Habit

Not a lot of people have large chunks of time during the day to read, so how do we get through books?

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It seems like fewer and fewer of us have time for what we might consider as “truly leisurely reading” anymore. If it happens, it’s more of a luxury that we have to plan and make time for. Reading / Andy Roberts

Yes, yes, yes: I know and have read that everyone gets the same 86,400 seconds each day to do whatever he or she chooses to do. So I know that I don’t read as much as I would like to, and I know for a fact that reading seems to come so naturally and effortlessly for some people that they could get through a book in as short of a time as a mere week (!!)

So how do they do it?

1. Wake up early.

I talked in my previous post about waking up early that it allocates hours of a relatively clutter-free mind to yourself. This is excellent timing to read some brain-power-consuming material, something more along the lines of Winston Churchill’s analysis of the Second World War or a statistical textbook or something along those lines, rather than a suspenseful novel that could be put down and picked up at a moment’s notice.

2. Having a e-Book Reader actually does help (with weight management)

It’s fairly straightforward to get a Kindle or some kind of similar device to put in the backpack, purse, or even in a large enough pocket that you can bring along to places. The fun thing about these devices is that you’re not limited to what’s expensive and popular: something equally as feel-good as The Count of Monte Cristo will run you the astronomical price of $0.99 as its copyright has expired. There are also all types of magazine and newspaper subscriptions that Kindle and other devices will support, which enables some reading during public transit, bathroom breaks, standing in the Chipotle line at lunch hour, waiting for your code to finish, et cetera.

3. Purists may not count Audiobooks and Podcasts as reading, but for all intents and purposes they are just as good.

If your commute is at any point longer than 10 minutes I would strongly recommend getting a well-reviewed Podcast manager like BeyondPod or Stitcher for Android. For the iPhone, the built-in iTunes podcast manager should suffice just as well. Podcasts have developed and evolved to the point where basically anything you’re remotely interested in will have a podcast dedicated to it for your daily commute needs. Below are just some of the most basic examples:

  • World News
  • Comedy
  • Stories
  • Sports
  • Language Learning
  • Business
  • Self-improvement
  • Naughty stuff

Another reason that I really encourage more audio-transmitted information is that it enables you to do some of the more mindless things that you know you should do, but you don’t necessarily want to do: jogging for a couple of miles, clean up the house, doing yardwork, and so forth. I don’t actually look forward to doing any of these things, but they are substantially less painful if I can focus my mind on a podcast or audiobook on it.

And finally, some thoughts on why it’s so hard to get back into reading when it seemed so effortless when we were children.

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I think this is more conducive to reading – especially if your phone is stuck on roaming and doesn’t have any 3G or LTE access. Nature / Moyan Brenn

I’m a firm believer in the thought that having access to the Internet makes it so hard to get focused into reading. Whether I was in my own room being tempted by my computer or even lying on my bed and couldn’t help myself but browse Reddit on my phone, hours fly by, and soon I’m lamenting at myself that I could have done some productive reading during that time.

Incidentally, the most relaxing places around the city that I’ve found to be especially conducive to reading are coffee shops, libraries, the airport, or on the swings of a playground. What all of these places have in common is that they force you to turn off your computer and actually venture outside to get your reading done. And just like everything else that is supposed to be good for you, the first step takes the most effort.

Reading, at the end of the day, is a patient effort. And we’ve gotten really good at not being very patient with the Internet available, constantly triggering our reward centers. So if nothing else, do try turning off your computer and leaving your phone somewhere else when you open a book – I hope you’ll be pleasantly surprised at how immersive uninterrupted reading can be.

Waking up early during Winter (It’s not a sin to wake up early and then proceed to play video games and watch Netflix.)

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This sleepy dog somewhat accurately represents a person barely woken up by a 6:00 AM alarm in winter. Except there wouldn’t be nearly as much light in real life. Sleepy | TCL8TO7

Winter is here. Our first snow has fallen, and I drive to work having to rely on my car’s headlights in the morning darkness and drive home having to rely on my car’s headlights in the utterly identical afternoon darkness.

For those of us who hinged our New Years’ Resolutions (or those who have Thanksgiving Resolutions – wow!) to the act of waking up early, we might have picked a bad season to do so. It’d be infinitely easier in the summer, where I could just throw the blinds open, hop into bed, and drift off to slumber knowing that Sunrise was at 5 and the light hitting my eyes would tell my body it was time to wake up.

However, just because it’s darker at a certain time in the day shouldn’t deter us from cultivating our early-rising habits. I, for one, get a strange sense of schadenfreude at myself in one of those rare moments where I wake up at 5 on a weekday. Wow, I’ve managed to write for 1,000 words, cleared all of my emails from the day before, finished one deliverable, and it’s barely 8:30 AM. That former me who woke up at 8 and almost missed his meeting? What an idiot. I’m not sure how healthy this line of thought is, but it does make getting out of bed in the morning easier.

I’m a strong believer in the school of thought that given the same conditions, we are more productive in the morning than at night. I haven’t been able to find scholastic literature backing up what I just wrote, but for me, night time is video game time. It’s an time to escape all the work I’ve done during the day and not think about the things I have to do in the near future.

Conversely, if I’d just woken up, my mind is relatively empty of random thoughts dropping by and it becomes a lot easier to focus on a task.

HOWEVER! We’re getting ahead of ourselves. This post is about how to get the habit of waking up early started, not for me to go on a self-congratulatory trip. So here’s the secret as far as I can tell:

To make waking up early in the morning a habit, reduce your mental preparation for waking up early in the morning.

So what does this mean? We split it into two main sections:

  • (Falling Asleep) If you’re sleeping at your normal time, make waking up at 5 AM (Or some other desired hour/minute) your #1 Priority. Do everything you can to ensure that you’re falling asleep at around 10. If you had something come up and you had to fall asleep at 11 or 11:30, you are still committed to waking up at the exact same time the next day.
    • However, an inflexible plan is a bad plan.
    • So if you for some reason pulled a half-nighter or all-nighter at had to go to bed at 2. Give your self a break and sleep in because you deserve your adequate rest!
    • If you happened to play Rocket League until 4 in the morning and feel terribly guilty about it. Go ahead and acknowledge it, get some decent rest and start your streak anew the next day without dwelling on it too much. Guilt in the self-improvement department has never done anybody any good, ever. However, maybe do consider deleting Steam if you find it to be a constant source of late-night dillydallying.
  • (Waking Up) Do something you LIKE to do instead of something you SHOULD do after waking up early.
    • So take the Rocket League example – if you go to sleep at 11 and wake up at the desired hour of 5 AM and proceed to play 3 hours of Rocket League – no worries!
    • Because the habit we’re trying to develop here is waking up in the morning, not doing XYZ in the morning.
    • I used to dread jumping right into homework and wading in the things that I was supposed to do right after waking up, and as a consequence I failed a lot at being an early riser. Then I switched to not judging myself for doing things like watching Netflix, browsing Reddit, or playing Final Fantasy after waking up.
    • After about three weeks, games and social media gradually stopped being a crutch for me as the habit of waking up early at a regular time became more concrete and more of a habit for me.

And for those of you who don’t have a need of waking up before sunrise…you don’t know how good you have it! Get your 8 hours of sleep in while you can.