Sunday, November 3, 2019

Reading for the sake of building numbers can be dangerous

I'm currently reading a book as a part of my daily private victory at work, and although I'm about three-quarters of the way through it, I already know I'm going to re-read it once I'm done.  There is just way too much information to absorb at once.

Then, I recalled a YouTube ad where someone had stacked up 52 books and said that great leaders are readers (they are, I'm not disputing that) and that in order to be great you needed a read a book a week.

I thought of how dangerous this was.  Not life-threatening dangerous, like jumping out of an airplane without a parachute or trying to catch a bullet your teeth or walking a highwire when I haven't put in thousands of hours of practice.  But dangerous when it comes to simply recalling information or putting it to good use.

In the past three months, I've been diligent on my daily private victory (see the link above for the YouTube video for more info) and putting in 30 minutes of nonfiction reading five days a week.  So far I've read a book every 1-2 weeks, and some I've even read more than once in a week just because I needed to absorb more information than during the first read--these books were quick reads to begin with, in order for me to read them so fast, as I am normally a slow reader.

It's good to read (nonfiction as well as fiction) but don't sacrifice your time by reading just to check off a task.  Take your time.  Absorb the information.  See how it applies to your life, if necessary.  The same goes with Scripture reading.  There are courses where one is tasked with reading the entire Bible in a single year.  It can be done, but how much are you able to learn by doing so.  In many cases, I've read a verse or two in the Bible and spent the week re-reading it and reflecting on it.  Reading for me is a marathon, not a sprint.  There are far too many lessons in the Bible to quickly brush over them.

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