How I inculcated a reading habit while working more than 12 hours a day
Books are undeniably the biggest repository of knowledge known to mankind. You know that you would definitely benefit if you read more often, but maybe you are just not able to find the time for it. Well, I work more than 12 hours a day, and I was able to find a way to consistently read, finishing one book per month. So can you!
You have the time! Accept this.
If you think that you are too busy, I would recommend you to go through the 168-hours exercise. I am sure that no matter how much you have on your plate and contrary to how little spare time you believe to have, you still have at least 10 extra hours left in your week. Which is much more than what is required.
And even if you don’t, if you know why you want to read, you must know the relative importance of building this priceless habit. You should probably prioritize this over some of the other things and find at least 20 minutes every day for reading.
Know why you want to read
One of the biggest reasons why you are struggling to inculcate a reading habit is probably that you haven’t found it to be important enough. It is much easier to consume video content than reading. Most things that you need to know are available in the form of attractive YouTube videos, so why bother reading?
Well, I used to think like that, until I actually started reading. I wanted to buy a present for one of my best friends, who is a voracious reader. So I went to the bookstore to find a book that she might like. While browsing the shelves, I kept finding books that kindled my interest. I did buy her a book as a present, but I also told myself to start reading one of my brother’s books, which was collecting dust.
I discovered that books are the largest and the most underrated repositories of knowledge!
Find a book that you would love to read.
Reading a book is not something you should struggle through in order to learn. Instead, for you to make the most of it, it is essential that you really enjoy reading it!
I have realized that one of the most important thing about maintaining the habit is to maintain the motivation. If you are not attracted to a book, you need not continue it. Drop it and pick another book! A perfect record is not as important as maintaining the habit of reading.
Drop it and pick another!
It needs to be a habit
If you want to really read up on all the books that you think would be helpful in your life, you need to make a little bit of progress every day. I once heard this in one of Laura Vanderkam’s “Before Breakfast” podcast:
We often overestimate what we can do in a day, and underestimate what we can do in a year.
By just reading a few pages every single day, you will read a lot more than your longest reading sprint. Consistency is the key. And creating a habit is the easiest means to be consistent.
Find the right cue
If you read the science of habit-formation, which I learnt from Charles Duhigg’s book called “The Power of Habit”, you will discover that our brain needs a ‘cue’ to trigger any habit-driven action. The easiest way to do that is to create a ritual. Find something that you anyway do every single day, without exception, like waking up, brushing your teeth, sitting on the couch or making your bed, and make that your cue. You can try a cue, and if it doesn’t work, you can always try again with a different cue until you find the one that works.
Make it easy
Once you have decided on a cue, the next thing you want to do is making it as easy as possible to read a book on the cue. Your book/Kindle or audio-book needs to be right there when it is time to read. If you plan to read as soon as you wake up, you keep your book over your nightstand. If you plan to read when you sit on your couch, keep your book much closer than the TV remote.
Also, please do not read on a multi-purpose device, like a phone, which you can also use for other things. It is really hard to start a habit when you have distractions. Invest a little bit in buying books. Books are unbelievably cheap, compared to the value that they create for their readers.
Reward yourself
In the habit-loop image above, you might have noticed that along with a ‘cue’, it also needs you to get a ‘reward’ for performing the desired action on the cue. Everyone has a different way of rewarding themselves; some more feasible to be done daily than others. The only condition for the reward is that you should feel good every time you read.
21 days rule
As you might have read it at many places, you need to force yourself to keep up with performing the “cue ➡️ routine ➡️reward” loop for 21 days to establish the behaviour as a habit. Frankly, I do not believe in the “21 days” thing. My method is to keep doing it the same way at the same time every day using my will power until it stops needing any will power to happen.
In fact, if I am being honest, even after the habit has formed and I continue to follow it for multiple months, sometimes I fall out of it. This generally happens when something changes, for example, when I finish a book and start another one. It again requires will power to follow the same routine for a few days, until it becomes effortless.
What worked for me
With all the theory out of the way, I can finally tell you what exactly worked for me.
What to read
When I started, I knew that I need to read regularly. But I knew nothing about forming desirable habits. So I started with the book that I have quoted the most in this article: “The Power of Habit” by Charles Duhigg. With the right tools in my armory, I set out to fix my habits.
It was not a easy thing to do. Every time I established a cue-routine-reward loop, something would happen that disrupted my habit and I would be back at square one. Feeling that I have failed. Until I accepted the fact that good habits need maintenance.
Anyway, after that, I started reading the things which I thought would be most valuable for my career. I started reading books on leadership, entrepreneurship and psychology. I formed a list of these books on my Goodreads account.
The cue
I started with “reading whenever I am travelling”. This worked very well initially because I lived in Bengaluru. And any taxi ride in Bengaluru over 5 kilometers is a travel! So every commute to the office and back were my cues to read. Even travel plans across cities fitted this cue seamlessly, and I would actually read more while travelling than my daily routine.
But this broke very soon as I changed cities and started living closer to my office. Travel became a rare event, and for a very long time, I didn’t read anything. I started telling myself that it is alright because I am way too busy! I was working for 15 hours on some days.
Ultimately, one day I realized that I am always going to be this busy because I liked being busy. As soon as I get done with one thing that required my attention, I’d always find another one! The cue that actually worked for me was ‘waking up at dawn’.
This worked wonders because at dawn, there is no urgency. The environment is quieter than any other time of the day. And it was something that would happen daily, as long as I slept on time. Waking up at dawn would also improve my health (and maybe help me get rid of my dark circles).
Set up a ‘bed-time’ alarm instead of a ‘wake-up’ alarm
I am against setting alarms for waking up — somehow, I am always irritable when I wake up to an alarm. So I set a daily alarm for 10:30 PM. A ‘bed-time’ alarm, which would remind me that it is time to sleep.
Making it easy
During my travels, I always have my book in my laptop bag, that I would always keep close to myself. And my book is always by my bed when I sleep. I even have a comfort chair in my balcony so that I enjoy the morning weather and fresh air while reading my book.
The reward
One of my most consistent reward is updating my progress on Goodreads. I would later receive notifications of my friends liking my progress update and would feel really good about it.
Another reward is that I make a lot of conversations based on the things that I read. As I read more, I become more potent of holding and contributing to conversations everywhere. I also feel happy whenever I am able to use the knowledge from a book in a real world situation — the choice of books definitely helps a lot in this part of the habit loop!
Closing remarks
Following the technique that I described above, I have started to read 10 pages every day very consistently. In the last 4 months, I have already completed reading 3 books, namely “The Infinite Game” by Simon Sinek, “Zero to One” by Peter Thiel and “The Monk who sold his Ferrari” by Robin Sharma. It doesn’t cost much and it might just be the best thing you ever do for yourself. At least give it a shot!
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