April 5, 2025
I want to read more. As I think most people in the modern era have experienced, my ability to focus has waned over the past few years. The one place I've seen this have the greatest impact is in my ability to internalize long-form text. It really bothers me that I'm losing this ability: there's a trove of information in books and articles, if only I had the self-patience to engage with it.
Over the past couple of years, I've tried various ways of motivating myself to read. At the start, I tried reading on a tablet (it was the fastest way to go from seeing a book title to having its text reach my eyeballs), but that was much too distracting. I bought physical books, but after picking them up and reading a few chapters, the pull of my gadgets kept yanking me out.
I think there were two main reasons I wasn't getting sucked in. First, I wasn't in the right environment. I kept trying to read in my bedroom, which meant my brain was in it's time to browse the internet and relax mode while I was trying to engage. Second, I wasn't reading books that I found engaging—instead, I was reading books that I thought would be good for me, such as textbooks. It's a bit like exercising or eating vegetables: doing something because you think it's good for you will only get you so far. Once the initial I'm-being-healthy motivation wore off, I needed something else to keep myself engaged.
This came to somewhat of a head two weeks ago, when I stumbled upon Careless People, by Sarah Wynn-Williams. Wynn-Williams is a former director of global public policy at Facebook, and her memoir covers some of the goings-on at the executive level. It offers a peek into the lives of the rich and powerful tech-elite, in their strive to become evermore rich and powerful.
As someone who's interested in technology and, increasingly, how powerful people make decisions, I decided I was going to read this book. I knew this book would be like candy for my brain. It probably wasn't the "healthiest" book I could have read, but I decided that, if this was the book that would get me to read more, or just prove to myself that I could read, then so be it.
How was I going to deal with the issue of environment? I decided to go all out and book a hotel room for one night. I considered not taking my phone, but ultimately decided to leave it on do-not-disturb the entire time. The point is less that it was a hotel, and more that it was a different environment that took effort and commitment to reach.
Overall, it was a success. I blasted through most of Careless People that night, and finished it up the next morning. On the way home, my head was swirling with moments from the book, thinking about how far I would personally be willing to go for the sake of my career (re: workaholism), and how I wouldn't let that control fall into the hands of my employer.
I want to keep reading. Obviously, booking a hotel room just to read a book is a luxury, so I'll need to find another solution. But right now, I'm just glad I restored a bit of my own faith in my ability to read.