A little side note – I know I’m a little late for World Book Day, and I just realized a few hours ago that I’ve never written anything about books, writing, or publishing even though I preach about it across my entire blog!!! Whooosh…I know it’s crazy. So today, here I am creating an entire category dedicated to the same. You’ll hear a lot more from me on this – tips, the who’s, why’s and how’s, book recommendations and reviews, and all the important details.
And hey! Happy World Book Day!
Six months ago, I found myself drowning in a flood of easy information. The internet—and all the lovely things on it, things like Wikipedia, Twitter, podcasts, the New Yorker, email, TED Talks, Facebook, Youtube, Buzzfeed occasionally, and yes, even the World News—provide unlimited sources of delight at the touch of a finger.
The delight, indeed, abounds. But it’s not always delightful. It comes with some suffering too. I was distracted when at work, distracted when with family and friends, constantly tired, irritable, and always swimming against a wash of ambient stress induced by my constant itch for digital information. My stress had an electronic feel to it, as if it was made up of the very bits and bytes on my screens. And I was exhausted.
This all came into a sharp focus when I realized, to my horror (but probably not to my surprise), that I had read just four books in all of 2019. That’s one book a quarter. A third of a book per month. I love reading books. Books are my passion and my livelihood, perhaps. I might have an unpublished novel in a drawer somewhere.
I love books. And yet, I wasn’t reading them. In fact, I couldn’t read them. I tried, but every time, by sentence three or four, I was either checking email or asleep.
I started to wonder: could training myself to read books again help me manage the digital information stress in the rest of my life? Could the cure for too much information be slower information? In the same way that snake venom can be used to produce curative antivenom, I wondered whether that old, slower form of information delivery—books—could act as a kind of antidote to the stress caused by the constant flow of new digital information. Whether my inability to sustain my focus—at work, home, and on reading books—could be cured by finding ways to once again sustain my focus…on a book!
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Understanding Our Brains, Part 1: Dopamine, pleasure, and learning bad habits
Recent neuroscientific research is starting to help us understand why we behave as we do with our modern information systems. Humans’ brains, it turns out, are built to privilege new information over just about anything else (including, some studies suggest, food and sex). The promise of that new information, spurred by, say, pressing the refresh button in your email, or the ding of a Twitter (or any social media) DM alert, triggers the release of a neurotransmitter—dopamine—in the brain. Dopamine makes us more alert to the promise of potential pleasure, and our brains are wired to seek out things that generate dopamine.
There is a learning loop to this process—new information + dopamine = pleasure—that lays down neural pathways that “teach” your brain that there is a reward for pressing the email refresh button (even if that reward is nothing but another message from your long lost acquaintance).
This loop is reinforced every time you watch a second, third, or fifth, cat video on Facebook. And it’s a very hard loop to break. It’s almost—almost—as if hundreds of billions of dollars of engineering and product design have gone into building the perfect machine for keeping us distracted; the perfect system to tickle certain wiring in how our brains are set up.
Understanding Our Brains, Part 2: The energy costs of flitting around
While the addictive attraction of new information is one side of the problem, the other side is the cost of jumping from one thing to the next and back again.
The typical human brain is about 2% of the body’s weight, but it consumes in the range of 20% of the energy, according to neuroscientist Daniel Levitin. What the brain is doing dictates how much or how little energy it consumes: when you are relaxing or staring out the window, your brain is “at rest,” and uses around 11 calories per hour. Focused reading for an hour will use up around 42 calories. But processing lots of new information takes around 65 calories per hour. And jumping from topic to topic is worse.
Every time you pop out of your work to read an email, it costs you not just time, but energy too. As Levitin says: “People who organize their time in a way that allows them to focus are not only going to get more done, but they’ll be less tired and less neurochemically depleted after doing it.”
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So what do we do?
My workday is tied to fast digital information: a keyboard, a big glowing screen, an Internet connection, data in and data out, crises to handle, fires to extinguish. While I can make some changes to how I approach that workday, it’s almost impossible for me, for most of us, to escape the digital flows of information during working hours. For me, it’s been more effective to start weaning myself from digital inputs during my life outside of work.
I’ve used “reading books again” as the focus of my efforts—to unplug from the flow of digital information, and reconnect with that slower kind of information, the kind I used to get so much pleasure from.
I’ve settled on three hard rules that achieve two things: they get me reading books again, and they give my brain a break from constant digital overload. Here are my three rules to read again:
1. I get home from work, I put away my laptop (and Mobile). This was probably the scariest change—there is an expectation that we are always on, always connected for work. But, for me, there are very few emails that arrive at 10:15 p.m. (or 8:15 p.m.) that need to be answered right away. There are crunch times when I need to work in the evenings, but in general having a clear, well-rested mind when I start my work in the morning is far more valuable than having an overtaxed, exhausted mind from too many emails the previous night.
