Help me to read again!

[SnowyPheasants]

I love books, they have always been a huge part of my life, and before the internet (I am nearly 50) I could spend hours each day absorbed in reading, from philosophy to fiction to whatnot.

I still buy books, but they seem to pile up. I love them, anticipate them, but find that most of my 'downtime' ends up on the internet. I know, we all know, it's easy, accessible and enjoyable, but I dearly miss the space and pace that reading in real life gave me, that slowing, introspection; without links, opinions and distractions. Where you can just lose yourself in wonder and learning. For some reason, this effect just doesn't materialise using the internet, at all, no matter how vast and fabulous.

It sounds ridiculous, as I haven't changed at all, but if I am not working or creating, I just chill out online, especially youtube, watching my favourite tv or reading websites that pique my interest.

I want to get back to reading books, and right now I only do it on the bloody toilet! Like for 2 mins, so my experience is fractured. I now have one of those bathrooms full of stacked books, like a 90's hippie, which fragment and totter and never get fully read.

How do you make time for book reading, in the traditional sense? I don't care if it's paper or Kindle, I just want to read. It's pathetic of me not have not worked this out, but any tips or methods would be much appreciated!

I have just read half a book sprawled in the bath. I find if I don’t take my phone into the bathroom and take a book instead then I read.

Half a book! (envy) lol, I like that! I do want to make time though, to re-establish a thing where reading a book is a part of my day. If I think about it, the internet takes up so many hours, why can't i save one or two for a book? It seems so simple...have I gone mad??

The way I got back into reading was to read a chapter in a morning before I got up. Then I added on a chapter at night. Now I read all the time again

I go up to bed an hour early get comfy and settled with a cuppa and read for that hour

I have a similar problem. Bought a couple of new books today, read about 30 pages and here I am on Mumsnet.

I saw something recently that said reading real books changes the structure of your brain in a way that a screen doesn’t. I think that the internet is oddly addictive.

So I am trying no screens in the bedroom and read a bit of a real book before sleep in an attempt to retrain my brain.

Thanks, it's weird isn't it? I am more of a book person than a web person, essentially.
I don't have any kind of 'fear of missing out' and almost never read news or social media - just sites of interest, like art and stuff. I have no excuse.

I see from comments that it might be about familiarity? So the gentle easing back in might do the trick. Perhaps to demand myself to reserve an hour or two each day. It can't hurt, technically, it's like sinking in a sea of soup and trying to climb back out of the bowl.

Well I have no answer but I completely understand. From reading a book every week, while working full time, to going, through covid/lock down into full time retirement and never reading a book at all. Like you, browsing stories online, trivial social media posts, mindless activities etc. I mourned for my old ways but over 2 years later I actually went to my local library and took out 2 books, read them and made a conscious decision to carry on. Still don't race through them like before, but I'm getting my habit back. Too many distractions in modern life I think.

I saw something recently that said reading real books changes the structure of your brain in a way that a screen doesn’t.

Would love to read this if anyone knows what it was!

This gives me hope!

Oh I’m terrible these days for scrolling rather than reading. I’m on holiday at the moment and brought 3 books for the week. In years gone by this would possibly have just about sorted me out. 3 days in and I have read almost half of one book 😳 I don’t know what’s happened to me!!

Block out a period of time to read and then go somewhere where it's just you and the book. That's easier if it's a paper book. If it's an ebook take it on your kindle or similar if you have one, NOT on your laptop, tablet, or phone. Or if it must be on a device, disconnect from the internet. I like to read outdoors, but it's hardly the weather for it. I felt really strange when I started going out without even my mobile, even if I knew I was just going to read in a cafe or park or something for an hour, but now I love it. Also the library itself is a good place to hide. It can even be another room in your house as long as you leave your tech behind (and don't go back for it!)

I stopped going online so much. Started turning the WiFi off on weekends. I read four or five books a week these days, sometimes more.

Great tips thank you!
I am not attached to a phone I am one of those odd buggers who leaves it for calls and texts only, and don't have a wild social life.

I am more attached to my work laptop and ipad, so I need to figure a way around that, without disconnecting, it seems too drastic. Luckily I don't have much to do with notifications or updates, and don't use social media outside of work. I want to make the time and just do it, and for it to become the new normal, I think.

