5
Finding Time
“Why should I read the book when I can just watch the movie?” It’s the universal lament of nearly every student assigned to write a book report, and of way too many men who think they’re “saving time” by watching the movie. Oh, but books and movies are such vastly different forms of communication.
Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them at all.
—Henry David Thoreau
Movies may offer glorious visual images, but books let us crawl up inside the words. Movies tend to force-feed the story to us at the director’s whim, whipping us from scene to scene so fast we barely have time to figure out what just happened before the credits start to roll (and roll and roll). Books let us linger. They invite us to spend a little time with the characters we love, to thoroughly examine ideas, to wrestle with and fully grasp difficult concepts. With books, the story never has to end. We can open the book and go back again, anytime we want. Books call upon the power of our imagination in ways that movies often deny.
But who has time anymore? A United Press International article in September 2006 (“Survey Shows Many Have No Time for Books”) cited a Chinese reading habits survey in which more than 40 percent of respondents said they have no time to read books. It’s not just in America.
The fact is, we’re all too busy. It’s a stigma of our high-tech society. Never has so much been available for so many—information, ways to get information, potential to stay in touch with family, friends, and associates, opportunities to get the latest headlines as fast as the reporters can make them up. Thanks to Internet, e-mail, cell phones, and careers that long ago left a forty-hour workweek in the dust, “downtime” has become a relic for most of us. With all that stuff competing for our time and attention, what’s a poor book to do?
Pat Schroeder, president of the Association of American Publishers, told USA Today (March 3, 2005) that people have been “convinced by the culture that they don’t have enough time to read books.”
Does that describe you? Do you think you don’t have time to read? Here’s what I’ve discovered: if something matters to you, you’ll find a way to do it. Maybe reading needs to matter to you more. I hope by the end of this book, you’re convinced to make time for books—for your sake and for the sake of those in your world.
After a long day at one of his various jobs,
he would read far into the night.
A steadfast purpose sustained him.
—Doris Kearns Goodwin on Abraham Lincoln
Horace Mann, the renowned early American educator, said, “Resolve to edge in a little reading every day, if it is but a single sentence. If you gain fifteen minutes a day, it will make itself felt at the end of the year.”
Mann was right, but I believe he hedged on that advice. We need to see reading as critical to our health. I admit I don’t have any hard facts to back this up, but my guess is if we all kept our minds active and engaged through daily reading habits, we would see a decline in the increase of diseases that affect the mind. We know, after all, that one cause of age-related mental diminishment is plaque buildup. We know how plaque builds up on our teeth, and we’ve developed tools for dealing with it. Isn’t your brain as important as your teeth? So think of daily reading as mental dental floss!
Abraham Lincoln, America’s sixteenth president, pursued reading with the passion of a starving man looking for food. Anytime was the right time to read, to Lincoln’s way of thinking. Doris Kearns Goodwin writes of Lincoln: “Working simply to ‘keep body and soul together’ as a flatboatman, clerk, merchant, postmaster, and surveyor, he engaged in a systematic regimen of self-improvement. He mastered the principles of English grammar at night when the store was closed. He carried Shakespeare’s plays and books of poetry when he walked along the streets. Seated in the local post office, he devoured newspapers.”
Could Lincoln have been driven by a sense of urgency, knowing somehow his life would not be a long one? Whatever the reason, Abe Lincoln made the most of the time he was given. He spent much of it learning by reading.
Make Time!
I’ve said this before, but it can’t be said enough: my personal favorite daily weight-lifting challenge is to pick up a book and read from it for at least one hour every day. Most days, I get in two to three hours. If I can do this with a full career, a crowded speaking calendar, and nineteen kids, I believe everyone can. Wherever I go on speaking engagements, I challenge my listeners to do what I do. With this book, I offer that same challenge to each of you.
Why not make that choice, too? Get up close and personal with words. Let them expand your mind and change your life.
