If you are like me (the earlier version of me), you don’t read much.

I know that I basically quit reading books after college.

Every now and then I’d read a book on the beach on vacation, but that was about it. I’m sure I read no more than 2-3 books per year.

My life coach, Dr. Tom Hill, encouraged me to replace watching television with reading good books, and I am so happy that he did.

Here are some interesting statistics:

• 25% of Americans did not read a single book (or listen to an audiobook) in 2013.
• The number of non-book-readers has nearly tripled since 1978.
• The typical American read five books in the last twelve months.
• The average American watches more than five hours of television each day.
• For people over 65, the average American watches TV more than seven hours a day.
• If you read one hour per day on any one subject, in a year, you’ll be in the top 10% of experts on that subject

One reason that many folks don’t read is that they find it difficult, and are slow readers. We are taught to read as small kids by verbally sounding out words. As we grow, even though we may not verbalize words out loud when reading, our brains are still mentally practicing the verbalization of words. This really slows us down, and doesn’t have to be the case.

A few years ago I came across an amazing program that dramatically improves reading speed. It is called eyeQ (eyeqadvantage), is super easy and inexpensive ($12/month for the cloud-based program), and it works! I improved my reading speed from about 200 words per minute to over 1,000 words per minute now, and still improving. I’ve noticed that as my reading speed has improved, I’ve found that I enjoy reading much, much more, and I look forward to digging into my next book.

With Amazon (I have an Amazon Prime account), book buying has never been easier. Of course, you can also supplement your books with Kindle Version, and I also like listening to audio books through a program and app called audible.  Most recently, I’ve had friends recommend Scribd.

I like organizing the books that I buy and read on a cool virtual bookshelf called Shelfari. If you join Shelfari, please look me up and follow me / share your reading list.

Finally, I can’t emphasize enough how important it is that you read only good books. There’s nothing more frustrating to me than spending my valuable time on reading a bad book. Reviews on Amazon are a great way to sort good from bad, and there are several other great resources for book recommendations. A new place to share book recommendations (new to me, anyway) is called Goodreads.

Some of my favorite books are:

• The Bible (I really like The Message translation)
• Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
• Synchronicity: The Inner Path to Leadership by Joseph Jaworski
• Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
• The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
• Dancing Wu Li Masters by Gary Zukav
• The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer
• The Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday
• Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Album
• Same Kind of Different as Me by Ron Hall
• Start with Why by Simon Sinek
• The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
• The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy
• Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach
• Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
• The Dip by Seth Godin
• The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
• The Four Agreements by Miguel Ruiz
• The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck
• The Shack by Paul Young
• Crush It by Gary Vaynerchuck
• Einstein by Walter Isaacson
• Onward by Howard Schultz
• Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
• Good to Great by Jim Collins
• Born to Run by Christopher McDougall
• The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor
• Nikola Tesla by Sean Patrick
• David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell

Every one of the authors above are fantastic, and you can’t go wrong reading any of their books.

Of course, I can’t pass up the opportunity to plug my new book, From Autopilot to Authentic. I hope you’ll read it and let me know what you think.

As with anything related to changing your life, it often times comes down to habits – ending bad habits and creating new habits! I like to say….”Make a habit of changing your habits.”

One thing I know for sure, if you can make a habit of reading good books, your life will change in amazing ways!

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