Wanna Read More Books? parts 6 – 8

Ryan Holiday, the author of 15 books, including The Obstacle Is the Way, Ego Is the Enemy, The Daily Stoic, Conspiracy and Stillness is the Key, calls himself a professional reader. “ That’s really what authors are. A book is made of books.” Some reading rules he has followed over the years:

6) Keep a commonplace book. As Seneca wrote: “We should hunt out the helpful pieces of teaching and the spirited and noble-minded sayings which are capable of immediate practical application—not far far-fetched or archaic expressions or extravagant metaphors and figures of speech—and learn them so well that words become works.” (Here’s a video on my commonplace book method).

7) Err on the side of age. Classics are classics for a reason.

Beat them up. Books are not precious things. As an author, I love it when people hand me a book to sign that has had real miles put on it. When people hand me a pristine copy and tell me it’s their favorite, I assume they are just flattering me. It’s obvious what my favorite books are…because they’re falling apart (here’s my copy of Meditations for instance).