Things are changing

Type: Opinion

This is inspired by another blog I recently read about why reading a book cover to cover is not probably the best idea for informational consumption today.

I was born and brought up in a family of moderate means; certainly not extravagant. Since childhood, I had a penchant for reading. Being the voracious reader I was, books were finished in a jiffy and new ones had to be purchased. But, since that cost money, and even though my parents always encouraged reading, I had myself formulated a rule to ‘complete’ the existing stock before moving on to something new. By ‘complete’ I mean, from ‘cover-to-cover’. It took me some time to realize that this habit of ‘cover-to-cover’ reading might have been considered impeccable by our previous generations, but certainly is no longer either very ‘informational’ or feasible now. For a very simple reason: ‘Information (over?)burst’. Think about it: Google openly admits having minded at least a trillion web pages. For a small kid with decent internet connection they have more information at their disposal than our previous generation ever had imagined. Additionally only some parts of the book might be what we are looking for. Why then invest your ever precious time on it ? Many times we start a book, read a little, and find that this is not what we had imagined it to be. Me? I used to try and complete it anyways (eventually gave up War and Peace at ~1000), but no longer. There are tons of books waiting out there for us, choose ! Wrong choice ? Choose another! But please don’t force yourself to finish it.

Another cliched advice is to be economically conservative. Why this never goes out of fashion, I have come to realize a very accurate truth: a little self pampering, maybe involving high expenditures to keep yourself motivated and focused on your dreams is good and certainly causes no harm. Since we can easily get swayed by ‘a little indulgence’ we must always draw a line somewhere, let it remain, but otherwise, do enjoy by all means. For instance, a ‘7k INR’ headphones might be considered an extravagance by my parents, but if I like to listen to music while coding, then certainly they are way more useful than ‘7k’ simply sitting in my account, accruing interest.

So spend, spend a little wisely, and read like a whore with insatiable appetite changing your ‘book’ frequently and for the same reason: to experience variety.

Prendre plaisir !