Last month I was in vacation mode, so I switched to lighter reading. I read A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson followed by Tom Clancy’s Red Storm Rising.
But, rather than just taking lighter books to read, that is also part of my plan to diversify my reading. Here are three reasons why we should diversify our reading:
- Avoid boredom
I don’t know about you, but reading the same topics again and again makes me bored. Even for topics I’m passionate about, I will be more refreshed if I also read other topics once in a while.
- Arbitrage knowledge
The art of arbitrage is important for living smart, and diversifying your reading allows you to do knowledge arbitrage. Knowledge arbitrage means taking ideas from one field to be applied to another field. If you read only one or two topics, it’s difficult to do that.
- Cross-pollinate ideas
Continuing the idea of arbitrage, not only can you borrow ideas from other fields, you can also combine ideas from different fields. Often it will give you “original” ideas since nobody has seen such combination before. Of course, you can only cross-pollinate idea if you have different kinds of idea to begin with, and that’s why you should diversify your reading.
Now, having seen the benefits, there is a trait that will greatly help you build the habit of reading diversely, and that is curiosity.
If you are curious, you will find it interesting and challenging to pick various topics to read. Curiosity will make reading diversely effortless. On the other hand, lack of curiosity will make reading diversely burdensome.
To ensure the diversity of your reading, you should also develop a reading plan. While you can always alter the plan later to accommodate new interests and insights, at least it gives you a clear direction to begin.
Here are three steps to develop a reading plan:
1. List the topics
The topics here depend on your preferences. If you are an artist, diverse topics may mean different topics of art in addition to some non-art topics. For people who are not artist, the whole art could be just a single topic. For yet another people, art is perhaps not even on their list. So, again, it depends on you.
Nowadays, I read mostly business, personal growth, and sometimes spiritual books, but I’d like to add more topics to my reading. So here are the topics I come up with:
- Personal growth
- Business
- Spiritual
- History
- Science
- Fiction
- Classic
Having seven topics is perhaps not so diverse, but that’s a manageable start for me.
2. List the candidate book titles for each topic
After creating the list of topics, you should populate it with the books that you may want to read for each topic. For example, here is mine:
- Personal growth
On Writing Well
- Business
Marketing for Dummies, Moneyball
- Spiritual
Become a Better You
- History
Essential Visual History of the World
- Science
A Short History of Nearly Everything
- Fiction
Deception Point
- Classic
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Again, the books you choose and the way you classify them are personal. For instance, you might not agree that I put On Writing Well under personal growth, but that’s convenient for me. Do what works for you.
3. Count the books you have read for each topic and keep the counters balanced
There could be a case where you list books in diverse topics but end up reading just one or two topics. To prevent this, you can count the book you have read for each topic and try to keep the numbers balanced. While it’s fine to give more attention to one or two topics, you should ensure that you also read the other topics.
***
You can do more steps than these three, but for the purpose of diversifying reading, only these three are essential.
As you can see, the reading plan helps you ensure that your reading is diversified. Otherwise, it’s far too easy to just read the usual topics.
Photo by Ian Wilson
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译文:
多元阅读的三个原因以及方法
上个月我在休假，因此转而读了些轻松的书籍。在看完Tom Clancy的《红色风暴》之后又看了Bill Bryson的《万物小历史》。
但是，尽管我只是读了一些轻松的书籍，但其实这我我多元阅读的一部分。以下我们为什么要进行分类阅读的三个原因：
1. 避免厌倦
我不知道大家如何，但要是我反复阅读一个话题，我会觉得很厌烦。即使是我有强烈欲望读到的话题，如果我能同时看一些其他话题的书我会感到有新鲜感。
2. 对知识进行贯通
贯通的艺术对于聪明的生活尤为重要，多元阅读就可以让你对知识进行贯通。知识的贯通是指从将一个领域得到的想法运用到另一个领域。如果你仅仅阅读一两个话题，做到这点很难。
3．融会思想
继续贯通的想法，你不仅可以从不同的领域得到知识，你也可以将不同领域得到的知识加以结合。当别人都没有作出这样的结合之前，就产生了源于你的观点。当然，只有起始于大量不同知识，你才能产生源于你的观点。这就是为什么要多元阅读的原因。
现在，基于这些优点，有这样一个品质能够极大地帮助你建立多元阅读的习惯，那就是好奇心。
如果你好奇，你将会发现选择多种话题进行阅读是很有意思，很挑战的。好奇心可以使多元阅读很轻松，相反缺乏好奇心会使其成为负担。
为了保证你的阅读多元化，你应该指定一个读书计划。当然你可以随时因新的兴趣和视野而改变计划，但至少让它给你一个清楚的方向作为开始。
以下是指定读书计划的三个步骤：
1. 列举出话题
话题的选择取决于你的爱好。如果你是个艺术家，你的多元阅读话题可能是很多艺术方面的不同话题，以及一些非艺术类别的话题。对那些不是艺术家的人们来说，整个艺术也许只作为一个话题。然而对于另外一些人，艺术也许根本不在他们的书单当中。因此，再说一次，这取决与你自己。
目前，我所阅读的大部分都是关于商业、个人成长以及励志的书籍，但我想增加更多的话题。这就是我想要开始学习的：
1. 个人成长
2. 商业
3. 励志
4. 历史
5. 科学
6. 小说
7. 古典
７个话题也许并不能算是多元，但对我来说确是个可操作的开始。
2．列举出每个话题的候选书籍
在建立了话题单之后，你应该为每个话题列出你想读的书籍。以我自己的为例：
8. 个人成长：《关于更好的写作》
9. 商业：《仿制品市场》，
10. 励志：《做个更好的自己》
11. 历史：《世界上重要的可见历史》
12. 科学：《万物小历史》
13. 小说：《欺骗的特点》
14. 古典：《本杰明·法兰克富自传》
再次声明，书籍的选择以及分类的方法取决于个人。例如，你也许不同意我将《关于更好的写作》放到个人成长里，但对我来说很方便。做适合你的就可以了。
３.数一数每个话题你读过的书，使其尽量平衡
会出现这样一个状况，你制定了不同话题的书目，但最后还是只读了一两个话题的书。为了避免这样，你应该数一数每个话题你读过的书，使其数量尽量平衡。对一两个话题给予更多的关注是很好的，但你也应该保证其他话题的阅读。
你可以做的比上述三点更多，但以多元阅读为目的，这三点是最重要的了。
正如你所看到的，阅读计划帮助你保证了阅读的多元化。否则，很容易会出现仅仅对几个平常话题的阅读的情况。