My previous blog mentioning Lee Iacocca was really about reading biographies and it unexpectedly drew a large number of emails wanting to know how I had the time to read.

I have the time to read because I make the time. I enjoy reading, which provides some escape, new knowledge, confirmation of some of what I do, enables me to be current on what clients are reading, and occasionally takes me on journeys to places I haven’t been but able to go to vicariously.

I have always read – when I was really young I read comic books, magazines, the sports sections of the daily newspapers my father brought home after work and stamp newspapers. When I was about 12 I discovered some paperback books my father read that had some “sex” scenes. I would sneak a look at them and flip through the pages looking for the juicy parts…which I read word by word…very slowly. What happened was that I knew the entire story – I didn’t realize it but I was speed reading the book. I found this out about the time Kennedy became president and it was revealed that he could read at 1500 words per minute rate. Evelyn Wood promoted her Reading Dynamics course and I took it a couple of times. I never was comfortable reading that way and remained reading at a slow rate – which I still do today. Occasionally I speed read a book I am reviewing, or a newspaper or magazine article (some of which can be long and tedious). For those, it works, but for pleasure or business books, I like my old fashioned way. BTW, the books can be paper, digital or PDFs but the reading method is the same.

I am always in the middle of a few books, reading what suits me at the moment with some moments shifting pretty quickly. I usually spend about a half hour to an hour a day reading something from a book. Long books take forever, shorter books less time. I now try not to pick novels that are more than about 400 pages – too much time devoted to nonsense. I read biographies and longer books in sections – 300 pages and then I set it aside for a couple or three months and then 300 more and so on until I get it finished. I try to vary my reading so it stays fresh. I have a nutsy exception which I will be writing about at some point when I complete that self-imposed project.

I also feel I should read current business best sellers so I can keep up with, or ahead of, my clients. Also, my reading has gone full circle since graphic novels have become de rigueur and I occasionally read one of these. I even mentioned and recommended a graphic book in a previous blogThe Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt. My last order with amazon.com included two graphic books and even a kids book [about Benjamin Franklin collaborating with Noah Webster on what became Webster’s Dictionary].

Read. Learn. Grow. Enjoy!
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