Reading More - Tips

One thing most of us have in common, we all want to be readers. We all know the importance reading adds to our lives and I won’t talk about that here todayu. Instead, one area we all want to work on is reading with concentration. It is easy for us to watch hours of a football match without losing our concentration. It is also easy for us to watch lots of movies in one seating without losing our concentration. But why is it so hard to read for an hour only with all our concentration present. This is what I am going to cover here today. If you check the examples of football and movies above, they have three things in common that helps it to have concentration for a longer period. These three things are: 

1. Programming

2.Practice 

3. Passion 

 Movies and football are automatically programmed into our minds, we do it all the time and that checks off the practice and it is one thing we love doing it hence the passion aspect being present.

 How can we make reading tick all the above boxes? 

PROGRAMMING 

 If you set out to do anything, you are supposed to program your mind first. You are supposed to answer your WHY for wanting to do that thing. For example, If I want to exercise and go to gym, I will sit down somewhere to set out plans. Why I want to go to gym? It is because I want to lose some weight. Why this gym specifically? Maybe it has good trainers or it is closer to my house or my friends go there or maybe it is cheaper than the rest. Now I will think of what times I want to go there every day. Maybe early mornings because I don’t go back to sleep and it is easy for me or maybe I will go in the evening because my friends go there that time and they will be my accountability partners. Asking yourself all this and planning out the answers is what we call programming of the mind. When the mind knows all these answers, it is like a GPS you put it all the directions and it is ready to take you wherever you want to go. Your mind plays the role of making sure you concentrate throughout the gym classes and not miss a day. Same goes for reading. 

We need to sit down and program down our mind to create a reading habit with concentration. But how do you do that? It again starts with you sitting down with a pen and a paper and asking yourself the following questions? 

1. Why do you want to read? Why now? Why this book?

 2. When or what times do you want to read? Daily or two times a week or more?

 3. Where do you want to read? At the library or in your bedroom or in the dining table?

 4. How will you be reading? Read over everything and be done or take notes? 

 These are examples of questions when you answer them, they help you program your mind perfectly. For example, you want to read to better yourself and now is the time you think you are free and the reason you want to read this book is maybe you want to work on your leadership skills. You want to read every morning before you leave the house for 10mins only and you will be reading in the balcony of the sitting room. You will be going through the book and noting down all important points along the way. These are your answers. The way your mind works is it will remind you every morning that you are missing something and when you get a book in your preferred place, it will make sure you concentrate throughout the reading with less distractions.

 The only way you can know if this works is if you give it a try. Program your mind today and start creating a reading habit in your life.

 PRACTICE 

The example we set above was only 10min reading every day. This is the best practice that can help you create a reading habit. Read for only 10mins and stop reading even if you were enjoying that book. Come back to it at a later time and read for another 10min and stop. The practice here is the same way you practice every other skill you learnt whether it is football or even cooking. Do it in a short period over many repetitions and you get a well-practiced skill in your life forever.

 PASSION 

Passion is the love and energy you put in into everything you do. If you are really into something, you have to love it to succeed in it. You can’t do something you don’t love and expect to get something big. 

Fall in love with reading first to get your concentration and reading speed to another level. How do we fall in love with reading? Go back to your why, why do you want to read? That gives you a clear reason which can make you fall in love with reading. Another thing that can help is only read what you love. If you are into histories of people, read more biographies. If you are into personal development, read the personal development books written by your favorite authors. That way you will fall in love with reading and become more passionate.

 In conclusion, always remember to write down your goals clearly. If your goal is to read 50 pages daily, write it down and that will help your mind into programming yourself. Also, start saying No more often. You will for sure be distracted, Say NO to everything when it is time to read. I hope you fall in love with reading very soon and you create a habit that will stay with you forever. This is the greatest investment I made for myself and I am sure it will be the same for you. Happy reading more books.