Success trainer Brian Tracy offers these tips for squeezing more reading into your schedule: “Take advantage of every gift of time that you receive . . . Always carry reading material to go through when you get these unexpected moments of waiting or inactivity.
“If you read a book a month . . . you will read twelve books a year, one-hundred-twenty books in the next ten years, and you will become one of the best-read people in the world, by using this method. Or, if you read the classics for fifteen minutes a day, over the course of a few years, you would have read all the great books of literature.”
We have advantages today that never existed before when it comes to reading. Many classic works are in the public domain and can be downloaded to your computer. You can print them out or read right from the screen if you choose. So you don’t even need to buy books, necessarily, or even go to the library to check them out.
It’s not that I don’t like people.
It’s just that when I’m in the company of others—
even my nearest and dearest—there always comes
a moment when I’d rather be reading a book.
—Maureen Corrigan, book critic for NPR’s Fresh Air
Tools for Reading Anytime, Anywhere
In the last decade, computer search engines have revolutionized our lives. As I am writing this book, I find the business headlines literally bursting at the seams with news of what the folks at Google and Amazon are coming up with. Online book options are an ever-growing trend. Google Print provides a free service that allows authors and publishers to promote books, and offers readers a tool for finding books they’d miss otherwise. It’s what you call a win-win situation, as their competitors are rapidly finding ways to innovate and offer more, too. Tools like these not only make research easier to do, but they make picking out your next book a much simpler task. You can “browse the stacks” right from home. For researchers, nothing is more promising. For readers, it’s a decided option. To my mind, as long as it gets and keeps people reading, it’s a great thing.
With all these electronic possibilities, however, I find I’m forced to agree with Dorothy Mays, research librarian at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida. In comparing the book in the hand versus the text on the screen, Mays told the Orlando Sentinel (November 4, 2005), “A book is portable, lightweight, easier on the eyes.”
Stephen Riggio, CEO of Barnes & Noble, agrees. He told New York Times columnist Ken Jaworowski (April 15, 2006), “[E-books and podcasts] are a very, very tiny market. As the writer Paul Auster told me recently, the book is a perfect technology. If it were invented today, it would be revolutionary. It’s user-friendly; it’s portable. Books are relatively inexpensive. The have value as physical objects; they last a lifetime.
“Not all books can be converted into digital forms—just think about illustrated books and children’s books.”
Personally, I think books will always have a “hands-on” appeal. Were that not so, all brick and mortar bookstores would have gone the way of Amazon long ago. Libraries would be historical repositories and museums, rather than way stations for hungry minds. There’s something decidedly more satisfying about holding a book in your hands rather than reading from a screen.
Ultimately, though, it doesn’t matter whether you read a book in your hands, from the screen of your handheld computer, or listen to it on the way to work. However you do it, you receive the kinds of ideas you can only get from books.
I think one reason books have so much impact on our lives is because they require a little more time and several senses to process their information. When we converse with one another, we use our ears, our minds, and our mouths. When we listen, we use our ears and—hopefully—our brains as well. When we read an actual book, we use our hands, our eyes, our minds—and then sometimes our mouths to read a favorite part out loud to someone nearby. I even like the way books smell. Books urge us to take notes or write down the thoughts they stir up. Books are a literal interactive conversation and a complete sensory experience.
When people hear that I read, on average, five books a week, they are often amazed. But the truth is, I have the same number of minutes and hours in the day as you do. I’ve just been so motivated by my love for books that I’ve learned to use those “extra” minutes for reading: stoplights, doctor’s offices, plane flights (I’ll admit I may take more of those than the average person). And I’ve trained myself to read rapidly and retain what I’ve read. This is a valuable skill, which I believe anyone can learn at almost any age. We’ll talk more about speed-reading later in this book. For now, let’s apply some serious thinking to when we can make time to read.
On my way to speaking engagements,
I’m always reading something I need to know
or preparing my next presentation. I’m a constant
student. I’ve read an average of more than three
hours a day for thirty-plus years, and I read a
wide range of materials—everything from
the Bible to several daily newspapers.
