Books

  • Finish More Books: How to Unlock the Power of Patient Reading

    Finish More Books: How to Unlock the Power of Patient Reading

    Until recently, reading anything felt straight-up strainful. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to read. I kept buying more books, my TBR had grown like bamboo on fertilizer, and, as a writer and philosophy student, reading is part of my job. And yet, reading patiently — let alone finishing books — had become as tough as opening a pickle […]

  • Don’t Remember What You Read (In Praise of Forgetfulness)

    Don’t Remember What You Read (In Praise of Forgetfulness)

    Advice on how to remember everything you read is plastered all over the internet. And to me — someone who juggles writing with studying languages and philosophy — this used to sound like the key to the promised land. Here was the antidote to living in a world of information overload. At last, I could escape the torturing anxiety […]

  • Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman: Top 5 Lessons

    Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman: Top 5 Lessons

    One of the things I love most about this book is the author’s personal history. You see, long before publishing Four Thousand Weeks, Oliver Burkeman wrote a weekly column on productivity. He’s a productivity geek. A guru. He knows every trick in the book — and added a few chapters. Did it make him happier, though? Complete, […]

  • 3 Deep Lessons from Greenlights (and Why You Should Get the Audiobook)

    3 Deep Lessons from Greenlights (and Why You Should Get the Audiobook)

    Ironically, I’ve never been a huge fan of Matthew McConaughey. The only noteworthy thing I used to know about him was the insane number of “Murphs” he dropped in Interstellar.  But then, I picked up his memoir Greenlights on a whim. (It was a long train ride, and I needed some soothing words in my […]

  • 3 Key Lessons From Rest by Alex Pang

    3 Key Lessons From Rest by Alex Pang

    Sometimes you’re lucky enough to read a book when you really need it. For me, Rest by Alex Pang was such a book. See, at the time, I was spinning too many plates. Heavy plates. On the one hand, I did a full-time master’s program where I was head over heels in projects and courses. […]

  • Deep Reading: The Skill to Absorb Everything You Read

    Deep Reading: The Skill to Absorb Everything You Read

    Deep reading helped me level up my reading practice in every possible way: I become totally absorbed in books. Everything I read is more memorable. Books are more attractive to me than social media. Ironically, I discovered it after a long and painful reading drought that was caused by… reading too much. See, I stopped […]

  • How to Worry Less About Money: 5 Lessons from the Book

    How to Worry Less About Money: 5 Lessons from the Book

    Normally, I really hate books about money. Sure, they teach you how to invest, how to go by with less, how to save for retirement, and all that. But here’s the problem: These are band-aid solutions. They might butter up your financial situation, but neglect far more critical, underlying questions: How much money do I […]

  • Why You Probably Shouldn’t Read ‘A Little Life’ by Hanya Yanagihara

    Why You Probably Shouldn’t Read ‘A Little Life’ by Hanya Yanagihara

    It’s been more than a week since I finished Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life. But the characters are still with me. I think about them when I make coffee, stroll through the woods, or meet a friend for dinner. And I’m not sure if that’s a good thing. Because A Little Life is inarguably the […]

  • Why Reading ‘The 48 Laws of Power’ Is a Huge Waste of Time

    Why Reading ‘The 48 Laws of Power’ Is a Huge Waste of Time

    Goodreads rating: 4.15 Stars. Over 1.2 million copies sold in the US alone. Recommended by Will Smith, Kanye West, and Michael Jackson. I desperately searched for a silver lining in The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. Unfortunately, though, I hated every second of reading this treasure map to hell. I can’t tell you […]

  • 4 Addictive Books for Short Attention Spans

    4 Addictive Books for Short Attention Spans

    Whenever I feel my attention span dwindling, I turn to these four books. They’re highly condensed, edited to the maximum, and hook your attention on every page. Plus, they’re made up of stand-alone chapters so you can flip them open and start wherever you like. These quietly addictive books are ideal if you want to […]