How habit of reading help me as a Developer & Writer

I'm a Full-stack developer who is always experimenting with code and building the web application for clients and in my spare time, I used to learn about design and development by reading articles for self-growth. When it comes to reading a book It's always a hard time for me because I felt that I don't have enough time to read General books without any academic books. So basically on the last day of 2017 I just watched a video of an Entrepreneur Pat Flynn (Founder of SmartPassiveIncome) on YouTube, but he surprised me when I heard that he read 45 books in 2017 and I think that's a huge number of books. So you can watch his video below.

This video guide is from Pat Flynn YouTube Channel. A great human and well-known Entrepreneur.

By reading some more articles I found that successful people reading more books than the Average people because an author puts their whole experience of life and research in that one single book. If you'll read that book so obviously you'll get a huge amount of knowledge in a short period of time.

So I realized that Pat Flynn and the other Entrepreneurs like Warren Buffett and Bill Gates can find time on reading books, Even though they have a more busy schedule and still they managed their time and read more books so why we can't.

Make a decision in 2018

At the start of 2018, I decided to read at least 12 books in a whole year by managing 1 hour every day, but not reading ebooks on computer or tablet because I spend most of my time in front of the computer and I decided to go to the Library for reading some print books out there without any interruption.

Source Image

So I just went to the Library near my home as you can see above without any specific goal that what to read and luckily some of my friends were already there. I just asked My friends where is the shelf of the Non-fiction books and they thought I came here for reading programming or networking books. They showed me the programming shelf, but I smiled. then I told them once again, I need books about Entrepreneurship and they helped me out by finding some books, but suddenly I found a book about Successful Time Management: A self-teaching Guide, 2nd edition by Jack D. Ferner. I just grab that book and look at the contents of the book and said to myself, that's what I need to read first.

I Start reading My first book

At the beginning of reading a book of Successful Time Management. I set a goal of reading at least one book per month (Due to 12 books per year Goal), But as I start reading my first book. I fall in love with the contents of the book the way the great author (Jack D. Ferner) shared his thoughts in the book by different real-life case studies, So let me share some of the important points/summary of this book in my own words. So here we go.

• People often make excuses of not having enough time or the one who helps everyone because they can't say no to anyone but due to different interruption, not focusing on his/her project which may help the whole community instead of the individual.

• Successful and unsuccessful people both have 24 hour's in a day and 168 hour's in a week, so how successful people still manage to find time for their family, work and personal growth while unsuccessful don't have, because they utilize their time by setting a time log and following everything according to the plan.

• It's always necessary to find out the time robbers (time waster) who basically doesn't let us to achieve our goal. time robbers are the one's who put their work on us by saving their own time.

• First, We must analyze time problems, time robbers and the different interruptions, then create a time log and Goal and follow to it according to the plan by doing the most priority work first then go to the lowest priority work.

Even though I set a goal of reading this book in one month but fortunately, In a short span of 10 days by reading 60 to 90 minutes a day, I'm able to complete the whole book with all the exercises and I also started my second book (The Startup Way by Eric Ries) which has gonna been completed within few days.

Reading habit helps me as a developer

Now the question is that How reading habits helped me as a developer?

Basically, the answer is pretty simple that reading habits make me more knowledgeable and show me the right path of Time Management which in 2017 I used to struggle to find enough time for working on my own Entrepreneurship journey as well as carry on my freelancing.

After reading the Time Management book and doing the exercises and finding the time problems, Now I use to have enough time by posting on Steemit, working on building my own product and some side projects. The product is Multipurpose WordPress theme and I'll have a plan to sell this product on ThemeForest. I do code every day for my product until it'll complete.

Reading habit helps me as a writer

I always had a plan to write articles about web design and development, but couldn't find enough time because I voluntarily taught physics, chemistry and Math to the student of 9th and 10th in our local Institute.

I used to start a blog in 2015 to share my knowledge to people about web design and development, but couldn't retain it for a long time.

In 2018 I had a plan to write 1000 words articles and share it on free platform Medium but suddenly on 20 Jan 2018, I found a tutorial of @Jerrybanfield on Facebook about Steemit and watched it carefully and habit of reading let me read more articles and books about Steemit before I started. then I felt that this is a great idea to share everything on Steemit and I created my account and after approval, I start writing from 24 Jan, 2018 on Steemit. I choose Steemit because of their supportive and engaging community as well as don't need any domain and hosting or spend years building an audience because It already has a big amount of audience which is increasing on a daily basis.

Conclusion

I shared this article just for inspiration to let you know that how effective it is making a reading habit. Reading habit gave me more strength in my Full-stack development, writing and self-growth. Now I have a clear goal that I can read more than 12 books in a year and will let you know about my progress.

Now I'd like to hear from you, How reading habit help you in your journey by sharing your thoughts in a comment below.