6 strategies that will make you a better reader — and person

If you find yourself wanting to speed up the reading process on a particular book, you might want to ask yourself: “Is this book any good?”

You turn off a TV show or movie if it’s boring. You stop eating food that doesn’t taste good. You unfollow people when you realize their content is useless.

Life is too short to read books you don’t enjoy reading. The thumb rule: 100 pages minus your age — so if you’re 30 years old and a book hasn’t captivated you by page 70, stop reading it.

That way, as you age, you have to endure crappy books less and less.

From Seneca to Ronald Reagan, it has been a best practice to save or collect notes, ideas and quotes.

Type out quotes and passages from great books to feel great writing come through you. Have a rough notepad, a collection of quotes, ideas, stories and facts that you want to keep for later. Or just use the Deepstash app!

 It will make you a much better writer and a wiser person. 

You were in high school when you read The Great Gatsby for the first time. You were just a kid when someone tell you the story of Odysseus.

The point is: You got it, right? You’ve already read them or learned about them, so you’re done, right?

We cannot be content to simply pick up a book once and judge it by that experience; it’s why we have to read and reread.

If a book changed someone’s life — whatever the topic or style — it’s probably worth the investment. If it changed them, then it will likely at least help you.

Ralph Waldo Emerson’s once quoted: “If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.”

 Humans have been fighting and dying and struggling and doing the same things for eons. To not avail yourself of their knowledge is arrogant and stupid.

How dare you waste investors’ money by not reading and learning from the mistakes of other entrepreneurs? How dare you so take your marriage or your children for granted that you think you can afford to figure these out by doing the wrong things first?

You must learn from the experiences of others. Drink deeply from history, philosophy, and more. Study the cautionary tales and the screw-ups, the failures and successes.

The path to wisdom is not a straight one. The journey is long and circuitous with twists and turns, ups and downs, highs and lows. Maybe you’re in the middle of a low right now, or you’re at the very bottom of the valley. This can be a scary place to be, because it can feel like you’ll be stuck there forever.

It helps to revisit your favourite books and be energized again.