I Started Reading More After Implementing This Trick

How to use your bad habits rather than fighting them to improve your reading habits

Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash

I started reading in 2020.

I read books because I watch some videos on social media. It was rich dad, poor dad. It was viral that day, so I bought it. Then I read and enjoyed it. But I don’t read it much. 

I only read for a little bit before it became another artifact on my desk.

At that time, I didn’t have the habit of reading. I play games for about 6 hours a day. I then tried to watch some self-improvement videos. And it worked. 

I started reading again. 

But still, not for long, I stop. I don’t read again and end up doing my bad habits again. I can’t consistently read and discipline myself to read a book a month. 

I even didn’t have the consistency to read at least once a day. I then started to hate reading. I thought that I wasn’t a reader. I don’t like books and hate reading.

But not for long. I started reading again. I feel like I have lost the opportunity to gain knowledge, opportunity, and wisdom by not reading. I then tried to find a way. 

I wanted to know how to read more.

This is where I found the trick.

The sandwich method

How about if I use my bad habits, which are scrolling and playing games with reading?

I usually open my phone and unconsciously click Youtube. After frying my brain with doom scrolling, I want to replace it. I start reading. I blocked my YouTube with an appblocker and didn’t open it for a couple of days.

But still, I didn’t replace it with reading. I still crave to open YouTube and avoid reading at all. Then I thought, How about I replace the pleasure of watching YouTube by reading?

The sandwich method was to read for one sentence or even a little bit, then watch YouTube, which is my reward. After that, I read again for a little bit.

So, read-Youtube-read.

After doing it for a while, I found myself reading more from a sentence to passage and chapter.

The key point of doing this is awareness.

Whenever I am aware that I want to open Youtube, I sneak a little bit of reading session before and after that. The goal is to implant in my mind that I was reading.

So, the enjoyment that I had was actually for reading.

This helps me to be aware of my bad habits and replace them with reading.

Just a tiny bit of reading.

I want to read.

I just want to, but I didn’t do it.

So the trick is to read for a tiny amount.

I read for one sentence.

Then I started to read more because I’m seeing it as an easy task. 

Reading for one sentence is not hard. So, it’s easy for me to just read more and more again. From one sentence, turn into one passage and then one chapter. It’s like levels where I’ve explained it full in The Habit of Reading and The Mastery of Reading.

This helps me to overcome the perfection of “reading sessions for hours.” with just reading.

I read even if I don’t understand it.

Most often, I force myself to understand it.

I don’t want to waste any time. So, I force myself to understand it even if I can’t. This actually leads me to hate reading even more. Other than that, I started to avoid reading because why would I need to read if I would end up confusing myself?

The key is to just read.

Yes, it is important to understand it, but usually it takes time. I usually understand a couple passages and then start to lose focus and don’t understand what the author says.

This is fine.

Because reading is supposed to be enjoyable.

There’s no rule about reading.

If scrolling on social media is easy and fun, why not read books too?

The Mastery of Reading 🚀| Reading 0 to 100

If you want to take it to the next level with a more exclusive and full guide, you can access The Mastery of Reading.

Click here to access the full guide!

This comprehensive guide offers advanced strategies to help you integrate reading into your daily routine, enjoy deep reading sessions, and use reading to enhance your career.

This is where you take your habit of reading from reading 0 to reading 100, which is mastery.

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Essential Resources for Your Journey 📚

• The Habit of Reading (Free) | Download here
  A Step-by-step Guide to Building Your Reading Habit from 0 to 1

• 30-day Simple Habit Tracker (Free) | Download Here
  Track Your Daily Habits with Customizable Months

• Life-changing Blueprint (Free) | Download Here
  How to Change Your Life with Implementation Guide

• My Booknotes (Free) | Download here
  Understand What You Read with Implementation Guide

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