—Zig Ziglar, motivational speaker and author
How Much Time Do I Need?
Business expert Jim Rohn advises us: “Hear or read something challenging, something instructional, at least thirty minutes every day. Miss a meal, but not your thirty minutes. You can get along without some meals, but you can’t get along without some ideas, examples, and inspiration.”
Old Sam Johnson took Rohn’s advice—and even mine—a leap further when he recommended, “A young man should read five hours in a day, and so may acquire a great deal of knowledge.”
I suppose we can all come up with something else to do these days, but my thanks go to the late great Groucho Marx, who observed, “I find television very educational. The minute somebody turns it on, I go to the library and read a good book.”
If all you want is a pastime—if all you really want to do is sit there and be entertained until your time is up—then watch television. Even at its worst, TV passes the time. Maybe you can at least find a good NBA basketball game to watch.
But I believe you want to do far more than that with the time you’ve been given. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be reading these words right now. Books will help you achieve your lofty goals, because through books you can take the collected wisdom of all those who’ve come before you—and build on it. Now isn’t that idea worth turning off the tube, putting down the joystick, or saying “no thanks” to that party? I’m not saying we shouldn’t do those things, too. Everything has its place, and some activities are meant for keeping in touch with others, building relationships, or just relaxing. I’m just encouraging you to consider your priorities—and give reading a higher place on the list. It really does deserve it.
If you think you’re too busy to read, look at how other busy, successful people spend their time. My guess is you’ll discover most, if not all, of them give reading some part of their day.
Washington Post writer Ann Gerhart reported on the reading habits of President and First Lady George W. and Laura Bush. “George and Laura start and end the day reading, with her often reading from the papers in the morning and both buried in books at night.” Developing a habit like this may require setting the alarm clock a half hour earlier or propping up your bed pillows awhile before nodding off, but I believe you’ll not only find that time well spent, you’ll discover you don’t miss the sleep you gave up.
Where do I find the time for not reading so many books?
—Karl Kraus, literary editor and publisher
Look for Empty Time to Fill with Books
If there is one thing that characterizes the times we live in, at least here in America, it is waiting. We wait at stoplights; we wait in lines at post offices, stores, movie theaters, and theme parks; we wait in doctor’s offices; we wait for job interviews. When we travel, which most of us do nearly every day to get to school or work, we even wait to get to our destination. “Hurry up and wait” is a theme song most of us have memorized.
My commute to work isn’t a long one, but I’ve learned to make use of stoplights. Since I’m familiar with my route, I’ve studied those lights. I know their cycles, and I know just about how much time I’ve got when I’m waiting at one. I use that time to read.
Maybe you don’t feel comfortable with the idea of reading at the wheel. I can understand that. I received a letter not long ago from associate Don Otis, who wrote me, “I still remember you telling me that you read books at stoplights! I’m not sure how that works, but I find myself carrying books . . . in lines. I hate to waste time.”
Is that you too? What about when someone else is driving? If so, you can read on buses, trains, planes, monorails—even stretch limousines, if you’re fortunate enough to ride in one. Hotel and resort CEO Barry Sternlight lives by this example. “I read, constantly . . . ,” he has said, “when I’m on the phone, eating lunch, commuting to work and, especially, when I’m flying. I never get on a plane without a huge duffel bag full of magazines and press clippings I pile on my office floor, between long trips, plus a novel or a new design book. I pretty much spend my entire time in the air reading, and with the amount I travel, that’s a lot of hours.”
When I hear people say they don’t have time to read, I find myself nodding in agreement with this advice from Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Guard well your spare moments. They are like uncut diamonds. Discard them, and their value will never be known. Improve them, and they will become the brightest gems in a useful life.”
We sometimes receive letters from businessmen who say they are too busy to read. The man who is too busy to read is never likely to read.
—B. C. Forbes, founder of Forbes magazine
Will I Ever Have Read Enough?
