Lessons learnt from reading a book a week for the past 10 years

eneigualauno.com

7 points·reallydontask··2 comments

Ah that took me a second to get it. Nice one.

I agree with the sentiment that the commonly touted top non-fiction books probably won't teach you much. But I wouldn't cast out the whole medium just because you didn't learn anything from The Art of Not Giving A F*ck.

The only kinds of non-fiction books that I feel have actually taught me anything are usually very specific mathematics books that walk you through the proofs of a field's main theorems, and probably some other textbooks.

Books you find in bookstores are best consumed as entertainment in my opinion. Regardless of the non-fiction label.

I feel this is an extreme position, but I share a similar sentiment. Just like many others, I bought Thinking, Fast and Slow - and I was so disappointed. So much text to present a couple of statements (some of which turned out questionable in the end). I totally regret buying that brick.

Atomic Habits, however, even though it has similar wrapping-to-contents ratio, turned out far more useful. Maybe because I could read out some of the stories to my family so they internalize them and understand why I leave my dumbbels on the floor instead of hiding them somewhere just like a civilized person would do (well, my wife now understands why, but she still doesn't approve of it).

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