“The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.” – Mark Twain
It wasn’t as such, why did I start reading books, it was more along the lines of how reading became an extremely consistent habit, that of which I do on a regular basis today.
A significant amount of time had to pass until I actually realised the why…
The story behind it.
Interestingly enough, there is a distinct story that sparked this.
This story was the fire that ignited me to pursue a love for reading, and in particular, good, non-fiction books.
A love for continuous learning emerged.
A Brief Introduction
I was in a period of a shift/change, where I was doing around 1.5 to 2 hours of driving everyday (more if there was traffic), and even though I love music (a lot of different genres), I felt I sought something more.
It came over me that I wanted to utilise this large amount of time every day by being more productive.
Don’t get me wrong though, after a hard day of work, sometimes you’ve just got to play some of your favourite songs (BANGERS) on the way home…especially on Fridays!
What Did I Use?
I was using the YouTube app on my phone to listen to TED Talks.
Disclaimer – I didn’t watch them as I was driving and that would be awfully illegal and dangerous.
As described on their website and through their YouTube channel:
“TED is a non-profit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks (18 minutes or less) … and today covers almost all topics — from science to business to global issues — in more than 100 languages.”
These were unbelievably helpful and educational, to the point where I think I watched over 300 talks in only a couple of weeks.
This is definitely something that I still do, although not as much, but think it’s immensely valuable to anyone in any career or profession.
Then came a conversation that changed it all for me.
My engineering supervisor.
It was a standard working day in November 2018 where I was part of a dynamic team which saw me as a site engineer at the time, constructing a major structural project out at the Port of Brisbane.
Going about our usual daily tasks, myself, the contracts administrator (CA) and my engineering supervisor (ES) were in the site office, where a conversation erupted around mindfulness and living your life in the present moment.
Simply, about appreciating the little things in life and how vital it is to not let things bog us down, both physically and mentally (more mentally for a lot of us).
(I myself have no idea how this came up or why we even got onto this topic, especially out on a construction site, but nevertheless, it did).
My ES told me about a book that he had read as younger guy living back home in Ireland before he decided to move to Australia permanently, and the importance it had on how he viewed the world.
A unique, yet radical perspective change, is how he described it.
The Book
Both myself and the CA were engaged in the conversation, absorbing, listening to the value that he brought upon us through the way he used words to describe the positive experience.
The book was:
My ES couldn’t rate the book more highly and recommended I read it and make sure to always go back over it again and again.
So, what did I do next?
I read it of course.
Surprisingly enough, he assumed I would just write down the book in my notepad and never act on it, as a lot of us do nowadays.
We are recommended things to do that are quite important all the time in our day to day lives (from people we work with, friends and family) but we never actually end up doing them.
We don’t like to be forced onto anything, rather we want to come to our own conclusions in our decision making.
I don’t know what it was but I did the opposite, and made an active effort to buy the book.
I have always been a self-motivated person, however there was something that just encouraged me. Something I can’t really explain even now.
I guess it just happened.
How I read the book.
Well, actually, I didn’t physically read it (interestingly enough), even though I did buy the physical book.
I tried sitting down to consume the content but couldn’t stay focused, so I ended up listening to the audiobook instead.
I was doing a lot of driving at the time to and from work and I found it was a much more effective and efficient way of engaging with the knowledge.
The Spark
Once I finished the audiobook of The Power of Now, a tremendous shift in outlook came over me.
I wouldn’t say I was “enlightened” per se, which is what the book proposes it could accomplish on the cover for those of which read the book and become involved in the teachings.
I guess I was more or less fascinated and attracted to furthering this initial outburst in knowledge seeking.
One thing led to the next and I began doing a lot of research into similar books which provided the same tone of education.
The personal development and self-help category.
I stumbled across many books, as I was attracted to anything that I thought could provide me valuable insights to improving myself and having a positive, influential impact on others.
Now I have a booklist that is over 300 different books, across a wide variety of development topics like business, personal growth and development, health and fitness, nutrition, mindfulness, investing, personal finance, psychology and so on.
If you want to see my current list that I have compiled over the last year or so, you can find it here dated as of this post.
Conclusion
It has been now nearly a year and half since that time and I can honestly say that every part of my life has seen improvement, both dramatically and in some cases only a little.
However little, some improvement is always better than no improvement.
I believe that once you stop learning, growing and improving you will die.
As harsh as it is to say, it may take a lifetime or it could be instant.
For me, I wake up every day and seek to simply be better than I was yesterday, whether that be my relationships, my career, my health, or just my general state mentally.
I do not and will not, stop educating and refining myself, and books provide that in an exceptionally effective way.
For a small investment of between 20 to 30 dollars and a couple of hours of your time, you can have at your fingertips someone’s or many people’s entire life’s work.
A wealth of educational goodness.
And one last note, don’t say you don’t have time to read – the best alternative is the loyal audiobook.
“I find television very educational. Every time someone switches it on, I go into another room and read a good book.” —Groucho Marx
That’s why I started reading books, what’s your reason?