Picture taken by me with Huawei P20 Lite
I haven't always been a bookworm, in fact, I've hated reading since I was a child. Last year, however, something has changed and I decided to start reading more. I've constantly tried to read fantasy novels, and I rarely finished them. I have realized last year that I much prefer reading popular scientific books that have the ability to teach me many things I haven't even thought about before.
Why do I want to start reading more?
Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and many other successful entrepreneurs make reading their daily habit. Of course it's not only about how much you read, but also the books you read. I have often heard many people on Youtube and different blogs say that everyone should read at least 30 minutes a day, but the vast majority of them failed to explain what sort of books people should be reading. The truth is, these people don't sit in their living rooms reading Harry Potter all day long (as nice as it is to escape the real world sometimes, relax and put your imagination to work), they read non-fiction books that help them gain more knowledge about different topics.
I have made the mistake of only wanting to make a list of 52 non-fiction books, thinking that was all I needed to learn new things and become more worldly, but I have soon realized that was not the case. And instead of doing that, I have added some classical literature in the mix, which I think is also important if you want to be well educated.
Funnily enough, I think many students think they're done with learning forever when they graduate college, but I believe that is when learning really starts. Schools just prepare you and give you some basic knowledge, but you will still have to do most of the work yourself later on by educating yourself on things that interest you.
Picture taken by me with Huawei P20 Lite
Why 52 books?
Reading 52 books in a year means I will read one book a week. That seemed like a good number to me personally, not too many, not too little. I have started reading a book a week since last summer (around August) and realized that is a good amount for me for an average non-fiction book (around 300 pages). Some books will definitely take me longer to finish (for example the intelligent investor has about 600 pages and isn't exactly a super easy book to understand) while others will take less. I have no doubts that I will finish this personal challenge at the end of this year and learn many new things, which I will also share on my blog here.
If you want to start reading more, whether it's non-fiction or fiction and you're having trouble with that, set some goals for yourself that will be achievable for you. Perhaps you want to read 15, 30 or 60 minutes a day, maybe you want to read 25 pages a day or perhaps you will allow yourself one full month to finish a book and read whenever you find time to do so. Maybe you're a hardcore book lover that plans on finishing 100 books this year. It's completely up to you.
If you already know what kind of books you want to read that's great, but if you don't, then I suggest you borrow many different books from your local library and read them to see which ones interest you the most. Perhaps you will also find some authors you like more than the others and that will give you more ideas for what to read next. Don't say reading isn't for you if you have only tried reading a handful of books that were more or less the same genre. Perhaps you just haven't found genres and authors you like. Also, make a list of topics that interest you, such as history, geography, medicine, law, art,... and try reading those.
Remember that you don't have to force yourself to finish reading a book you don't like, in that case it might be better to find a different book that will provide more value to you and read that one instead.
