7 ms·

I have been reading a decent amount lately. This year I have read 28 books so far (should end up with 30 books) and the last 2 years I have read 50 books in tot

by pavs 16y ago

I have been reading a decent amount lately. This year I have read 28 books so far (should end up with 30 books) and the last 2 years I have read 50 books in total. http://iampavs.com/books/ http://iampavs.com/books/ I have found that reading books itself is not so difficult, nor is it difficult to find time to read books. The difficult part is to make reading books a _habit_. The same way going to HN and Reddit (or whatever your frequently visited site) is a habit. You unconsciously find yourself refreshing that page even though you very well know nothing new happened within the last 30 seconds. Everyone needs to start at some place and I think instead of forcing yourself in to the habit of reading books, one should ease themselves slowly in to forming a reading habit. Someone mentioned Pomodoro technique and I would recommend that. But I would suggest against taking a mechanical approach in to reading and instead start with small chunk (15 minutes of reading time a day) and slowly built yourself up for longer reading time. If you asked me 2 years ago if I can go through 1 hour of uninterrupted reading I would probably laugh at you. But I now find myself reading 2-3 hours of continuous reading a day without much problem (not everyday though). Getting a kindle helped to get some distraction-less reading experience. Do it. Reading books outside your field is the best thing you can do for yourself.

elai 16y ago
There's reading, and then there's remembering and using most of it a couple of months later and years later. Otherwise it just becomes another form of newspaper/HN reading and just mostly gives a vague reference memory in the back of your head.
- pavs 16y ago
  Unless you are savant you are not going to remember most of what you have read couple of months or years later however you are likely to have a vague recollection of the general gist o the book. You are also not going to use most of the things you have read/learned in the book in real life. Unless you are only reading self-help type of books.
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - mquander 16y ago
    This is not normal. If you give a damn, you will retain good books; it's not magic. Think carefully about the ideas you read, write notes (if you like), and fit them into your mind.
    - pavs 16y ago
      Sure. If you read 2-5 books a year, its possible.
      - mquander 16y ago
        Everyone reads and learns at different speeds, but for me, M carefully considered books per year is better than N mostly forgotten ones, for all positive M and N.
        pavs 16y ago
        You are eventually going to forget most of what you read few years later. So to me, the extra effort in trying to "remember" a book seems pointless. To me relational connection is more important that "remembering" a book. For instance if you can point out "x event" in a book I have read (if it is a particularly interesting part of the book), I can give you a gist of what that x event in the book was talking about and things related to that event. I can also recall similar events in other books I have read. However if you ask me to remember a "hard number" or "hard fact" I will most likely not recall it. "Remembering" a book seems like ridiculously thing to do unless its a programming book or you are preparing for an exam in school or work related. You tries to remember books in casual reading?
        zackattack 16y ago
        Crescat scientia, vita excolatur. This is an issue that I myself am grappling with. I read a lot in 2010. I probably read about 50 books. Some of them, I actively read: I kept my pen handy, underlined where appropriate and then wrote questions in the margins. If I made notes on a page, I would circle the page number; once I finished, I would flip through all of the pages with circled page numbers, and then dump all my notes into a plain text document. I would then try to assert some sort of cohesive logical structure on my dump, INTP-style, and then post it to ZacharyBurt.com. I hate the feeling I feel when someone mentions an idea from a book I have read, me appraising it as so (fresh and different), and then me feeling that if I had to invoke that idea as part of a creative solution to a problem, it probably wouldn't have come to the forefront of my consciousness. And of course, could I tell you the precise contents of many of those books? No. In fairness, Leonardo himself observed that genius requires spaced repetition. To that end, while reading, I have tried to build the habit of skimming ultimately irrelevant, unless needed for later reference, details. I still read them to evaluate whether they deserve a more in-depth look. But I am concerned here that my process is not ideal. Has the reading bolstered my creativity and pattern matching ability? Probably. Has it improved my analytic capacity? Probably, especially noticeable during the time period after I finish reading a book. Do I remember the core lessons from each