Most people who know me would know that I have been a good speaker, movie watcher, decent writer but a very bad reader. All my life, it would not be an exaggeration if I say that I have read not more than 20 books (outside academics and at work). I had for a long time wondered what made me to not read and used to look with wonder at friends who would read one book a week. I had tried to read but would stop mainly due to two reasons:
1) Distraction - Mind keeps roaming around all the time
2) Lesser patience - wanting the book to end quickly. I would look at the no.of pages and lose hope. It was so much easier to watch a 3 hour movie and get the essence of the story.
3) Not sure if I like the genre or not sure which genre I would like to read at all.
I would not hesitate in saying that I have had an inferiority complex of not being able to be a voracious reader. I was a voracious movie watcher, though, but hey who looks at movie watching as a virtue anyway!
In my previous writings, I had written about dealing with my movie watching addiction and how Anna inspired me to get out of it and spend more time with family.
Once I reduced my movie watching, I somehow felt a void, an availability of time for myself which I did not know what to do with. It was when Anna suggested me a set of books to read. The best part about it is he did not give me books he thought I should read such as the cliched "100 books you must read before you die" but he suggested books to me for areas of my interest. For instance, he knew fiction was not my kind and I loved a lot of history and philosophy on the other hand. He even went to the next level by also gifting me a book (I have not yet started it).
I wanted to impress him for the belief he had on me. I started with this book "The difficulty of being good" by Gurcharan Das. I had no clue what this book was about, I just chose it at random from the list Anna gave me and ordered online.
I tried reading it and believe me, initial days were tormenting, because my mind was not tuned to reading or to read a 300 page book in a flow. After a max of 10 pages, I would feel fatigue and quickly switch on my youtube videos. And even while reading those 10 pages I would keep doing something or the other. After a while, like an Annual Leave at work or a sabbatical, I just took a random break from reading the book for almost a month!
In one particular conversation with Anna, he said he thought i gave up reading. That hit my conscience of probably letting him down, though he is a person who doesnt care much. I said no matter what, I am going to finish this book. Its fine even if get distracted but I will come out strong.
Initially again, I faced the reader's block but I kept daily targets for myself (eg. 10 pages a day) and slowly scaled it up every day. I should probably thank my daily 8 km running for this since this stepping up attitude of mine I think developed by slowly increasing the distance of run everyday.
As days passed, I realised a particular change in me. I was not trying to know the story or the narrative, but I was trying to think along with the writer. This made me more curious on what more the writer has to say. The more I got to know, the more I felt i needed to know more. This made me read the book with more attention and also I spent thinking about the ideas in my mind when I was alone. One can also possibly attribute to the fact that this book covered an area of interest of mine - philosophy.
I have always been accused on being a bad listener but when I kept reading more, I felt I was listening more. I was trying to swim in an ocean of thoughts, much to my satisfaction.
Today, I finished the book and hence thought I ll write this. Its only a small start to my journey of reading and understanding various perspectives.
I have decided to be more choosy on my movies - earlier I used to see whatever comes my way, but now I have decided to pick movies that inspire or make me think. Also I would want to increase my reading and broaden my knowledge and perspectives.
My take on my limited reading experience is as follows:
1) Know what you want to read, what suits you and what are you looking for in a book.
2) It does not matter how much you read but what is the take away from your reading.
3) Go with your own pace and mood. You are reading for you after all, not for some sales deliverable at work!
4) It does not matter if you are not reading some books that the whole world reads or reading something that nobody reads. You are not reading to tell others what you read, you are reading for you to know more on something you want to know about!
I know I am a novice in reading, but I am sure that i will develop this habit consciously and become not only a well read person but also a good listener over time. Because, my intuition somehow says that reading and listening have a correlation.
And yeah, thanks to Anna for help me rediscover myself.
- Unmimdfulscholar
