Introduction: Read More in 2016 – Start Forming the Habit of Reading a Book a Week
I am an introvert. I am very reserved, but people mistake it for being unfriendly. But, if you get me talking about books, you’ll have a difficult time getting me to shut-up. I cannot remember a time when I didn’t enjoy reading. So, I would love it if you made it one of your goals to read more books in 2016 because you’ll experience so many benefits.
Back in the day, when I was attending high school in Jamaica, I would use my pocket money to buy some magazines that were imported from the UK. Can’t remember the names of the magazines now, but I remember that by the time they got to Jamaica, they were three months old. I didn’t care about that, all I cared about was that I had the opportunity to read freely.
Every Wednesday after school, I would head to the supermarket and wait patiently for them to unload trucks and stack the magazine stand. And speaking about books, I was totally into Barbara Cartland
and Mills and Boons
– I had already graduated from Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. Do you remember those days? Or are you too young?
Today, we live in an instant world.
And that’s the problem… people want instant gratification… but the real, lasting benefits of reading more books is not instant, especially if you read the way that I recommend – taking notes while reading, extracting the five big ideas, then combining the ideas to innovate. I want you to get the most out of the books that you read, so that’s why I recommend that you read this way.
It seems as if reading a book is a lost art, and it makes me very sad. However, I was delighted to read a recent article in the New York Times, “Our (Bare) Shelves, Our Selves” that indicates that children benefit academically from a home library. The New York Times article pulled information from, Social Forces Oxford Journals, which reported the results of the survey. The article in Social Forces “Scholarly Culture and Academic Performance in 42 Nations” reports,
“Notably, research has demonstrated that scholarly culture—homes that abound in books and in which the way of life involves esteeming, reading, and enjoying books—is associated with higher educational attainment in several rich Western countries, net of social class and many other factors (de Graaf 1986; de Graaf, de Graaf, and Kraaykamp 2000; Evans and Kelley 2000).”
Not only will you benefit from reading more books in 2016, but so will your children, if we are to believe the results of the study. To get the most from the books you read, you have to choose the right books. In my opinion, the right books are the books that have the potential to transform your life for the better. These books would include books that help you to perform your work more effectively and efficiently, as well as help you to develop personally. To make sure that you choose the right books to develop professionally, might I suggest that you answer the following five questions:
- What issues does your industry face?
- What issues do you face in the workplace, and perhaps even personally?
- What’s a problem that would give you great satisfaction if you could solve it?
- What’s a new skill you have always wanted to learn?
- What areas do you have to develop to become a better version of YOU?
Have you read?
Choosing the Right Books: Read the World Challenge
Answering the five questions will give you insights into the kind of information you need to further your knowledge, which will determine the books you read. Imagine what would happen in your career, if you found ways to resolve important industry and workplace issues? If you cannot answer the five questions, there are many people who are able to assist you.
Talk to industry experts, your boss and senior level managers to find out what issues they are grappling with – what workplace issues keep them up at nights. Talk to librarians to identify top five books in your industry, then scan the Table of Contents to identify the questions that the authors are trying to answer with their books.
Additionally, you may face challenges in the way you perform your work, or your colleagues may mention the difficulties they face in performing their roles. You may have aspirations of becoming a speaker, and want to develop expertise in one or two areas. Perhaps you want to create a course to sell on Udemy, as a way to get some passive income. These are cues and clues for you as to what needs fixing and what areas you need to develop, which provides you with an opportunity to go on a reading adventure into the minds of people who know about the topics you are interested in.
Each expert may be knowledgeable about the book he or she wrote, but if you read say three to five books on the topic, extracting the big ideas from each that direct you how to solve the issues in your workplace, you are ahead of them. And if you took that one step further, by using the Monthly Reading Matrix to combine the ideas, you can leapfrog against them.
Further Reading
Knowledge is power – 30 books every young entrepreneur should read
50 great books recommended by TED and TED-Ed
We have so many opportunities to make an impact in the world if we are willing to take a chance. Break free from your self-imposed barriers, then go forth to conquer the world – it starts with reading one book each week for 52 weeks. If this sounds daunting to you, invite a friend to join you on the Strategic Reading Challenge, where we’ll have a community of readers supporting each other.