book? No. And that's a big problem. Usually with a book I try to figure out a few different take-aways and then implement them into my life. But unless I implement them immediately and convert them into habits, I will probably lose the lessons. A challenge I face as a reader, and perhaps why I have accumulated a small following as a writer, is figuring out how to convert ideas from a book into actionable habits. So what major life habit changes have I made in 2010? I became vegan. That's it. But I also made some changes to my business strategy, putting lots of money in my pocket. And I became better at competitive sports. I felt happy for greater intervals of time. And my mental map of how my brain works has become more clear. And hopefully, the books I choose to read next year will be ultimately more relevant useful and practical. I have been planting seeds (for creative sprouting, which has paid some initial dividends). I have been also grasping for intellectual edification, trying to answer big questions that have been lurking in my head. Hopefully I will also start asking better questions instead of wasting time on the wrong questions. Practically, I think that I could reduce each book I read into a few solid actionable ideas/suggestions. I may actually go through each of my blog's entries. If I eliminate rationale, I will be left with only results.. and people pay for results. Want to get the personal improvement of reading 50 books without having to compensate my ego by listening through my insufferable nerdy analysis? Get the PDF for $X. I also have to figure out how I want to shift my reading strategy for 2011. Thoughts welcome.
JesseAldridge 16y ago
I don't know. I have a suspicion books are overvalued due to the cultual weight they've historically carried. Wise people read books. We tend to think of browsing the internet as frivilous when compared to reading classic literature -- but is it really? With books, the individual ideas don't get filtered by up and down votes or what have you. You only get ideas from one person -- you don't get immediate dissenting views. People on the internet know attention is a scarce resource and make an effort to condense their ideas as much as possible. Long form has advantages, certainly; but perhaps a big reason we are so drawn to the internet is that it is actually the better use of time.
- nostrademons 16y ago
  With books, the individual ideas get filtered by the process of revision that's necessary to produce a work good enough to get past the slushpile. It's a very different sort of filtering process. Social news sites distribute the filtering load across many different people, but collapse it in time - any given person spends about 2 seconds deciding whether to up- or down-vote a story. The publishing industry collapses the filtering load across very few people (a handful of editors decide whether a book will be accepted or rejected for publication), but spreads it out over time (your editor will then work with you over a protracted period to make sure the work expresses your views as clearly and as fully as possible). They seem to result in very different outcomes. Social news tends to promote articles that are just barely at the edge of common practice. They make you think "Oh, that's a good idea", but can't fundamentally challenge the way you think, because you don't have time to absorb a fundamentally challenging idea. Books, however, can fundamentally change your outlook - if you let them. But the process of letting them is difficult, and you need to find the right book, and it needs to come at the right time in your cognitive development. I think the Internet has done a great thing for making the masses of people better informed, but it still does not replace books. Partially because, on a competitive level, all of your competitors have read the same blogs as well. You need to distinguish yourself with something difficult, which ideally would come from personal experience, but books are often the next best thing.
- ThomPete 16y ago
  If you read outside your own area you are in fact doing something different. You are combining knowledge from other fields and tie them into your own. This can never be a bad thing no matter how different the field might be.
coliveira 16y ago
> If you asked me 2 years ago if I can go through 1 hour of uninterrupted reading I would probably laugh at you. My goodness. This made me stop in the tracks. I find it hard to believe that the web life style is making so much damage to people. I have always taken for granted that reading for hours is the easiest thing an educated person can do. I don't have the time now, but when I was a teenager I could read for 4, 5 hours non-stop (maybe with a snack or two). A few books grabbed my attention for a whole day. It is sad that people think it is an effort to concentrate on a single book for longer than a few minutes.
- zaphar 16y ago
  I completely agree. When I was a teenager I easily read 3-4 books a week. That pace has slowed since but I would guess I still read well over 50 books a year. My mom tracked my reading count one summer and I clicked in at 200 books.