I wouldn't miss nor lose anything to give it 2 hours per day. It's pathetic.

Sounds ideal,!

I have to schedule in reading time to keep up the habit. Its the only way it gets done which sounds rediculous really because i love reading and being totally immersed with the story but i get lazy and watch tv or faff about online. At minimum I will read for an hour at some point over the weekend. I'd love to be one of those people who can read anywhere like in a cafe or on the commute but I get distracted with my surroundings and need silence to concentrate so have to fit it in when I'm at home.

I'm in a library book group. We meet once a month. The good thing about a library group is that it's not like a mates book group where it's mainly wine and lols. This is a nice, friendly discussion but you are definitely accountable to your fellow group members and feel a responsibility to finish the book so that the discussion is worthwhile.

Some books I've had to force myself to finish, others I have been surprised at how much I have enjoyed them, even if they are not ones I would usually choose.

So yeah, I'd say the discipline of a deadline and accountability focuses the mind and gets you back in the habit of reading.

Yes, I can see that it is a discipline. How tragic that it has come t this though, when it was once an eager pleasure. I wonder how fragmented out attention has become.

I would also like to ask, since I don't have children, have any of you noticed any patterns in younger people? say those who were born into the internet era and never experienced a 'before'? Are any of the avid readers, above the age of 10?
I would be interested to see how this pans out for future generations.

I definitely don't read as much now as I used to. The one tip I have is to get books from the library, or your library's app which you can download onto your phone or iPad (will probably be either Libby or BorrowBox). I find that the having a fixed return date forces me to read them. Whereas the books I buy just pile up by the side of the bed or on my Kindle.

I have exactly the same problem and I have worked hard to get back to reading, first I focused on building up how many pages I read - but reading was a chore that needed to be done, I would get to the end of the page and feel bored. I couldn't tune into a book and the characters the way I used to.

Part of it (for me) was that I used to need books in a way I don't now - I used to love slipping into another world but now I am happier and don't have to. Another side to it is concentration - the internet and fast and easy entertainment doesn't help with that.

Anyway what I did/do is recreate my favourite reading situation from childhood - which is, wintertime (or blind drawn), reading from lamplight, sitting on a comfy chair facing a cosy corner, soft blanket over my lap.... and it worked - I could read for much longer than before. Phone in a different room, laptop in a different room - no visitors expected and landline turned off. Perfect.

I don't think I'm ever going to get back to what it once was for me - but I have it back a bit.... and that is enough for me.

And read something you know you loved before!

It is difficult to see it as a chore - I only have associations with pleasure and feeling right, it is as if my mind has been usurped!

There's something sad about this, but at the same time I can see your point. If something has become less important to you, it is senseless to use force to get it back. I suppose the difference lies in knowing whether it is still vital.

I think I miss the way my mind worked, when I read. A certain kind of stillness and focus. In comparison the internet shatters my attention, whilst giving the illusion of immersion. I think I want both, I just haven't figured out how to do it.

I recommend a book in diary form. Tell yourself you'll read one entry and hopefully you'll get hooked and keep going. Then you'll be back in the habit of reading.

I am like this, too. I have put my Kindle aside for now, and am reading ‘proper’ books. I love the Kindle, but felt a need to sort of go ‘back to basics’, with the feel of a real book, having to have the light on to read etc. I’ve been reading stuff that years ago I might have turned my snobby nose up at - thrillers, detective novels, ‘popular’ writers - to ease myself back into it all. I am just trying to recreate the simple pleasure I have always found in being immersed in a book and am finding I am starting to really get back into it.

I don’t look at a screen after going to bed, and go to bed slightly earlier to get some reading in. I’d forgotten what a lovely way it is to relax before sleep.

I could have written this ( except the toilet reading bit). It's frustrating isn't it?

Join Goodreads and set yourself a reading challenge. Yes it's social media but it's not as flashy as the others and it keeps you on track with e.g. a book a week. At the end of the year it generates a collage for you of your year in books which is very satisfying.

I am very much the same. I have got into the habit of no screens apart from my Kindle Paperwhite upstairs so I read before I go to sleep, if I wake during the night and before I get up. But the evenings when I could be reading I am mostly messing about on the internet.
I do read in the bath and sometimes lie on the bed and read. I annoy myself though, I waste so much time and reading really soothes my brain.