I have hated reading for the last 22 years.
I was born in a small village and a typical middle-class Indian family where marks/percentages in examinations are essential for growth. From my childhood till April 2021, whenever I held a book in my hand, it was for studying and scoring high in my examinations. Due to this, I always had pressure to achieve well, and I never understood the essence of reading. There are three main reasons which led to this feeling in me.
- When I read something, I had a feeling that I had to memorize, like memorizing the critical dates in history, and I was not too fond of it.
- The concentration required to understand a paragraph or a chapter was too much for me. And less number of pictures and illustrations in the book made it more boring. Instead, I preferred watching a movie.
- And finally, the lack of vocabulary skills.
Today I understood one important thing, your company — friends, family, etc., are the ones who define you. And your company is your bubble because you rarely think about anything out of this bubble. And Even if some new thought enters your mind, it may be removed because of the surrounding influence. This bubble might be a reason that reading never excited me. I still remember my school days. None of my friends showed interest in reading. Whether it be reading comics, storybooks, etc.
When you travel or show courage to meet new people and create new surroundings, these things start to change.
My interest drifted towards reading.
During summers, I used to visit my maternal grandfather’s place. Here I used to hang out with my cousin. He is the most intelligent person I ever knew. He was excellent at his studies and enjoyed his life to the fullest — playing video games, reading harry potter, sherlock holmes, and much more. And here I was, always trying to memorize stuff from textbooks to do well in exams. Sometimes I felt like I was the saddest soul on this earth.
I observed his love of reading, and thoughts arose that people who read are intelligent and successful, and I wanted to be one of those. But these were crushed/forgotten once I was back in my hometown. Being from a middle-class family, I was highly frugal that I never even spent money on chocolates. And I said to myself — “I didn’t like to read, and If I buy a book, that money might get wasted if I didn’t read that book.”
After my schooling, I moved to Hyderabad for my secondary education. Here I joined Chaitanya college — well-known for IIT preparations. Here I started studying even more. From morning 6 am till 10 pm with two hourly breaks for lunch and snacks. And I was not allowed to go out of the compound as well. It was a jail for students, so they studied well. And I had no chance of reading anything else apart from studies — Mathematics, science, and physics.
Time passed in the same manner until I started studying Engineering and moved to Bangalore. We move to a new place, meet many people, and keep spending time with them. But there will be a few with whom your views, goals, and perspective match. And these people become your lifelong friends. I have such a friend, and his influence on me for reading books was significant. He always used to read, even in the classroom when professors were teaching. He read so many books that he had to buy a new bookshelf. One can observe the knowledge he gained from these books in his words.
I wanted to gain such kind of knowledge and perspective. And at this point, I knew that I had to start reading, and no negative thoughts or anyone could have stopped me.
Finally, I bought my first book.
I bought my first book(The Subtle Art of Not Giving F**k) in April 2021. I chose this one because it has an excellent rating :). This decision would be a massive change for me, but I had already gathered the courage for this change. Things got interesting from here; I finished reading this book in one month; I was shocked and proud of myself at the same time.
Sometimes I could not stop myself, and I read for hours. I have read around ten books to date, and it has been an excellent experience.
Reading a book gives you a whole new set of eyes to observe things around you. When you read a new book, this perspective might shift slightly because thoughts may contrast with previous ones or provide new methods.
I must say that, read to understand and apply techniques to yourself. Don’t read a book just for reading/completing a book. Try to understand the author’s perspective, and it will take you deeper. Also, I learned that choosing what you read in the beginning is very important as it will become the base of your thoughts. I will soon post the new blog describing why selecting the right book is essential and which books you can read.
I hope you enjoyed reading this. Have a good day, see you soon :)
