Sure, there's a certain satisfaction in hitting the buy button on Amazon, knowing you now have a nondescript brown box to look forward to in your mail. But the true foreplay of book selection is browsing a quality library. With that in mind, see if this gets you in the mood. War and Peace anyone?
Thanks to 800-CEO-READ for the lead.
Before you go off and buy The Secret for that unenlightened friend of yours for Christmas, keep this in mind. That book is a culmination of other sources from the past. If you want to read the real first "secret" book, then Napoleon Hill's book is the place to start. If you've read The Secret or have heard guys like James Ray on Oprah, you'll be shocked at how much of Hill's content they've all borrowed. I say start at the source. Does anyone know where Napoleon Hill got his info? Hint: Andrew Carnegie.
I love books. I love to discover them, read them, and share them. When I say "share" I don't mean, however, "loan." I have a policy: I don't borrow books or loan books or check books out from the library. I'm too passionate for any of that. If I want to read a book, then I want that book. I want it as part of my personal library, I want the option to read it again years from now. It might mean something different to me then. I like to look at my library of books and feel a sense of accomplishment (not in a "look how smart I am" type of way). I love to tell people about the book I'm reading and send them an Amazon link later so they can buy it themselves.
Sometimes people will hand me a book and say, "Here, I'm letting you borrow this. You have to read it." I thank them for the reco and politely refuse the book, stating that I'd rather not have the looming dread of needing to get it back to someone sometime soon and keep it unscathed in the process. Why put that type of pressure on such an enjoyable thing?
I don't loan books because in general books are cheap. Buy your own. Put it up on a shelf after you've read it. Own it. Sure when you move it's a pain, because they're oh-so-heavy, but that's a piece of you you're hauling. It's not just paper, it's inside you. It has formed you in some way and become you. Embrace it. Haul it.
Cicero said, "A room without books is like a body without a soul." Read on.
You'll notice in the section on the left side of my blog that I am sometimes reading more than one book. It's a practice of mine that I encourage everyone to try at least for a while. I am right now reading two business books: Influencer: The Power to Change Anything
There are three reasons I enjoy reading more than one book at a time:
1. I find that the longer I take to read a book, the more I retain.
2. I like to read one book, usually a more cerebral one before I go to bed and then a more energetic one while I'm on the train commuting. It allows me to enjoy a book appropriate for the atmosphere. I'm not into reading adventure books before I go to sleep. Make sense?
3. In the end, I tend to get more books read over the course of a year, which, of course, is a good thing.
Pick two books at first to try this method. Maybe one business and one fiction. Read the fiction before you go to sleep and then the business book on your commute or during lunch. See if it works for you.
