What happened six months later? Patients who received the “sham surgery” showed the same improvement in pain, inflammation, and mobility. The same! Even though they got nothing! What about a year later? Two years later? Same thing! Whaaaaat? Shawn tells us this is doubly fascinating because “osteoarthritis is a progressive condition that naturally gets worse over time, not better.” Then Shawn falls further down the rabbit hole and finds that the power of beliefs (see what I did there) is not only so strong … but it’s actually growing! He then tells us about a study showing that the placebo effect has actually doubled in twenty years. Doubled! Seriously. And that’s just the introduction. We’re going on a ride here. And the amount of research studies you are going to learn about is like… hundreds. Endless. It could be overwhelming if not for the tiny, sweet, digestible dosage he dispenses them with. Shawn is the gumball machine of research studies. And he tells us early that, “Beliefs are real, even when they are not true” so then … wouldn’t it make sense to know which ones can help us most and make sure we’re doing everything to grow those? It would! It does! And this book shows us how. The Seven Core Beliefs from Page 17 are:

My behavior matters, I am grateful, I matter, I have something to give, I am not alone, This work is meaningful, There is something greater than me. But did you know research shows “strengthening these core beliefs can help double the rate of promotion, potentially extend life more than 7.5 years, increase the likelihood of surviving cancer, and improve test scores by almost 25 percent.” This book isn’t just a listicle and piles of facts, though. Each belief is explained and supported through research, generous personal stories, and teaching which makes it a kind of textbook, too. Shawn is a natural professor. On Page 37, he tells us that “If, as a parent of a child starting a new school, you tell your kid ‘You’re going to love it here!’ you’ve just provided a meager meal for the brain. Much better would be: ‘You’re going to love it here because you started at a new school three years ago and ended up loving it [warrant]. And you are great at making friends like you did on your soccer team [specific warrant]. So, if you work hard and are kind [qualifiers], I believe you’re going to love it here, too.” Helpful, right? Doesn’t mean it’s easy! Shawn gets vulnerable and expresses a lot of ways in which he’s failed and how he’s learning to grow. Then, the last third of the book gives specific ways on how we can grow these beliefs. There are things he calls “The Disaster Elevator” or “The Memory DeLorean” where he gets into detail on how his family shares a ‘favorite family picture’ for Wednesday night viewing ceremonies. I took three pages of notes. So many highlights, so many dog ears. I think the six years Shawn took “off” were clearly more productive than most people’s six years on. Out of the cave, he's blinking into the light and giving us a book so desperately needed today. For you, for your spouse, for your kids, for your CEO, for your team, this is a book everyone will gain tremendous value in reading.

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have enjoyed Shawn Achor's work for many years, ever since I first watched his TED Talk (my favorite talk!). Therefore, I was really excited to see this on NetGalley and be given an opportunity to read his latest work. While his premises are based on scientific studies, Shawn's writing is very accessible and filled with humor. This book is needed now to fight against the "Four Horsemen of the Modern World" aka burnout, anxiety, loneliness, and depression. The book is broken into 3 parts.

Part one explains how powerful our beliefs are... even if they aren't true. He says, "Beliefs don't just shape our perceptions; they scientifically change the probabilities of our actions." A person can change their health, wealth, and future based on what they hold to be true. Do you believe you're stupid and can't get a job? That will likely become true because you won't put in the effort to learn skills that could get you a good job. Alternatively, if you believe you can learn and grow and that you have the potential to be great, you have a much better chance of having a fulfilling life. He shares the science behind placebos and "nocebos" - a false negative belief (a term I learned from the book). Later in the book, he also defines a "vericebo" where you use true information to change the belief.

Once you understand the importance of your beliefs, part two goes into depth on each of the 7 core power beliefs:
- My behavior matters - this is super empowering because you have the power to change outcomes
- I am grateful- studies have shown how gratitude can improve health outcomes and increase happiness
- I matter- especially to someone who depends on you. To show someone else they matter, give them your attention, which leads to
- I have something to give - it doesn't have to be money or material goods
- I am not alone - when this is a strong belief, "we see more possibilities, rebound faster from setbacks, and take smarter, bolder actions."
- This work is meaningful - by understanding the purpose in your work, you are more likely to find stress to be invigorating instead of debilitating
- There is something greater than me - studies have shown that if you hold a spiritual belief, it will significantly improve the quality of your life

