Using GTD to manage reading books

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Obsession with Book Ownership

Busydave said:
Hi Dennis

How did you cope with the switch between possessing a book and just borrowing it? I would find it very very difficult to give away a book I haven’t yet read, even if it was readily available in the library, or cheap on Amazon. There is just something about holding that little world in your hands that goes way beyond cost or storage issues; darned if I can put it into words though! Dave
Speaking ONLY for myself, the words I came to put on that something where 'obsession' and 'neurosis'. [See "The Psychology of Collecting", by Maisterberger.] Owning a book that I hadn't read was a substitute form of 'having knowledge'.

I now limit my purchases to indispensable reference works and books that I cannot get through the local public library. I do try to be nice to the Inter-Library Loan desk personnel to get more than what the Westchester Library System has. I also focus on the deductibility of the expense, if I am buying.
 
I'm a big user of audible.com, which gets me two books-on-tape (well not really, they are digital files which I play on my treo phone when driving). Now some won't call this "reading" but believe it or not I tend to remember my books on tape much better than the books I read the more traditional way, perhaps because I live with them for a longer period of time until they are done.

Anyway, I let audible do the prioritizing for me - I make sure that I always listen to them in the order that they were purchased (I tend to have a several month backlog). I also buy one fiction book (for the fun) and one nonfiction book (for the knowledge) each month. Indeed, I think I was first exposed to GTD through an audiobook download!

My non-audiobook reading is not so organized, and frankly I don't think it will ever be. Unlike GTD, I do have piles of unread books and magazines and I don't worry about integrating them into GTD.
 
ProfDD said:
Owning a book that I hadn't read was a substitute form of 'having knowledge'.

Dennis

I felt something seismic inside when I read that post. Thanks – you may have rescued my spare room from total immersion in unread books.

pageta said:
I have managed to trim my stash a bit. For the longest time I couldn't figure out the "use it and love it" rule to my books (aka keep only what you use and love and get rid of the rest). I finally decided to keep the ones that make me feel good - either from the memories of enjoying reading them or the anticipation of the joys of reading them - and get rid of the rest. So the ones I've tried to get into but never could, the ones that are from times in my life that I'd rather forget, those types of books are all gone.

Thanks Pageta

Dennis gave me to key to getting rid of unread books, and I think yours is the key to getting rid of many of the ones that I have read.

This is great!

Dave
 
Doctor, Heal Thyself

Busydave said:
Dennis
I felt something seismic inside when I read that post. Thanks – you may have rescued my spare room from total immersion in unread books.

Thanks Pageta

Dennis gave me to key to getting rid of unread books, and I think yours is the key to getting rid of many of the ones that I have read.

This is great!

Dave
I am so happy that my words could have a good impact ! I still haven't had the courage to SELL/GIVE AWAY/DUMP the books that I have.
 
I've recently noticed that many skills I want to learn don't require a book's worth of information, at least initially. I've been using the Scrapbook extension in Firefox to store a library of online tutorials for various applications like Photoshop, AutoCAD, Python programming, etc. This saves me the burden of carrying full books in addition to my laptop. Obviously, some of these topics, like AutoCAD, ultimately require more rigor than an online tutorial, but as icebreakers these tutorials (e.g. "Introduction to AutoCAD 2002") are worth the weight they spare me from carrying.
 
PhotoReading

omerkhan said:
Has anyone incorporated Photoreading into this or other "speed reading" type techniques?

I use PhotoReading on an occasional basis. In my opinion, it is strongly reminiscent of the Evelyn Wood "multiple read and recall" technique. This is where you read the material in a very rapid manner called structuring, and then perform a recall. Then you skim it and do additional recall. Then you read line by line and do additional recall. Finally, you do a quick once-over of the material stopping to read and recall any sections that are still not clear. PhotoReading replaces the structuring step with the technique of going into "PhotoFocus," which is a special way to focus your eyes on the page - actually through the page - to do a very high-speed initial read of the material. (This is done after some initial structuring steps on the material.)

The book claims that some people can have some useful recall of the material even after only doing the PhotoReading step. This is called "spontaneous activation." I can't say that I have experienced this, at least in the ways it is described in the book, but by the same token, I may just not do it often enough to get to that point.

Some people regard PhotoReading as a gimmick, and claim that the PhotoFocus-PhotoReading step doesn't do anything at all. However, I can say that after doing the PhotoReading step, I do seem to recall more in the subsequent reading steps. Therefore, I think something is going on there.

The way PhotoReading and/or Evelyn Wood can save you time is that you can read something several times at varying but high rates of speed and still take less time overall than slow, once-through reading - and usually with equal or better comprehension. However, getting to that point and staying there takes regular practice.

In addition to that, many books aren't worth reading at any depth. It is better to find that out by doing an initial structuring plus one or more high-speed reads than by slogging through it line by line.

Finally, some books have good parts and bad parts. It is a better use of time to locate the good parts as quickly as possible and focus only on them rather than slogging through the whole book at the same speed.

At first blush, you might think these techniques are only useful for non-fiction, but they can help you read fiction more quickly as well. First, with practice, your line-by-line reading rate will improve. Second, you can accelerate to higher rates to skim through particularly tedious passages, and then slow down again when you want to. Finally, when you leave a book for an extended period of time. You can do one or more high-speed reads up to where you left off in order to get back into the story.

Hope this helps.
 
ProfDD said:
I still haven't had the courage to SELL/GIVE AWAY/DUMP the books that I have.

Yes, "courage" - another bull’s-eye point Dennis. Why is it that we need courage to get rid of books? What is it we are afraid of losing ... especially with virtually everything available on Amazon nowadays? Maybe it's the instant availability?

Dave
 
Getting rid of books definitely feels different than decluttering other items.

To me, it's at least partly about identity. The few times I've gotten rid of a significant number of books, it was once I'd moved on from a certain major interest/phase/identity and recognized and embraced the fact that I've moved on.
 
ActionGirl said:
Getting rid of books definitely feels different than decluttering other items.

To me, it's at least partly about identity. The few times I've gotten rid of a significant number of books, it was once I'd moved on from a certain major interest/phase/identity and recognized and embraced the fact that I've moved on.

I totally agree!
 
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