Reading 100 Pages A Day

While listening to the Tim Ferris Show with Brandon Stanton (founder of Humans of New York), Brandon talks well-nigh his life before pursuing photography; purposeless, and not happy with what he was doing. In the quest to find meaning, he committed to reading 100 pages per solar day, mostly biographies. He believes biographies are the "all-time form of history" and teaches you much more than a self-assistance volume could. I couldn't agree more.

"Reading brings united states of america unknown friends"
Honoré de Balzac

On 28th May after finishing 30 days of yoga and 21 days of meditation challenge, I thought reading 100 pages per mean solar day would be a fun and intellectually stimulating challenge.

And so, I decided to give information technology a go, ordered a bunch of new books and waited for 1st June.

I read 3000 pages, for 75 hours, over 30 days, and finished 7.five books. Here's a brief reflection on my claiming.

https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*_XhEEy7xxnG5-8IEMgFywg.jpeg — Books Read in June

Google says it can take an average reader nearly two.8 hours to read 100 pages. I am a below-average reader. I should've googled this before starting the challenge.

The first 5 days were immensely challenging, it took me three hours every solar day to end. By 7 pm, I would have read 40 pages and I would become broken-hearted and frustrated, almost deciding to lower my goal to 50 pages or skipping a few days in betwixt.

If yous consider taking up such a challenge, I recommend going for anything other than self-aid books. Non-fiction and biographies are the best. From personal experiences, I read not-fiction much faster, especially if the story is gripping. With self-assist, ideally, you would too apply the principles in your life, merely knowing does not assist.

It'south kinda similar binge-watching Netflix. I tin watch shows similar Westworld, Stranger Things, or The Big Bang Theory for hours, but I can rarely do the same with documentaries like Our Planet, I Strange Stone, or Cosmos. There'southward too much data overload and it gets boring later on a point.

"I find idiot box very educating. Every fourth dimension somebody turns on the ready, I go into the other room and read a book."
Groucho Marx

Mixing upward genres ever works. I had stocked a good mix for 30 days. A biography, a couple of memoirs, one travelogue, one business volume, and a couple of fiction. Variety helps immensely.

Diversity in length is also important. I don't want to exist reading iii ten 1000 page books for the whole month. My books ranged from 250-600 pages long.

Another of import lesson is setting up the environment for success. I really learned this from Atomic Habits past James Clear, which I read in February. An instance: keeping your shoes next to your bed and sleeping in your workout apparel and so information technology'due south easier to work out in the morning. To make it work for me, I kept one book next to my bed and some other ane on my work desk. Seeing the book constantly reminded me to read. And putting my phone on silent whenever I planned an extended reading session helped tremendously.

Using the two-minute rule : "If it takes less than ii minutes, then do information technology now." Another solid tip from David Allen's bestselling book, Getting Things Done.

When I open up Instagram for a quick peek, I unremarkably finish up scrolling for longer than planned. I tried to practise the aforementioned with reading, and if the volume is interesting, information technology definitely works. I would beginning with 2-min power reading in between tasks and ended upwards reading for xv–20 mins at to the lowest degree. Better spend the time reading than on Insta.

Reading 2+ books a fourth dimension:

At the start, I was obsessed with reading 1 book at a time, finishing it quickly, and checking it off on Goodreads. When I was reading Walden, I realized how incredibly taxing reading 100 pages of one volume can be (I withal recommend Walden, though some parts are dull). And then, I tried 2 books at a time, reading 50 pages of each in a day. This works best if one is not-fiction and some other is fiction. It breaks off boredom and brings the excitement of learning from 2 authors at the aforementioned fourth dimension.

https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*1zncrloypZMyE2_gv8WtsA.jpeg — Reading tips by Austin Kleon

Eventually, after 3 weeks of toiling, my speed improved. The last x days were a breeze. I tried to fit in reading whenever I got time and was ever searching for my book. I remember I can do 100 pages in ii hours now unless the book has a really small font size and is on quantum mechanics. A significant improvement from when I started.

Reading is i of the most rewarding habits I've built this year. If you're struggling to build ane, challenge yourself, and aim to read every 24-hour interval for 30 days. Choose a goal that works for yous. You can do 10 pages a day or l, or read for ten or thirty minutes a twenty-four hour period. I was already reading about twoscore–50 pages a day before the challenge, so annihilation lower than 100 wouldn't experience challenging, and what'southward the point of a challenge which is easy?

And if you don't enjoy it, don't stop reading. Try a unlike book, possibly experiment with a new genre, you might be surprised by what you like.

Thank you for reading. What'due south your experience with reading? Got whatever book recommendations? I'd love to hear from you lot, you lot can contact me here!