Finally, in part three, he provides 6 practical methods for combating the Four Horsemen and strengthening the 7 core power beliefs. Have you ever felt yourself spiraling out of control as your thoughts drag you into the pits of despair and the eventual destruction of all you hold dear? Try using the Disaster Elevator to help you stop spiraling. Want to train your brain to be happier? Schedule a time to look at photos of times that you enjoyed and share those with others. Do you talk to yourself in ways you would never talk to a friend? (I'm such an idiot! No one likes me. I can't do anything right?) Those are 3 of the top 12 negative mantras that people tell themselves, which your brain will believe even if they are not true. You can improve life for everyone around you by starting a wave of positivity, as beliefs are contagious. (Sadly, this is true for negative beliefs as well.) One way to do this would be to have a common text that is meaningful to you and a group of peers. The final strategy is to find a "positive neural tribe," which includes eliminating the negative people from your life as you are able. He rightly points out that the people you've never met but who spin you up on social media are the easiest to cut out.

I found this book to be easy to understand, funny, and highly applicable. I plan on sharing it with friends and a group I'm in with others who need to hear that they matter and what they do matters. I'm hoping to even do a book club.

If you are struggling with depression, loneliness, anxiety, or burnout, or simply want to be happier, I highly recommend this book!

I want to thank the author, Shawn Achor, the publisher, Crown Publishing, and NetGalley for providing me with early access to this book.

[sierra ʚɞ · Rating 5 out of 5]

What makes this book especially compelling is how it expands on a simple but powerful idea: same world, different beliefs, different outcomes. Shawn Achor explains how the beliefs we hold about ourselves and the world do not just shape how we see reality, they actively influence what happens next. He explains that beliefs are not just abstract thoughts, but measurable predictors of performance, health, and connection. The concept that beliefs do not just reflect reality, but can bend it is both fascinating and motivating.

A major strength of the book is how it addresses the challenges of the modern world. He describes what he calls the Great Drift, marked by rising burnout, anxiety, loneliness, and depression. Rather than leaving you stuck in those realities, he offers hope through research backed insights. He introduces seven core beliefs that strongly predict outcomes related to health, success, and overall well being, and explains how strengthening these beliefs can unlock greater potential.

This book also stands out for its practical tools with six research based strategies to help reshape beliefs, including techniques like the Disaster Elevator, the Memory DeLorean, and building what he calls a Neural Tribe. These ideas are not just theoretical. They are actionable and tested across a wide range of environments, from corporate settings to schools and communities around the world.

At 178 pages, organized into three parts and 19 chapters, the book is structured in a way that makes it easy to follow and quick to read. This was my first time reading anything by Shawn Achor, and I can clearly see why he is considered one of the leading voices on the link between positive thinking and positive outcomes. This is a book every person needs to read. Finishing it left me eager to explore more of his work and to start applying his ideas in everyday life by adopting a more positive perspective on the world around me.

Thank you Crown Publishing Group and Penguin Random House for my gifted ARC!

(ARC received for free via a Crown Publishing Group giveaway on Goodreads)

[Mike Zahajko · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first heard Shawn Achor speak live about 15 years ago at a company event, and I still remember how energetically he blended storytelling with research insights. Since then, his TED Talk on "The Happiness Advantage" has become something I’ve shared many times with friends, co-workers, and family.

For nearly 10 years, my calendar had a recurring 6:30 AM “Happiness Workout” appointment Monday through Friday. Inspired by Shawn’s five habits to improve happiness, I intentionally added more random acts of kindness, journaling, gratitude, meditation, and physical movement to my life. It worked. Some seasons I was more consistent than others, but I can honestly say those practices shaped my outlook, relationships, leadership, and overall happiness in meaningful ways.

Reading "The Power of Beliefs" came at the right time for me. My oldest is graduating high school and leaving for Mexico for two years to serve others, and this book felt both personal and timely. The seven core beliefs Shawn outlines are simple, yet they rang true as foundational principles that shape how we experience life.

What I appreciate most about Shawn’s work is that he combines research with practical ideas that are actually usable. I know I’m going to incorporate the “Memory DeLorean” more intentionally at home, and the concept of interrupting negative mantras feels incredibly applicable as a parent. The “Disaster Elevator” also reminded me of Dale Carnegie’s "How to Stop Worrying and Start Living", another book that has had a profound impact on me. Shawn has a way of making ideas memorable enough that they stick long after you finish the book.

This is one of those rare books that feels both encouraging and actionable. I’ll likely add it to my annual re-read list alongside books like "Leadership and Self-Deception", "How Will You Measure Your Life?", and "Redefining Possible". I already volunteered to share ideas from the book in our company culture and learning meeting next month, and we’ll add a few copies to our internal library as well.

