Book babble: Reading - the key to life??

Hello there book worms and reading bugs!

I'm going to start doing some book reviews… or rather reflections as I see them. I read a fair bit, in fact a little more than I should, meaning I really need to take more action and less theorising/reading about other's action ;). But still, reading regularly is a very good habit. It's just a case of getting a good balance on your consumption and application.

It also depends on what you read of course. Reading personal growth type material, inspiring auto-bios and practical business books are great for expanding the mind and potentially improving your life. Celebrity gossip mags, perhaps not so much. The only down side is that you trick yourself into thinking you're progressing but without some sort of action it's just latent knowledge. And knowledge is only potential power.

Having said that, it's better than bad habits or sitting around doing nothing. At least you have consumed that information which could be used at a later date.

Anyway, I've got several books on the go at the moment and just put a few more on my Kindle. This happens to be one of the best inventions known to man. Yes, we can all have a debate about real books vs kindle/electronic devices. I love both but the Kindle has opened up a whole new world.

Kindle - you can have many books and just carry around something smaller than 1 regular book, often cheaper books (no printing costs), you can adjust the text (font and size), use and adjust the light on some models, it's not a screen like a computer (as is some people's worry), much easier to handle (better for the beach!) and a certain amount of anonymity… just in case you're reading Art of the Deal ;).

Hard books - the 'romance' of borrowing and lending, leaving used books in places for others to pick up, the real book feeling and smell, not reliant on technology, and no anonymity which is great for if you're proud of what you're reading… and a conversation starter (good way of getting a date!)

Anywho, I feel that I can distill some of what I've read into some posts… my own unique take of course. It won't follow any conventions, but perhaps pick out a few quotes and big ideas from the book and expand on them as I see fit.

For the record, I just finished Shoe Dog by Phil Knight (founder of Nike) so will do a post on that (I picked out one section here). I'm about half way through Total Recall by Arnold Schwarzenegger which I'm meaning to go back to, part way through The Art of Asking by Amanda Palmer (who also has a TED Talk on the subject) and today I added Gary Vaynerchuk's latest offering Crushing It and Relentless by Tim Grover.

I also got the hard copies of Dianetics by L. Ron Hubbard (controversial?) and Tools of Titans by Mr Timothy Ferriss. There are various others which I may touch on too. There aren't enough hours in the day or years in the years life to get through all the material! And perhaps I should be doing more writing than reading, but what the hey.

By the way, is there any kind of 'book club' type thing on Steemit? If so, please point me in the direction! Or we could set something up for anyone interested. Let me know about that too…

I believe Mr Will Smith once said that the keys to life are running and reading? In fact, here he is!

Cheers Will, we'll do our best… with both! ;)

~ Adam
@adambarratt

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Creative Director & Copywriter
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Check out the series so far!