A few times this year, I've found myself recounting how I got into a solid reading habit. Often, I repeat the basic same story:
I was an English teacher...and was asking my kids to read a minimum of 20 mins a night at home to build their reading skills and love of reading. I realized at a certain point I should take my own advice! So I made myself read ~20 mins for fun every night. Now it’s just a habit I can’t do without; I often read a little longer now but for nights when I’m tired, 20 mins still seems manageable, which is why I still hold that goal for myself. I recommend it - it helped me get back into reading for myself (and not just for work).
What I've also realized, is that reading for myself has beget some really great things in reading for work. In addition to the countless emails I read every day, I often need to bring texts and articles into the design of professional development for lots of different audiences. This has often been why I focus on fiction at home, since so much of my work is non-fiction.
Reading consistently truly sharpens skills (like comprehension, interpretation, etc). The consistent practice of reading means my brain is pretty used to taking text and doing something with it - making meaning and deciding what to do after.
Reading has made me even more curious. Although fiction is my go-to, I often get wrapped into non-fiction reads while at bookstores, and feel compelled to pick up non-fiction books. Memoirs are generally the ones that I finish cover-to-cover, but I read excerpts of and utilize lots of other types of non-fiction, particularly books that relate to business, leadership or the impact of science on organizations.
The combination of the above two things led me to lead a short meeting for my whole organization on Daniel Pink's newest book, When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing. It was essentially a presentation and activities based on the first two chapters of the book. I also have used three cornerstone texts in developing the foundations for professional learning communities on my team. I feel incredibly fulfilled as a designer when I'm helping others to access and make meaning of texts in the context of their work.
So, my 12 of 30 books this year comes from my daily reading for myself, but it has yielded exposure to dozens of other texts that also make reading for work even more pleasurable.
Maybe this is all to say - life is about reading, and it can be in both my personal and professional lives seamlessly.
To books,
~MJ
