How do you actually read?
How do you actually read?
Background:
I'm in my 40s and I've always sort of beaten myself up over not being an avid reader. I go through phases where I read a bunch, sometimes I'll finish a book in a months time, sometimes start a book and forget it, sometimes it seems like I go literally years without really getting into any book at all. But I still accumulate them.
Because of how important reading is and now I "fail" to prioritize it, I've always found myself in a poor relationship with reading. I feel this artificial pressure to read things that are only important and will somehow make me more useful. I feel this artificial pressure to start one book and read it to the end. I feel this artificial pressure to become a changed person by fully investing every bit of info from every book.
I've been learning that these pressures are untenable.
I've also noticed that I partake in all kinds of things without the same expectations: tv shows, games, podcasts, media and news outlets, social media, etc.
Right now I have 6 books that I am actively reading, and I am trying to remember that it's for enjoyment and not some high level goal. Someone told me if I read 10 pages a day I would finish about 10 books a year. I found this so encouraging.
Taking the pressure off of reading has really helped me get more productive at reading, and I think it will help me convert my habit into a truly fruitful one.
So now I ask you:
- What are your reading habits like?
- What do you like to read?
- What kind of stage of life are you in, and how does that affect it?
- Have you made any changes, positive or negative, to your reading habits?
- What else?
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- "Foundation" by Isaac Asimov is one of the only 3 novels I have read, that are were not part of my school course.
- Another one was some romance novel that I got as a prize for some competition I can't remember and I managed to force myself to read it until the end. Needless to say, I didn't like it. The setting was probably Victorian Era.
- The third is an English translation of the Light Novel "Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei", which I am not sure when I intend on completing.
I am a very sloow reader. Foundation was a pretty thin book and I took months. I tend to read a little, imagine it, dream on it and have fun that way and this one turned out to work really well for that. I thought of checking out the Prelude and other parts in the series, but never went ahead with it.
I have seen myself getting intrigued by the thought the writer (may/may not have) put into the worldbuilding aspect and find myself exploring the same in my mind.
My habits: I read what I feel like, when I feel like it. I remember having borrowed picture encyclopedias from school libraries as a child and just leisurely reading them. Those things were pretty fun too.