How to Cultivate the Habit of Reading (or any other positive habit).

Life follows the law of compounding, what you do repetitively shapes the outcome of your future. So the little things you do everyday matters a lot. You might not notice the changes tomorrow or next week, but do it consistently for 10, 20 years, the result becomes exponential. That’s the power of habit. Same thing applies here. To be successful in investing, or I would say in life as well, you want to become a lifelong learner and the most effective way is to read. Here are a few ways to develop a lifelong habit of reading.

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In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a broad subject matter area) who didn’t read all the time — none. Zero. You’d be amazed at how much Warren reads — and how much I read. My children laugh at me. They think I’m a book with a couple of legs sticking out.”

Charlie Munger, American business magnate

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Start extremely small

The biggest obstacle from starting is the feeling of getting overwhelmed. So the way to prevent that is to start as small as possible. If you can’t floss your teeth, start with a tooth. Can you read a page a day? How about a paragraph? A sentence? Pick a target that you think it's achievable every day. It is better to do one paragraph a day than 10 pages once a week because repetition is the key as opposed to numbers. Repetition creates momentum that is the cornerstone of habit forming. You can always add more pages once reading becomes second nature. But before that, focus on the act of starting.

Create a routine

On top of starting small, you want to dedicate a space for the habit to grow or else other daily priorities will quickly crowd it out. You can pick a specific time every day or link it to an activity. This can be while you are stuck in a traffic (if you encounter that every day); right before you head to bed; while having breakfast and so on. I set my reading routine when I train to work and half an hour before bed. Having a routine creates consistency, saves you from exercising your limited willpower and increase the odds of turning it into a habit.

Reduce friction

Just as some people would place their phone somewhere out of reach to stop themselves from checking messages, having books within reach when you need them is important. You want to minimize the effort of picking up a book as much as possible. Whether that’s placing them on your desk, inside the bag, on the bedside table and so on.

Read what's interesting

Read something that interest you is more important than the quality of the material. You want to create a pleasurable reading experience right from the start. While it is true we should always read books that are above our level, doing that too early can create a painful experience that discourages repetition. Picking up a great book like The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith sounds ideal, but it will not do much good to your motivation. At the same time, if you lose interest halfway through a book, it is fine to put it down instead of slogging through the remaining pages. You can pick it up later when you are ready.

These methods are not only applicable to reading but any positive habits that you wish to nurture. Turning something into a habit is always hard at the beginning since it takes conscious, deliberate effort to keep it going. But knowing how our brain works and have a few ways to work around it can improve the odds of success. And once your brain adapts to the new habit, it will become effortless.

Lots of love,

Cryptochindian.