Reading Skills:
How I Beat Reading Slumps (pt. 2)
Didn't catch part 1?
If so, welcome! It's a pleasure to have you here.
Find the first part here.
Otherwise, I hope this one is just as useful as the other. Ironically, I'm in a slump of my own so hopefully this will kick me up the ass and rescue me. Enjoy.
Audiobook Stacking
After a long break with books, you probably filled the gaps with short-form slop- all the tiktok-esque stuff -and that hurts your attention span. It happens to me even after a short slump.
Whenever I felt confident enough to read again, I was humbled by the restlessness in my eyes. They drifted across lines, got tangled between thoughts, and had to rescan the same sentences over and over for the words to actually stick.
Bleh. It feels like half your IQ points melted away.
When your mind is hyperactive, the simple effort to process the words in front of you becomes clumsy.
One solution to this is ‘audiobook stacking.’
This is when you pick a (physical) book, download its audiobook version and then read through your copy alongside the narrator in your ears.
In other words, you use both audio and visual formats at the same time.
The narrator keeps you on track and your mind is less tempted to wander off. My earliest proof of this technique working was in English class, back in secondary school (early high school, for the proud Americans).
Brits of my age will remember reading Shakespeare, Dickens, and plays like An Inspector Calls in group reading sessions, where each person took turns to read a portion out loud while the others followed along in their own copy.
This worked so well, I got absorbed in the book enough to accidentally fly past the narrator and read the whole chapter in a trance-like state.
It’s not for everyone, or for every book, but if you need to jumpstart your focus, there’s little better I can think of.
Purpose
How did monks sit through thousands and thousands of manuscript pages with no boredom to derail their mission?
They wished to get closer to God.
Do you think they could pour in those same hours if their grandest goal was to embarrass brother Klaus in the next philosophy debate?
Petty, but relatable. Probably not.
When you have a strong purpose behind your reading, it’s given direction -energy you need to push through struggle.
Purpose trumps ability too.
You may feel your comprehension is weak- literature is hard, after all -but with determination, you’re like a Honda Civic with a v8 engine.
To put this into practice, I pick my books with precise intention.
Who do you want to be?
What do you want to learn?
How will that book get you there?
Answer these questions, and every book you end up reading will be in line with your values and goals.
Kill all distractions
The boring advice works.
It’s copy-pasted in every turbonormie self-improvement blog on the internet, but for good reason. The simplest principles, the ones you get bored of first, are responsible for 90% of your success.
One of these timeless truisms is to keep a distraction-free environment.
Humans can’t multitask.
It makes no sense to harass your brain with other sources of stimulation while you read, be it podcasts in the background, reels on your phone, or even music, I’m afraid.
The last one comes with a caveat.
Music with lyrics is the main danger -your mind attaches to the words, which pushes you out of the book’s narrative. Songs are stories themselves, after all.
However, I have found that even music without lyrics has the same effect. There are rises and falls; moments of peace, followed by action and resolution. That auditory journey was enough to attract my attention and knock me off course.
If you need music, I’d recommend something repetitive, quiet, and simple, like lo-fi or ambience.
The biggest culprit is still your phone. I keep it out of sight- or even better -in another room altogether. Even if it’s only in your field of view, it teases you like a siren with the promise of quick dopamine. I like to put it under a pillow or even behind my computer monitor.
Out of sight, out of mind.
The war against distraction is endless. They’ll pop up everywhere like sales assistants in a duty-free, so it’s up to you to identify and remove them, all for a butter-smooth reentry into reading.
Carry a book everywhere
In the normal tide of life, I get about one thousand words written down each day. About half of that is usually on a whim:
In a bus.
On the screechy underground trains.
As I wait for an event to start.
Wherever and whenever, I can pull out my phone and get some thoughts down. The same goes with a book -most are portable, especially with how good e-readers are nowadays.
In the chaos of modern life, these small oases of time can be the golden chance you need to become the reader (or writer) you always wanted to be.
You may not see yourself as one, but ten random minutes a day will tell you otherwise. But most fall short and waste this chance.
You can’t read what you don’t have -without a book on you, you’re left to twiddle your thumbs or, more likely, scroll through videos you’ll forget about a minute later.
Carry a book wherever you go, and every spare moment of time can help you regrow the habit.
It’s easy because there’s nothing else you can do.
Find accountability, or make it
How can you clean the rust off of your literary gears with willpower?
It’s fallible, it comes and goes. It’s no steady ground to build a habit from. So, what’s the answer?
Don’t.
Fruitful reading doesn’t need to be a grind against discipline when you inject some form of accountability into it.
