Я Изменил Свое Мнение о Чтении.

How reading literature helps you understand more about yourself and your view of the world.

Childhood.

First of all, I was never a big fan of reading because of my dopaminergic personality. The idea that you have to stay in one place and pay attention to only one thing was driving me crazy. I would rather go outside and play with my friends, come home and play on the computer. That was giving me way more dopamine than staring into a book.

In school, we were assigned to read utterly boring novels. Most of them were Romanian/Moldovan authors, which didn’t describe worlds that children would love to be part of, at least in my case. Apart from Ion Creanga’s “Amintiri din Copilarie”, which I found interesting because I spent 1 month in my grandma’s village, I haven’t read anything else at school.

At home, reading was also present, in a way. I was paid with “spending time at the computer” if I was reading. However, I always found a way to break the system by skipping pages and lying about the plot, in order to spend as much time playing video games.

I built a hatred towards reading books. People who did that were fake, strange, and most importantly did that to impress teachers and parents.

Getting to Know “Reading”.

Back in 2017, I got into “entrepreneurship, financial freedom, motivational stuff ”and so on. However, from all the useless things that I did during that time, I came across Robert Kiyosaki’s book “Rich Dad Poor Dad”. This was the second book that I have ever read and I loved it.

I learned so much about investments, financial advice and the philosophy towards money. That’s when I realised that I was wrong about my relationship with books. You can learn a lot from them.

However, reading became a “thing” only after I started watching Pewdiepie’s series “Literature Club”, where Felix was reading a list of books monthly and afterwards giving his opinion and rating them. This series motivated me to start reading on the regular and helped me find books that I was interested in.

Why Should You Read Books.

As I have mentioned in the beginning, I described myself as a “dopaminergic” person. I found out about that from the book that I am reading at the moment, “The Molecule of More” by Michael E. Long and Daniel Z. Lieberman.

Reading books helps you understand more about yourself. I no longer wonder why I get distracted easily, get excited and eager to go after goals or rewards, have an addictive personality and constantly get tired of repetitive things. I was thinking that something was wrong with me, constantly blamed myself, or maybe I had a mental illness. But now, by learning how dopamine works, I accepted how I am and started using this as a tool.

In 2019 I was going through a tough period, to say the least. A lot of unexpected and difficult events occurred in my life and I wasn’t ready for such pressure. That’s when I first experienced depression and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I was quite immature, naive and very stubborn. That’s when I came across Jordan Peterson’s book “12 Rules for Life” and his lectures.

Reading books can improve your life. After reading Jordan’s book, I started dealing with my problems. Started telling the truth to others and most importantly to myself. Above all, I learned that I have to pursue what is meaningful not what is expedient. Jordan Peterson saved me.

Last month I came across Joe Rogan's Podcast with Matthew Walker, a professor of neuroscience and psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. In this episode, Matthew explains why sleep is so vital, how it can improve our daily performance and most importantly how lack of sleep harms our health. I wanted to learn more about sleep and how can I improve it, that’s why I read Matthew’s book “Why We Sleep” and afterwards wrote a story on Medium titled Why & How Sleep Matters.

Reading books can make you an expert in a certain field. Matthew has spent a lifetime learning about sleep in order to write this book. All I had to do is spend a few hours reading the book and now I know pretty much everything about sleep.

One of my favorite books of all time is “Shoe Dog” by Phil Knight. It is a memoir by Nike co-founder Phil Knight. Phil had a crazy idea, he believed that Japanese shoes could become more popular than European shoes in America. He details the many risks he encountered, the crushing setbacks, the ruthless competitors and hostile bankers — as well as his many thrilling triumphs.

Reading books can motivate you. This book proved to me that everything is possible. You can achieve and become anything and anyone by taking risks and believing in your crazy ideas. You just have to keep going.

After reading lots of non-fiction one of my friends recommended “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexander Dumas. Dantes is imprisoned on the island prison of Chateau d’If for 13 years, where he plots revenge against those who betrayed him. With help from another prisoner, he escapes the island and proceeds to transform himself into the wealthy Count of Monte Cristo as part of his plan to exact revenge. This is one of my favorite books and the longest book that I have read (1276 pages).

Reading books can help you escape reality. I became Dantes. The book describes everything: the atmosphere, the smell, the looks, the colours, everything. You are immersed in that world. I still feel like I've been there, experiencing the 19th century and reliving Dantes’s life.

How to Develop a Reading Habit.

1. The most important thing is to begin by reading something that you will find interesting. After taking a huge break from reading last year, picking up the habit was pretty difficult. So I started reading the Harry Potter books.
2. Start your own “literature club”. Introduce reading to your friends or/and family and start reading together. Set monthly goals, and discuss the books that you are reading and what have you learnt.
3. Read 2–3 books at the same time. I get bored reading the same book, so I always switch to a different one. A great way to do this is by reading different genres.
4. Set goals and schedule a time for reading. For example, one of my goals this year is to read 2 books a month. I tend to read ~30 pages every evening before sleep.
5. Motivate yourself by watching youtube videos. Start by watching Felix’s series Literature Club. John Fish is another great example, his taste in books is amazing, I read a lot of books from his list. Check out one of his videos. Also, this is one of my favorite videos/documentaries about books.
6. Buy a kindle. This recommendation came from a friend and it changed my life. At first, I was biased because I “liked the feel of real books”, but, after using kindle I understood how easy and comfortable is to read on it. You can read in the dark, doesn’t affect your melatonin that much at night; it weighs very little so you can carry it around and you don’t get tired of holding it. Most importantly, you have access to all your books on one device.

I am so happy and grateful to be able to read and consume as much knowledge as I can. If I was to give one piece of advice to someone, it would be to start reading books.

Tip: Use a pen/pencil or your finger to sweep along the line as you read. This will improve focus and speed.