Read More Books

Education, mental health, Mind, peak state by Pat DeCola

Look, we all want to read more.

I feel like I don’t read enough, you probably feel like you don’t read enough, and we all wish we “just had the time to sit down and read.”

I’m certainly still working on this aspect of myself, as my book collection continuously grows wider and more interesting … but also taller and taller.

My goal at the moment is to hit 20 minutes of good, solid reading a day, preferably in the morning before things really get underway. It’s just enough that it’s a realistic amount to achieve daily, yet it’s an amount that will compound my knowledge over time.

And it’s that compounded knowledge that is what we’re really looking for, especially as dads.

Inventor and writer Lin Yutang on the magic of reading:

“Compare the difference between the life of a man who does no reading and that of a man who does. The man who has not the habit of reading is imprisoned in his immediate world, in respect to time and space. His life falls into a set routine; he is limited to contact and conversation with a few friends and acquaintances, and he sees only what happens in his immediate neighborhood. From this prison there is no escape.

But the moment he takes up a book, he immediately enters a different world, and if it is a good book, he is immediately put in touch with one of the best talkers of the world. This talker leads him on and carries him into a different country or a different age, or unburdens to him some of his personal regrets, or discusses with him some special line or aspect of life that the reader knows nothing about. An ancient author puts him in communion with a dead spirit of long ago, and as he reads along, he begins to imagine what that ancient author looked like and what type of person he was…

Now to be able to live two hours out of twelve in a different world and take one’s thoughts off the claims of the immediate present is, of course, a privilege to be envied by people shut up in their bodily prison.”

Source: The IMPORTANCE OF LIVING

When faced with any decision, no matter how big or how small, we take with us every single previous decision and every bit of information we’ve ever learned. It stands to reason, then, that with the more information one has acquired through experience and learning, the better decisions can be made moving forward.

And if I’ve come to learn anything about parenting, it’s just a series of decisions, big and small, over and over again until you pass out watching Season 3 of The Office for the third Wednesday in a row.

So, basically, I want to commit as much of my time to reading and learning as possible, because I know it will help me navigate my own life more successfully, and will in turn help me perform better as a father and husband.

In the meantime, here are some resources I’ve collected to get the juices flowing on why it’s important to cut into that growing stack but also on, you know, how to actually do it.

Looking at those headlines, it certainly seems like science wants us to read. So maybe we should, then?

And here are some recommendations for books I’ve read recently, have in the hopper or are my classic go-tos.

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