Using Daily Books in my Morning Routine
I start my morning every day with a cup of coffee and my iPad. I have a custom page set up on my iPad to follow my morning routine with apps.
One of the first apps is the Kindle reading app. For the past two years, I’ve used daily books, which have 366 short readings, one for each day of the year. Last year, I used The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living by Ryan Holiday and Daily Creative: Find Your Inspiration to Spark Creative Energy and Fight Burnout by Todd Henry.
This Year, Reading a Few Pages Every Day
This new year, I’ve started a different practice: Instead of using daily books in my morning routine, I’m reading regular books a few pages at a time. On January 1st, I began reading: Letters on Ethics: To Lucilius (The Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca) and Meditations for Mortals: Four Weeks to Embrace Your Limitations and Make Time for What Counts. When I get done with one book, I’ll choose another to begin reading.
I like the idea of reading a little from each book each morning and then having the rest of the day to ruminate on what I read. Too often, I attack a book to get it done so I can move on to the next unread book in my Kindle library. Not that I don’t try to think about it as I read, but I feel I’m on a self-imposed timetable to get it done.
How Will This Work Out?
It will be an interesting experiment to see how I engage with each book by reading just a small portion every day. Will I take more notes about what I read? Will I write more about what I think about what I read? Will more time to think about my reading result in more practical applications?
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