Imagine you’ve read an entire book and when you’re done you’re asking your self ‘what did I gain from that? What did I learn From that?’.
We’ll be sharing with you some tips on choosing books that you’ll actually enjoy and gain from. These tips will help you to decide whether you want to read a book cover to cover.
The Biggest mistakes we make when readers
Before we jump into the tips, it’s important to discuss the biggest mistakes we make as reader to avoid these mistake or change our mindsets.
Mistake #1: We think that every book needs to be read cover to cover.
To be truthful, every book is not worth being read cover to cover. Identifying which books are to be read cover to cover and which book are not, will help determine the value we find in it at the end of the read.
Mistake #2: We make reading more about will power rather than love power.
If you are dragging yourself just to read, and every page is a struggle to read that means that you’re relying on your will power and you’re not quite making it through. But really you should be relying on your love power.
Throw your energy in a book that give you genuine interest, you’re excited to learn and you’re energized to speak about and read.
Don’t just read a book because somebody told you to or because it’s number one on the New York Times Best Seller List. Read a book that you are passionate about or is on a subject that you’re interested in.
Mistake #3 – Wrong way at looking at successfully reading books
We measure success for reading books by how much books we finish, rather than how much we have actually learnt from a book.
Finishing a book is nowhere near as important as actually learning from it and gaining from it.
Tips on how to choosing and reading Books that you’ll actually enjoy and learn from
1. Determine why you want to read in the first place.
- Is it because you want to be entertained?
- Or Is it because you want to learn new ideas about how to improve your life?
- Or Maybe it’s because you want to grow your intellect?
- Is it because you want to learn new information?
You are closer you are to finding clarity on why you want to read a book, the more closer you’ll be to becoming a successful reader.
2. Learn More about the book you choose to read
Before start to read a book, google or search for the Ted Talk or youtube video relating to the book. This allows you to determine whether you feel that topic is compelling enough and whether you feel attracted to that subject line. The main aim of this is to grasp the concept of the book as quick as possible.
It allows you to understand the essential principles, the underlining thought behind the book from the author without having to invest a week or a month to actually finish the book and then realizing that reading that book was a waste of time.
3. Start at Chapter One. Read Chapter one in full.
When you find the book that you’re interested in, read chapter one. The author always puts a lot of energy and effort in chapter one. So it’s important to read that so you get an idea of the big picture of the book and what’s to come.
4. Highlight the key Chapters and areas of interest and read them
Highlight the sections that you really find interesting and that stick out to you.
5. Focus on the most important words in the sentence.
Focus in on the more stronger words in a sentence. For example, if a sentence has 10 words and you can read the most important 3-4 words and still extrapolate the same meanings.
You’re able to grab 90% of the meaning while looking at 30% of the words.
6. Read the first 3 lines and Last 3 lines of each paragraphs that you think you might be interested in.
When you read the first 3 lines and last 3 lines in you’ll be able to quickly ascertain if that paragraph has insights that you really want to know. You’ll be able to grab the key information and decide if you want to read the rest.
When you’re reading, if you’re not learning from it, it’s not inspiring you or motivating you, you have to drag yourself through it. Move on.
7. Use Audio Books
If you are someone that likes audio books, there are some apps that speeds up the audio so that you can listen the content much faster.
8. After each chapter, write down the 3 S
- The story that inspired you
- A statistic that you found interesting
- A note of something you’d like to Share with someone else
This is a great way of getting more out of a book.
By doing these tips, you’ll be able to get a grasp of an entire book within 2 hours and know if the book you’ve chosen is the right book. Rather than reading the entire book cover to cover and realizing that you got little to no value from it.
Here is what some of the most successful people in the world thinks about books.
Warren Buffet, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, says he spends 5-6 hours per day reading 5 newspapers.
Bill Gates, American Business Magnate and Investor, reads about 50 books a year, mainly books in the categories of business, health, engineering, diseases.
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, says he reads book to educate himself about different cultures and backgrounds.
Orah Windfrey, American Talk Show Host, Television Producer and Actress, calls that reading is her personal path to freedom.
Mark Cuban, American businessman and Investor, says he reads to learn about new industutires
Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, said he read the Britannica Encyclopedia in its entirety by the time he was 9 years old.