by pavs 16y ago

elai 16y ago

There's reading, and then there's remembering and using most of it a couple of months later and years later. Otherwise it just becomes another form of newspaper/HN reading and just mostly gives a vague reference memory in the back of your head.

pavs 16y ago
Unless you are savant you are not going to remember most of what you have read couple of months or years later however you are likely to have a vague recollection of the general gist o the book. You are also not going to use most of the things you have read/learned in the book in real life. Unless you are only reading self-help type of books.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- mquander 16y ago
  This is not normal. If you give a damn, you will retain good books; it's not magic. Think carefully about the ideas you read, write notes (if you like), and fit them into your mind.
  - pavs 16y ago
    Sure. If you read 2-5 books a year, its possible.
    - mquander 16y ago
      Everyone reads and learns at different speeds, but for me, M carefully considered books per year is better than N mostly forgotten ones, for all positive M and N.
      - pavs 16y ago
        You are eventually going to forget most of what you read few years later. So to me, the extra effort in trying to "remember" a book seems pointless. To me relational connection is more important that "remembering" a book. For instance if you can point out "x event" in a book I have read (if it is a particularly interesting part of the book), I can give you a gist of what that x event in the book was talking about and things related to that event. I can also recall similar events in other books I have read. However if you ask me to remember a "hard number" or "hard fact" I will most likely not recall it. "Remembering" a book seems like ridiculously thing to do unless its a programming book or you are preparing for an exam in school or work related. You tries to remember books in casual reading?
        zackattack 16y ago
        Crescat scientia, vita excolatur. This is an issue that I myself am grappling with. I read a lot in 2010. I probably read about 50 books. Some of them, I actively read: I kept my pen handy, underlined where appropriate and then wrote questions in the margins. If I made notes on a page, I would circle the page number; once I finished, I would flip through all of the pages with circled page numbers, and then dump all my notes into a plain text document. I would then try to assert some sort of cohesive logical structure on my dump, INTP-style, and then post it to ZacharyBurt.com. I hate the feeling I feel when someone mentions an idea from a book I have read, me appraising it as so (fresh and different), and then me feeling that if I had to invoke that idea as part of a creative solution to a problem, it probably wouldn't have come to the forefront of my consciousness. And of course, could I tell you the precise contents of many of those books? No. In fairness, Leonardo himself observed that genius requires spaced repetition. To that end, while reading, I have tried to build the habit of skimming ultimately irrelevant, unless needed for later reference, details. I still read them to evaluate whether they deserve a more in-depth look. But I am concerned here that my process is not ideal. Has the reading bolstered my creativity and pattern matching ability? Probably. Has it improved my analytic capacity? Probably, especially noticeable during the time period after I finish reading a book. Do I remember the core lessons from each book? No. And that's a big problem. Usually with a book I try to figure out a few different take-aways and then implement them into my life. But unless I implement them immediately and convert them into habits, I will probably lose the lessons. A challenge I face as a reader, and perhaps why I have accumulated a small following as a writer, is figuring out how to convert ideas from a book into actionable habits. So what major life habit changes have I made in 2010? I became vegan. That's it. But I also made some changes to my business strategy, putting lots of money in my pocket. And I became better at competitive sports. I felt happy for greater intervals of time. And my mental map of how my brain works has become more clear. And hopefully, the books I choose to read next year will be ultimately more relevant useful and practical. I have been planting seeds (for creative sprouting, which has paid some initial dividends). I have been also grasping for intellectual edification, trying to answer big questions that have been lurking in my head. Hopefully I will also start asking better questions instead of wasting time on the wrong questions. Practically, I think that I could reduce each book I read into a few solid actionable ideas/suggestions. I may actually go through each of my blog's entries. If I eliminate rationale, I will be left with only results.. and people pay for results. Want to get the personal improvement of reading 50 books without having to compensate my ego by listening through my insufferable nerdy analysis? Get the PDF for $X. I also have to figure out how I want to shift my reading strategy for 2011. Thoughts welcome.

JesseAldridge 16y ago

I don't know. I have a suspicion books are overvalued due to the cultual weight they've historically carried. Wise people read books. We tend to think of browsing the internet as frivilous when compared to reading classic literature -- but is it really? With books, the individual ideas don't get filtered by up and down votes or what have you. You only get ideas from one person -- you don't get immediate dissenting views. People on the internet know attention is a scarce resource and make an effort to condense their ideas as much as possible. Long form has advantages, certainly; but perhaps a big reason we are so drawn to the internet is that it is actually the better use of time.

nostrademons 16y ago
With books, the individual ideas get filtered by the process of revision that's necessary to produce a work good enough to get past the slushpile. It's a very different sort of filtering process. Social news sites distribute the filtering load across many different people, but collapse it in time - any given person spends about 2 seconds deciding whether to up- or down-vote a story. The publishing industry collapses the filtering load across very few people (a handful of editors decide whether a book will be accepted or rejected for publication), but spreads it out over time (your editor will then work with you over a protracted period to make sure the work expresses your views as clearly and as fully as possible). They seem to result in very different outcomes. Social news tends to promote articles that are just barely at the edge of common practice. They make you think "Oh, that's a good idea", but can't fundamentally challenge the way you think, because you don't have time to absorb a fundamentally challenging idea. Books, however, can fundamentally change your outlook - if you let them. But the process of letting them is difficult, and you need to find the right book, and it needs to come at the right time in your cognitive development. I think the Internet has done a great thing for making the masses of people better informed, but it still does not replace books. Partially because, on a competitive level, all of your competitors have read the same blogs as well. You need to distinguish yourself with something difficult, which ideally would come from personal experience, but books are often the next best thing.
ThomPete 16y ago
If you read outside your own area you are in fact doing something different. You are combining knowledge from other fields and tie them into your own. This can never be a bad thing no matter how different the field might be.

coliveira 16y ago

> If you asked me 2 years ago if I can go through 1 hour of uninterrupted reading I would probably laugh at you. My goodness. This made me stop in the tracks. I find it hard to believe that the web life style is making so much damage to people. I have always taken for granted that reading for hours is the easiest thing an educated person can do. I don't have the time now, but when I was a teenager I could read for 4, 5 hours non-stop (maybe with a snack or two). A few books grabbed my attention for a whole day. It is sad that people think it is an effort to concentrate on a single book for longer than a few minutes.

zaphar 16y ago
I completely agree. When I was a teenager I easily read 3-4 books a week. That pace has slowed since but I would guess I still read well over 50 books a year. My mom tracked my reading count one summer and I clicked in at 200 books.