I want to start trying using books as references rather than rushing to finish each one.

I like reading books but I’m sometimes more obsessed with finishing them than fully absorbing them. I’ve read so many books with life changing “wisdom” in them, feel inspired, in some cases maybe move some things around in my life, but as time passes the lessons tend to fade from memory.

For some, like Atomic Habits, the way of doing things became so ingrained that even when you forgot the lessons, one or two things became a permanent fixture in your life with compounding effects.

For others, like Show Your Work, I read, learned the lessons, then slowly forgot. But when I say "forget" here it doesn’t mean like totally forget, because nothing in the book is what I’m not aware of. It’s the framing of things and how they apply to your life. For example, I know that having a brand you’ve built makes access so much easier. I’ve done that in my own way. But my natural instinct to just go disappear somewhere conflicts with that. So when the knowledge is not top of mind or some goal or mental state has high priority, it shifts. Then you get so used to the new state that you don’t match what you know with where you’re at.

So, I’m hoping that now with my experiments with buying physical books I can have a few books I know my natural instinct would fight with the lessons in them. I can pick them up at random or planned intervals, read a specific chapter or page to remind myself of why I do certain things and then drop them. No compulsion to start and finish, no need to boost my ego, just going back to specific things that hit me and struck me in the beautiful ways they were written that seem to speak directly to ME.

Naturally, life has its seasons. I would forget lessons. But I would also remember them. This year, I relearned lessons I already learned years back. Maybe you could say it was from a more mature perspective? Maybe. But the fact remains I had to relearn them. Now, I’m hoping, like everything you optimize, the time in between forgetting and remembering becomes shorter and shorter. For example, say you need a break for your mental health. Valid. But the difference between that break being a few months to say 2-3 years may simply be remembering the lessons you learned and why you do what you do.

So taking a page out of religion, certain religious texts have remained unchanged for several millennia, yet people read and consume and meditate on the same fixed amount of words daily. The words don’t change but the context does.

Sometimes you need a reminder.

Sometimes you need encouragement.

Sometimes you need harsh accountability.

Sometimes you need to rediscover the same words but with more life experience.

Whatever the case is, it’s okay to have a long pile of books you’ve finished if that’s what you genuinely enjoy. But we should also build that habit of 2-3 books we sit with, no end in sight, using them like we use dictionaries, giving ourselves the grace to fall off but also the ability to come back up again. Giving ourselves the chance to stop and reflect and to grow. Not just amassing knowledge but allowing ourselves to be changed by it.