What Happened When I Cultivated A Daily Reading Habit

March 5, 2020

Over the past couple of years, I’ve made the switch from picking up my phone subconsciously to carving out time to read each day. Sometimes it’s for a few minutes and other times I finish entire books. One thing occurred to me today as I finished yet another book, reading each day has led to so much good in my life.

The more reading I’ve done the less time want to spend on social media.

After coming across an article stating that Warren Buffet reads on average 500 pages a day and is one of the wealthiest men alive, I realized it was time to make a change. No longer did I want to be distracted by scrolling on all my social media accounts. I didn’t necessarily wanted to be Warren Buffet, but instead it allowed me to see there were better things to be doing with my time. This is when I challenged myself to read 52 books in a year. When the first 365 days were up, I had read over 100 books.

To date, I’ve rid myself of 99% of social media, only checking my family and close friends only Instagram once a month.

We read together as a family.

Children model behavior and if they want to read more from watching me then so be it. My older children and I find book series that we have a shared interest and read them together. We can then talk about the book, discuss characters and can’t wait to get our hands on the next book in the series.

My youngest is still learning how to read, so for him this looks different. We always have a stack of books from the library in our living room. Before school, he and I will grab a couple for me to read to him. It is said that reading 1000 books (yes, you can repeat) to your child before kindergarten will prepare children for their later reading success. We didn’t document every book we’ve read but over the last 6.5 years of his life, I know I’ve read him a TON of books.

He gets to pick out books he thinks look good and then listen to him mom animatedly read to him.

I’ve become a better writer.

As far as genres go, I’m a pretty eclectic reader. There will be spurts of non-fiction only books and then when I want to escape into the depths of someone else’s words with a good fiction novel. When I read, I no longer have a shortage of topics to write about, cultivating not only a daily reading habit but a daily writing ritual as well. And it’s not all about blog posts, I write in my journal, letters, emails, book ideas, the list goes on.

The more I read, the ideas generated continues to grow. I love using the notes app on my phone to record all the thoughts in my head. Since the distraction of my phone is lessen after reading, I’m okay with the conversations in my head and also stillness that reading provides me.

I may not be Warren Buffet, but the changes made by incorporating a daily reading habit into my life have increased my standard of living a hundred fold.

How often do you read?