These days everybody recommends reading. Do you want to be a better reason, do you want to be person of value, then read a book. I thought that reading was a recipe for success. But it took me 6 years and 100 books to realize that I was wrong.

Since I started reading, I focused on non-fiction category. After all they are based on facts and they are applicable to real life. I wasted 2 years on self-help books(Rich Dad Poor Dad, How To Think and Grow Rich, my God). Then slowly found my favorite niche and authors.

I started enjoying it, reading became my habit.

I felt as if each book was making me smarter. But I was wrong. Non-fiction didn’t make me smarter, it did what it’s supposed to do - provide with surface level knowledge. The recipe for bestseller book is simple. Writers need to choose popular topics(success, money, relationship, eetc) and make them very easy to read. We did it to ourselves with technology

Thanks to the AI and short videos, we cannot focus in one task more than 3 minutes. Let alone reading books, we cannot read messages longer than 4 sentences anymore. So authors have to choose common sense things and explain as if we are 6 year olds(people ask in this style from LLMs)

So after my frustration, I picked up textbooks. I remembered what is “real” learning. Textbooks are uncomfortable to read, because I need to focus, contemplate and memorize the contents. However, even with concrete knowledge I still didn’t feel the change.

I think I change by doing, not by knowing. And reading in a sense stopped me from doing things

For example, I preffered reading about Algorithms rather than writing the real code.

Maybe it is not about IQs and knowledge. Maybe it is about will and actions.

I prefer to be illiterate action taker than professor possesing all the knowledge and doing nothing. Okay maybe not illiterate, but you get the idea

I am not saying reading itself is bad, but being stuck in “learning cycle” is. Unless I apply the knowledge from the books to real problems, then it is mental entertainment(central idea of non-fiction)

That being said, I was wrong about fiction too. I wondered why would I read made up tale. Apparently, each fiction book has several topics that it deals with. The contents are seriously clued to the characters. So it actually makes the ideas memorable. For example, I read the The Mount of Monte Cristo, now the idea of resilent and honourable man lives in my mind. And whenever I face certain situations that is relatable to the book I remember him.

In conlusion, if I started reading from the beginning, I would prioritize textbooks and classic fiction books over today’s non-fiction bestsellers. I would also read more essays and study papers. I would do more, but I can’t

Because I feel the burden in my heart everytime I make a wrong move. Till now I struggle with mistakes and losses. I wish I was more resilent and mature about it. I wish I could shut up that inner kid that only accepts success. I wish I felt more confident about risks. I wish I didn’t overthink every decision.

100 books could not make me achieve above mentioned values, maybe 500 will, maybe 1000 will. But I doubt it. We are humans. Word “insan” comes from Arabic language and it means “forgetful”.

We forget, we ignore, we assume until we smash our head to the wall. You can read about smashing your head to the wall, but it never comes near smashing it in real life. My current take on books is that they are a bit overrated, and education is not answer for everything

I will end with Dostoevsky’s quote:

“Talk nonsense, but talk your own nonsense, and I’ll kiss you for it. To go wrong in one’s own way is better than to go right in someone else’s.”

Okay one more quote from my favorite movie - The Matrix:

“There is a difference in knowing the path and walking the path”

PS: This essay is not advice or message adressed to others. It is adressed to myself. I wrote it to understand myself

Side Effect of 100 books