2. After dinner during the week, I don’t watch Netflix or TV, or mess around on the Internet. This is probably the change that has had the biggest impact. That hour or two of post-dinner wind-down is, for me, the only real free block of time in my day. So, once the dishes are cleaned, I no longer even ask the question; I just get out my book and start reading. Often in bed. Sometimes at an outrageously early hour. I thought this change would be most difficult, but it’s been the easiest. Making time to read again has been a real pleasure. (And I enjoy the TV; I do watch more than ever.)
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3. No glowing screens in the bedroom (Kindle is OK, though). This was my first move away from digital overload, and even if I cheat on the other rules occasionally, this is the one rule I never violate. Not having a connected Mobile or iPad or Tablet by my bedside means I am no longer tempted to check email at 3:30 in the morning, or visit Twitter, Instagram, Facebook or even LinkedIn at 5 a.m. when I wake up too early. Instead, in those moments of insomnia or an early wake-up, I reach for my book (and usually fall right back to sleep).
4. I make it a point to read first thing in the morning. I always, ALWAYS read first thing in the morning. No, I don’t mean the social media check-up, but rather a solid piece of information from a book. I either read for 15 minutes straight or on those lazy mornings where I’m late for work, I usually listen to a podcast or an audio-book, or watch a motivational video on YouTube. This habit has by far been the most revolutionary and consuming. But, it was worth it!
Following these four rules has made a huge impact on my life. I have more time—since I am no longer constantly chasing the next byte of information. Reading books again has given me more time to reflect, to think, and has increased both my focus and the creative mental space to solve work and business problems. My stress levels are much lower, and energy levels up.
Managing the flows of digital information in the workplace, and in our personal lives, is going to be an ongoing challenge for all of us in the years and decades to come. Digital information flows will get faster and more voluminous. The internet is just a couple of decades old, and we’ve only had smartphones for less than 20 years.
We are still learning how to live in this information ecosystem, and how to build the ecosystem for humans rather than for the information. We will get better at it—as humans, and as builders of technology. And in the meantime, reading books again will help.
Also, have you read a book lately? If yes, I’d love some recommendations for my reading list. Comment below.
Feel free to ask any follow-up questions or share your ideas in the comment section below. Alternately, I’d really appreciate for you to share this content on your social media platform if you found it useful so that others can benefit from it too. If you have any doubts or want a personal clarification, send me an email on eclipsedwords@gmail.com. For more inspiration, fun, and smiles, follow me on Instagram
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I have had a similar experience with electronic media and reading books. I love the feeling of being able to look up definitions or get more in-depth information by going off on tangents, but it IS not relaxing. It also doesn’t seem to off the depth of thought which happens in the extended conversation between and author and a reader (me). It always amazes me that I can touch the mind of someone who may have passed away decades (or centuries) ago. I also prefer the sensory input of books – the smell, the feel / weight, the touch of turning pages and hearing the sound of the paper. I have read fewer than a dozen books in electronic format – kindle, nook and pdf. There is just NO comparison to holding a book.
Thanks for the interesting post!
Kevin
Reading is a kind of therapy, good for the soul!
I’ve always referred to being forced to switch from one train of thought to another as mental whiplash. This was just about having to change course at work, but it never occured to me that his is also what happens consuming 140 (or now 280) character blurts on the internet. After reading your post, I realize what I’ve been doing to myself – thanx!
Book reading is definitely a better pace (and less exhausting.) I think in my case I will allow the internet its time during the day, but switch to book pace at night – then maybe my brain will slow down enough for a good night’s sleep.
Reading is good and I love the picture you included in the post. A good definition of all we gain from reading.
I am learning to engage in reading more than ever myself.
Oh my goodness I feel this. I used to read books all the time, but gradually the internet has reduced my attention span. I flit from screen to screen, app to app, webpage to webpage, taking in snippets of information and then moving on at lightning speed. I too can only read a few sentences before itching to look for something else. It feels manic. Exhausting. It happened to surreptitiously that I didn’t notice. I hope neuroplasticity allows me to reverse this habit. I know it will take a monumental effort but it has to be done. I even struggle to read long blog posts (but I enjoyed this one very much!)
I loved reading books. I have also shared some book reviews on my blog. It’s therapy for me to write book reviews at times. ❤
Yes! I was dragged down by news and social media. I cut those out and started reading books again – so much better! Simple, calm.
I’ve switched form my evenings of YouTube videos and Netflix series to reading blog posts. I do feel wiser and more accomplished 🙂 think I might start reading books again to!