Hi there I’m Cameron,
For the past several years I’ve kept a list on my phone of books I’d like to read. No matter how many I get through the list just seems to continue growing each week. On a good week I’d get through a book and cross it off only to add 2 more in its place. It was like fighting the hydra from Greek mythology.
So this year I wanted to make a change and this website is the result. I guess it’s loosely a New Years resolution? I didn’t think about that till now but it seems fitting.
My plan is to write a book summary every day for the year and possibly even continue into next year if I’m still feeling it at the end. This is the strategy I’ve decided to use to give my reading a boost, while also trying to crush that pesky list.
But why?
I listen to a lot of podcasts, on one in particular one of the guests mentioned that most people are lucky to take away one single piece of useable advice from each book they read. I take that to mean that if you only get one thing from a book then it has technically served its purpose for you.
Now I realise that many books offer far more than one actionable idea. But how many books can you realistically get through in a year? How many points can you take away from those books during the year?
I don’t know what your answer is. Mine has statistically not been many.
The Strategy
I’m the kind of person that needs consistent small effort over a very long time to see some progress, or feel like I’ve made some at least. Rather than sit down and try to do a book a week (I considered it) I needed something more concrete that I could commit to daily.
A book a week would have had me breaking the book apart in 7 days worth of reading and notes. If I had fallen behind due to work, study or life I probably would’ve given up and never got any further with it.
But writing a book summary every day? That felt nice and concrete. The amount of time I have each day will vary wildly so some days will not be as great as others but it also means I need to be doing at least some reading and writing every day.
Most of the books on habit I’ve read up till now, especially this one, have all said the same general things. Start small, build on success, tie habits together and be consistent.
I’ve wanted some sort of creative outlet for a while now so I’m hoping this scratches that itch as well.
So my consistent daily habit will be posting a new summary everyday, I apologise in advance for how potentially terrible the early ones will be. All I can say is that I plan to become a better writer with time and practice, I also welcome all feedback.
I will update this page as my process and thoughts on this evolve. I firmly believe that action always beats inaction so I’m just going to start and iron out the kinks along the way!
**Update May 2019**
I lasted approximately 4 months and then suffered a bout of food poisoning that ended my streak. For now I’m going to continue posting but perhaps moving to 3-4x per week instead of everyday as I go back and flesh out some of the older posts.