Going to the gym four times a week is hard. As soon as your motivation errs, that could spell the end of your habit -one missed session becomes five, and sooner or later, your gym progress is reduced to a monthly wire out of your bank account.
You’re left to sigh at yourself in disappointment.
I really should get back into it, you repeat again and again -but life goes on, and nobody’s watching.
Say you have been working out with a friend for months now, and that same rough period hits you. To tell them “I’m sitting this session out” three of four times a row . . . that’s a different type of shame.
It hurts. It feels like betrayal.
You must tell your friend you have surrendered, and leave them to train alone, all while you stagnate in the rearview mirror.
That push for you to honour yourself (and your friend) is accountability.
Now if we trim down the drama, it works just as well with your reading habit. How you add accountability is your call, and there’s no right or wrong way to approach it. The high-effort solution is to join some form of reading club, whether online or in-person.
The more realistic strategy is to set small goals -say, 20 minutes of reading per day. Even better when you can keep it visual -I like those colour-coded habit trackers that you fill in according to how well you did that day.
It’s a treat for the eyes as you make progress, but also a gentle reminder to get your act back together if you see too many red squares start to show up.
It’s flawed, but Goodreads lets you track your page progress. Beyond a nice spark of accomplishment, your friends on there can see your pace and again, their invisible judgement (or rather, your perception of it) can offer a gentle push to rebuild your habit.
Block time
BoOoOoOoring.
But necessary.
I don’t believe you should boss yourself around with a cramped calendar -it makes me envy our ancestors, who were never told when and where to be by some cold electronic brick. They awoke when they pleased, stretched their legs in the sun and basked in life’s freedom.
But the past is behind us. Very far behind us. There’s no way the modern man and woman can avoid their long list of responsibilities, and time management is the best tool to stay in control.
Keep it simple and give yourself 10-60 minutes per day to read. Choose when this block of time will be, and defend it like a barbarian on a bridge.
It’s ok to say no to distractions if this is who you want to be.
My favourite time to read is first thing in the morning, perhaps after a run, and always with a cappuccino in hand. It awakens my mind and gets a good habit out of the way.
Before bed, during lunch break, home after work -the choice of when belongs to you, so long as it’s feasible with your energy then.
Timer method
Since we have opened the door to the Influencer™ advice, why not continue the streak?
The timer method helps you slay the toughest beast of habit-forming: the start.
It takes great willpower to actually sit down and begin, so anything to ease that burden is welcome. This method has you set a timer for a minute or two, then promising yourself to read for that long.
That’s it.
Two minutes.
Easy, right?
The commitment is light, so you aren’t put off by all the work ahead of you. The friction to start is eased off, and hopefully once you do begin, you find that reading past the two minute mark is easy.
And if the timer rings and the energy still isn’t there?
Flagellate yourself.
Or don’t. Just try again later.
It’s not that deep . . .
Dialogue
I’ll make a generalisation I believe is accurate.
Readers tend to be quiet people.
They avoid the spotlight, find peace in solitude and save their energy for close friends, not for puppet shows with people they don’t give two shits about. That’s how I’d label myself, and you may see yourself in these words too. But as soon as you ask those those same people:
“What do you like to do for fun?”
Their whole demeanor changes. Eyes widen, pupils sparkle and the silence breaks fast. They erupt into conversation and share all the joy, knowledge and insider details of their beloved hobby.
You might never get a chance to share what you love, but as soon as someone gives you the green light, you cherish every second, especially if the person in front of you takes an interest.
Maybe I project my own experience here, because it’s exactly what I feel. I can go months without even a mention of my favourite past-times, but once I do, it’s blissful, and I could rattle on for hours (don’t do that though).
Does that same loneliness push you away from literature?
It’s tough to get back into books when nobody is there to do it with you -empty rooms, empty conversations, and all the good ideas left to bounce around in your head.
There’s no sense of community to drive you forward.
But where do you find it? There’s many options. I find my outlet for dialogue as I write these articles, respond to you, and make videos I can be proud of. The internet is free for everyone to do the same, and there’s a hundred thousand formats for you to choose from: essays, blogs, communities, threads, ebooks, REAL books, journals, podcasts, public notes and many more.
Hell, just find yourself a few good friends you can be authentic with.
My most fun and thoughtful conversations were set in the local pubs, drink in hand and cigarillo smoke in the air. Too vibey.
You can do anything, so long as it’s a way to materialise your reading in the real, physical world. That’s how you find a sense of meaning in your actions and keep your motivation at a slow-burn for the future.
Words spill into reality, and reality makes you feel.
Yours,
Odysseas