Tips For Doing Large Quantities Of Reading?

Jimmy Clayton

Jimmy Clayton

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Feb 26, 2008
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I'm the kind of person who accumulates books far faster than I can read them. I would assume there are a large amount of people here who are much the same way.

But recently, I have become rather overwhelmed and my reading progress has slowed to a crawl.

Does anybody have any tips for how to organize your reading and manage your "reading/research/self education" time effectively?

*Note*: I use the word "book" because I am still living in the 1920's, but book = normal book, ebook, audio book, information posted on the internet, etc...

Do you read one book at a time? Do you read multiple books at a time? All on the same topic? Or do you read multiple books on different topics? (One on interwebz, a biography, one on philosophy, etc)

Do you have a master list of books in order that you follow? Or do you just pick up the next book you can find when you finish the previous one?

Do you find a book you like, sit down, and grind it out over the span of a weekend? Or do you go "slow and steady", and take a month to finish a book?

At what point do you put down a book and say, "This book sucks - i'm not going to finish it..."? Or, do you solider through hoping to get at least a little something from every book you buy?

Thanks in advance.
 


another fucking hipster buying books to look "deep". Try cracking the cover, lazy fucking poser.
 
Most of what you're reading is a waste of time. I stick to reading only for leisure and only before bed. I used to try to read any and everything but it just doesn't work. You think you are learning everything but really you're learning nothing.

Burning through books doesn't even let you understand the arguments and concepts of them. You just throw out excerpts from books during conversation and it seems like you know what you're talking about.

Take one book, ONE, and read it this way - http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/PDF/howtoread.pdf

Now figure you're going to do this on all those books and I guarantee your reading list will shrink in 2.19 seconds. Think of all the books you read last year and now try to think of the specific benefit you gleaned from it.

You read the talent code eh brah? What are you doing with it that it's helping you right now? Probably nothing. You aren't Mark Cuban, you don't need to read 3 hours a day because he does.
 
dmnEPC said:
another fucking hipster buying books to look "deep". Try cracking the cover, lazy fucking poser.
Click to expand...

Blow me fuckface.

I buy books for information, not to look deep.

Most of the best books I have read have only been available in "physical book" form because they are older. You know, a time before any shithead from WaFo could write a book, format it for Kindle, sell it on Amazon and call themselves an author.

And bro...did you just call me a hipster? (In Coach Hines voice...)
 
Jameel said:
Most of what you're reading is a waste of time. I stick to reading only for leisure and only before bed. I used to try to read any and everything but it just doesn't work. You think you are learning everything but really you're learning nothing.

Burning through books doesn't even let you understand the arguments and concepts of them. You just throw out excerpts from books during conversation and it seems like you know what you're talking about.

Take one book, ONE, and read it this way - http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/PDF/howtoread.pdf

Now figure you're going to do this on all those books and I guarantee your reading list will shrink in 2.19 seconds. Think of all the books you read last year and now try to think of the specific benefit you gleaned from it.

You read the talent code eh brah? What are you doing with it that it's helping you right now? Probably nothing. You aren't Mark Cuban, you don't need to read 3 hours a day because he does.
Click to expand...

Thats some good info. Thanks
 
Jimmy Clayton said:
Blow me fuckface.

I buy books for information, not to look deep.

Most of the best books I have read have only been available in "physical book" form because they are older. You know, a time before any shithead from WaFo could write a book, format it for Kindle, sell it on Amazon and call themselves an author.

And bro...did you just call me a hipster? (In Coach Hines voice...)
Click to expand...

O'rly? How are you getting the information? Osmosis? Seriously though, there is no secret to reading. Just start 1 page at a time. If that is to hard, try one paragraph at a time. Still to hard? Just open a book and read the first word. You will be amazed at your results..
 
I joined goodreads the other day. Seems like a reasonable way to keep track of what you've read, and what you want to read.

At University I used to break each book down by chapter with number of pages, stick it on the wall and tick it off as I went. Visual progress and bitesize chunks motherfucker.
 
I highly recommend that you start taking notes on the non fiction books you read.

I find myself being able to reference things much better. There are always times that I think "this book covered what I am dealing with pretty well...but what was it?" Well with book notes I can usually back track and figure things out.

The other thing I like is if I ever want to re-read a book I can always just read the book notes.

I also have a fiction book in my bathroom. I choose fiction because it's much easier to pick up and put down after reading only a few pages. I read 3-5 a years just from that.

Finally, audio books. If you drive to work or drive to the grocery store you can listen to your book. This works better for fiction books since I like taking notes. Lately I have been experimenting with listening to non-fiction books and taking audio recordings of my thoughts with my phone and then writing them down when I have the time. The only issue I have with that is my notes are not as in depth.
 
Stephen King wrote in his book "On Writing" that he feels that most people think that you have to read in long stretches, but sometimes little sips are also fine.

He suggests that you can read while waiting in line or even waiting for your food to arrive. Granted he reads 60-90 books a year and that's his life but you need to learn how to chunk.

Chunking books does work well.
 
Audiobooks are awesome, I've almost entirely cut music out of my drives unless I'm with other people. Audible.com is worth checking out. Be it 3 minutes or 3 hours, you can learn something everytime you get in your car. I've listened to several books this year, and hours worth of podcasts, too.
 
I'm reading 2 books right now ("Think Python" and "Influence - The psychology of persuasion") and several research papers (about Bitcoins and psychology).

I never really stress myself and say "I need to read 100 pages today!!". I only read when I want to and when I have the desire to. I'm by no means a fast reader (1 page per 1:30min I think - but keep in mind, I'm reading in English, which is my second language) but I mostly try to pick up what's discussed in that particular page and reflect what's been discussed. There is no point in reading books, that ought to enlighten you, super fast and end up skipping some of the more important parts of it. If I'm reading a novel (recently finished "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy") I'm reading faster though, but again, I try to reflect what's happened and try to explain certain behaviors in the characters or the environment.

All in all, find your own reading style. Certain type of books need to be read slower in order to understand what's going on, others can be simply "scanned" to realize what's happening. Read when you have the desire to, else you will end up learning close to none.

If you want some book recommendations about certain subjects, hmu.
 
I write notes in the margins of all my books, notes for myself and important points. It helps me retain the the information better. It's kind of neat too because when I reread a book after time has passed I look back at myself through my notes. My father did this, picked it up from him. I would read his notes growing up and add my own.
 
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