To Read 100 Books in a Year

I read 100 books in 2019, and nearly 2 years later, I’m starting to understand what I learned from it.

In a nutshell, by undertaking (and achieving) this endeavor to read 100 books in 365 days, you learn:

1. empathy — what empathy is, how empathy operates in this life, and how empathy illuminates the basic human condition;
2. that each present moment is filled with infinite, boundless possibilities; you need only to grow the awareness to see deeper all that is available; and
3. each time you set, pursue, and achieve a goal (big or small), your confidence increases at an exponential rate, snowballing into a momentum that reverberates throughout your greater existence.

The following is a reflection I wrote, in real time, when I finished my 100th book, so it’s written in present tense. I also include some brief personal reflection here, as 2019 was a cataclysmic year in my development as a reader and a writer — personal stories that will no doubt be fleshed out & developed into stand-alone Medium articles in the near future :)

One might assume that in reading all these books, one-hundred mother-loving books, I might stumble onto some secret: the meaning of life. Or better, perhaps: the American dream. But alas, I have not. What I’ve gained through my reading is subtle, deferred…