If you’re asking me, the answer is a resounding NO! And my research reveals I’m in good company. Socrates once said, “Employ your time improving yourself by other men’s writings, so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.”
He’s right! We have more books on weight loss than most other topics—when the fact is, if we just saw reading as more vital for our lives than eating, we might need the weight-loss advice less—and the world would be richer for it.
After all, what happens when you read something that inspires or challenges you? Sure, some of us close the book and go back to bed, but more people are likely to act on what they’ve read.
In the mid-1960s, Blanche Caffiere was a librarian at View Ridge School in Seattle. One day, a fourth-grade teacher brought in a student who kept finishing his work ahead of the class and needed more to do, something to challenge his active mind. The boy quickly picked up on the Dewey decimal classification system and became an expert shelf-stocker.
Seeing his need for an even greater challenge, Caffiere gave him a stack of cards for overdue books that had actually been returned, but misfiled. “Is it like a detective game?” the boy asked. And he was off like a bloodhound in hot pursuit. This went on for weeks, with the enterprising youth quickly rising from gofer to regular librarian.
One day, the boy’s mother broke the news that the family would be moving. Both Caffiere and the boy were sad. “Who will find the lost books?” he asked.
Not long after, Caffiere was pleasantly surprised when in walked the young apprentice. “Guess what?” he said. “That other school doesn’t let boys work in the library.” He’d asked for and received a transfer back to View Ridge.
“I should have had an inkling that such focused determination would take that young man wherever he wanted to go,” Caffiere wrote in the Christian Science Monitor. “What I could not have guessed, however, was that he would become a wizard of the Information Age.” That boy, his active mind inspired by the world of books, grew up to be quite an entrepreneur. Today, Microsoft founder Bill Gates is one of the most successful men of all time—largely because he knew how to use his time well.
If no other book you’ve read has made that kind of difference for you, let this be the one book. If through this book you are convinced that reading matters, both for you and for your family—if you begin today to make books a regular, scheduled part of your day—I’ll have achieved my purpose. And nothing excites me more than changed lives. Books have that kind of power.
Want to find time to read? Fall in book love.
Seek out the books that fire your passions.
Follow your intellect and your heart.
Then time will find you.
—Steve Leveen, from Starbucks’ “The Way I See It” series, #94
Tips to Make Reading a Daily Decision
Motivator Brian Tracy is a man after my own heart. He challenges people everywhere to “read at least one hour per day . . . One hour a day will translate into approximately one book a week. One book a week will translate into approximately fifty books over the next twelve months. If you read an hour a day, one book per week, you will be an expert in your field within three years. You will be a national authority in five years, and you will be an international authority in seven years.”
Wherever I go, whenever I speak, I deliver the same anthem. As I said a few pages ago, I challenge everyone—and that means you—to read, in a book, for one hour every day. Not sure it works? Try it out. Test it for a month. We’ll look a little closer at this challenge later on, but for right now, hear me out. I want you to think about this.
Let’s say you want to be a writer. Get yourself a stack of books on various aspects of writing and make a plan to read one hour a day as you whittle down that stack. By the end of a month, you’ll know more than you did at the beginning. By the end of the year, you’ll be an expert on understanding what it takes to be a great writer. Of course, you still have to apply what you’ve read, but you’ll be amazed at how reading shapes your ideas. When you sit down with that pad of paper and pen, or roll your chair up to the computer keyboard, you’ll be dazzled at the words spilling forth from your little cranium—all because you’ve been exercising your mind. It’s as if your mind is the muscle (which it is) and the books are the weights you lift to keep that muscle in shape.
Friends, I really can’t urge you enough to make reading a regular, critical part of your daily pattern. One hour, if you can—and you can! Try it. Be amazed at the results.
To be a reader is to think like Thomas Jefferson, who wrote to John Adams in 1815, “I cannot live without books.” It is to find books as fulfilling as your life’s work. Are you getting the message? It’s not about finding time at all! It’s about making time count—by filling it with books.