Thank you Shawn - well done on the book and audio recording. I definitely recommend it.

[Helen Wu ✨ · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is classic Shawn Achor. Optimistic, science grounded, and genuinely fun to read. The Power of Beliefs takes decades of research and turns it into ideas you can actually use without feeling overwhelmed. It is incredibly digestible, full of humor, and backed by solid data from workplaces, healthcare systems, and global organizations. I have read Achor’s previous work and was excited going in, and this one may be my favorite. It clearly shows how beliefs are not fluffy thoughts but measurable predictors of performance, health, and connection.

What made this book especially timely for me is that I am studying burnout prevention and imposter thoughts, and the overlap is striking. The reframing tools around worst case thinking, meaning making, and shared beliefs at work felt immediately relevant. The research on burnout, loneliness, and belief contagion mirrors what I am seeing in both the literature and real life. Thank you to NetGalley and Crown Publishing for the advanced copy. This is one of those books that feels hopeful without being naive. Everyone should read it. Highly recommend.

[Erin Reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Power of Beliefs: How Strengthening Seven Core Beliefs Predicts Greater Success and a Better Life
by Shawn Achor

Thank you to Crown Publishing for the ARC.

The Power of Beliefs is an optimistic, research driven look at how the beliefs we hold can shape our behavior, choices, and outcomes. Shawn Achor writes in an accessible way, using studies, examples, and practical tools to make the material easy to follow.

The strongest parts of the book focus on burnout, anxiety, loneliness, and the ways our internal narratives can either keep us stuck or help us move forward. Achor’s strategies are clear and usable, especially when he focuses on reframing negative thought patterns, building supportive communities, and changing the language we use with ourselves.

That said, the faith and religion elements were not for me. While they may resonate with some readers, I found myself less engaged when the book moved in that direction. I preferred the sections grounded more firmly in psychology, behavior, and everyday application.

Overall, this is a quick, encouraging read with useful takeaways, even if not every angle worked for me.

3.5 stars.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Achor breaks down seven different beliefs/attitudes and how they change the way an individual interacts with the world.

Why I started this book: Loved Achor's Ted talk and his previous books.

Why I finished it: Good reminder that our brains filter the world for us, and we need to clean our filters. Solid reminder with practical suggestions for taking care of the basics. Scanning for good, celebrating memories, stop negative self-talk, etc.
Core Beliefs
1. My Behavior Matters
2. I am Grateful
3. I Matter
4. I have Something to Give
5. I am Not Alone
6. This Work is Meaningful
7. There is Something Greater than Me

Pair with: The Power of Agency: The 7 Principles to Conquer Obstacles, Make Effective Decisions, and Create a Life on Your Own Terms

[Savvy_ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I haven’t read one of Shawn Achor’s books before, but I have watched videos of some of his speeches and liked what I saw. I was grateful to have the opportunity to read this ARC ebook from NetGalley and Crown Currency publishers. I really enjoyed this book. The author’s voice is incredibly readable. He expertly blends research from both scientific and divinity studies along with personal experiences to prove his points. I found myself highlighting so much, and I can’t wait to read this again at a slower pace—trying to focus on one core belief at a time for a longer period of time. This book will appeal to a wide variety of ages and professions. It is not just applicable to business, but also to life. I highly recommend reading Shawn Achor’s The Power of Beliefs.

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was generously offered a free copy of this book because I’m on the author’s mailing list. I was able to get the audiobook and finished listening to it this morning. The Power of Beliefs is positive, actionable, the right length, and thought-provoking. The insights are powerful and make strong points about how what we believe about ourselves matters and shapes our lives. I recommend it, and it’s now on my audiobooks list in bold (meaning it’s a favorite)!

[Kerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyable read! I think everyone can benefit from reading this book. Shawn uses wonderful examples to illustrate his points and adds humor while also providing bite sized actionable tips and tricks.

[Kimberly Monaghan · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Power of Beliefs is not only another home run for Shawn Achor, but it’s also a win for all of us, no matter our age or circumstance. Read my full review: https://booksuplift.com/the-power-of-...

[Daryl J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can only say this: Read this book … then read it again … and read it again third time. I won’t say it’s life-changing. I will say that it will change you in many ways. Backed by research, clearly written, and filled with interesting anecdotes, THE POWER OF BELIEFS by Shawn Acher is outstanding!

[Lydia Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book works for BOTH the science minded and the religious. Highly recommend.