6 Ways to Curb Your Tsundoku (Buying Books and Not Reading Them)

I don’t think there’s any way to completely stop tsundoku (Japanese for [basically] buying books and not reading them, making them pile up) aside from not buying the books you’d like to read and not downloading ebooks as well, but if you keep buying and not reading them then I've got some tips to get you to read the books or keep you from piling them up.

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Apparently, for me, this habit started because I used to love reading books. Growing up, I’d read everything of interest that I could get my hands on. Comics made it worse perhaps? But hey as you grow older you won’t always have the leisure time you used to have so the urge to read sticks but the time to actually do it gets shorter and shorter until – Whoa! There’s no time at all!

Okay, I know, there’s plenty of time in 24hrs to squeeze in reading but I prefer earning money more than reading now. Haha. I don't even get to watch all those movies, TV series, anime shows anymore unless I do any work. Well, I do get to watch shows more than read books nowadays so unless they turn books into movies or TV shows, most of the time I won’t bother reading any at all.

Yeah I still read a lot but not books or magazines. Most of the time I read online articles and watch videos so I don't have this habit anymore. I rarely buy books these days but I still have a lot of unread books stored somewhere.

Ok this habit might not be a problem for most people but what do you do about tsundoku if you want to stop or even minimize it? Here are some random ways to help you out:

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1 Bring that book (or magazine/comics/graphic novel), you’ve been dying to read, with you.

You know how most of us hate waiting right? Well, the next time you know you’ll be stuck or waiting in a very long line somewhere, bring a book. Hopefully it’d be bright wherever you’ll be going so you’d be able to read it.

Read while waiting in the hospital, at the bus station or airport, or even while you’re waiting for a taxi or something. Best to do this when on your own because if someone's with you, YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO READ.

I was able to go through an entire magazine and some books because of this. Unless I didn't have any emails or online marketing that needed to be done while waiting in line, I can read the damned thing. Lol.

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2 Get audiobooks of those unread/bought books instead so you can listen to them while on the way to somewhere.

Just make sure you find one that won’t bore you to death. Some audiobooks I’ve listened to have awful narrators so I ended up getting rid of them. If it makes you sleep and you tend to ignore it while on the way to wherever then it's useless.

But of course, for safety, make sure you can still hear your environment when listening to something because you might get too distracted to hear something coming your way.

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3 Only buy/download the books you want to read when you're planning to go on a long vacation.

Like, instead of going swimming at the resort you booked, you can read all day for a day or read parts of the book. Sounds fun eh?

Or heck, bring the books outside and read it while you're at the beach. How does sun bathing while reading a book sound? :D

4 Don’t spend too much time in bookstores, especially when you have money to spare.

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If you spend too much time inside a book store it’d definitely add more books to your ever growing pile of goodies. Better yet, don’t go to bookstores at all if you can! Ask someone to go there and buy what you need. It’s all about self-control. ☺

5 Borrow someone else’s book or go to the library to read.

I’m pretty sure if you borrow someone’s book, you’re more likely to read it than when it’s yours. Or borrow one from a library so you can read it there, or take it home then return it whether you’re done reading it or not.

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Or if you can't stand not going to the bookstore, if they let you read the damn book inside the store just read it inside the bookstore.

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6 Sell your unread books or give them away.

If you can't make time to read the books you bought whenever you can, then just sell it off and earn money from it. Don't want to sell it off? Give them away to your friends and family so you'll have a better chance at still being able to read them when you get the time to see them.

Bottomline:

Other than that I think the only other thing you could do is to just make time to read that pile of books and be done with reading them.

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Hey, it’s not that bad when you have tsundoku but it may be bad for your budget, spare time and wasted space. If we read whenever possible, it would definitely make us get through every book in the pile in no time. By then we won’t have tsundoku anymore... only until we get new books of course. ☺

So do you think this helped at all? Lol. If not you can share your own tips in the comments too!

XOXO,
@artgirl

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@artgirl is a freelance artist and also a real estate agent for resort-type condo communities in Metro Manila.

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