If you want to grow, you need to expand your personal capacity. I already wrote about it before, but I think it’s necessary to touch on this topic again. It’s an important topic that deserves constant reminder.

Expanding your personal capacity is essential for your personal growth. It will take you the next level in life. It will make you a better person. For that, what you need to do is taking a new challenge. You should move out of your comfort zone and do something that stretches your skills and abilities. It’s inconvenient, but that’s the way to grow.

So here is my question to you:
What new challenge are you going to take this year?

We still have eleven months in 2012 which is enough to work on a new challenge. Don’t waste them by just doing what you always do. Do something that will take you to the next level in life.

To help you choose a new challenge to take, here are a few ideas:

• Take an online course
  Is there a subject you are fascinated about and want to study if you had time? Well, this year might be the time for you. There are a lot of courses available on iTunes U that you can choose from, not to mention other sources like YouTube. There is even a new breed of interactive courses that will give you assignments and give you feedback (here are some examples). With so many options available, I’m sure you can find something on the subject you are interested in.
• Start a side business
  Perhaps you already have an idea for a side business. It could come from your hobby or from a specific need that you come across. Why don’t you make it a reality this year?  Having a side business is a good way to expand your capacity because it will teach you a lot in the process. Plus, it could give you an extra cushion in this uncertain economic times.
• Start a blog
  Today everyone can express his or her thoughts through a blog. You are no longer limited to just being a consumer of information. If you have a subject you are passionate about, it’s a good idea to start a blog on it. You will learn a lot more by writing about it, plus you will meet interesting people along the way.

One word of caution: don’t expect instant success if you decided to build something. It takes time to build something, so don’t get discouraged if your blog didn’t attract many readers or your business didn’t give you enough revenue in the beginning. Remember, your goal here is to expand your personal capacity.

Those are just a few ideas from me. I’m sure you have a lot more ideas on how to expand one’s capacity. I’d like to hear from you, so feel free to share them in the comments.

For updates and interesting links, please follow me on Twitter.

Photo by Tony the Misfit

So here we are in 2012. We have left 2011 behind and the new year has come. No matter how you did in 2011, the important thing is that you improve yourself in 2012. Aim to make this year your best year ever.

To make it happen, here are two self improvement habits that you may want build in this new year:

1. Journaling

This is one of the most important habits to build for your self improvement. There are at least three reasons why journaling is important:

• It makes you find the lessons behind every experience
  Perhaps this is not the case in the beginning, but once you make journaling a habit, your mind will automatically explore every possible lesson in your experiences. Rather than just being a passing event, every experience becomes a learning opportunity.
• It encourages you to think through the lessons you learn
  Journaling involves writing down the lessons you learn. To do that, you will have to get the gist of the lesson and put it in a concise form. That encourages you to think through the lesson so that you can truly get it. This will make the lesson sinks deeper into your mind and heart.
• It helps you remember the lessons
  First, the act of writing itself helps you remember the lesson. And second, your journal becomes a place that you can refer to in case you forgot the lesson.

As you can see, journaling is good for your self improvement, not just for the end product but also for the process itself. So, if you haven’t done so, make journaling a habit of yours this year.

2. Reading books

I know I’ve written about this many times, but this is worth repeating: reading books is an important habit for your personal growth.

One day I listened to an episode of Freakonomics podcast titled Growing Up Buffett. It features an interview with Peter Buffett who is the son of Warren Buffett, the famous investor. There is one thing the young Buffett said about his father that’s interesting to me: “He read a lot and he still does.” Reading has been a habit of Warren Buffett for years. No wonder he can make so many good decisions in changing market situations.

Many other famous people also have this habit in their self improvement arsenal, so it’s wise to make it a habit of yours as well.

If you already have this habit, aim to do it better this year (for example, by adding some biographies to your reading list). I still have a lot of room for improvements in this area so this is something I’m going to work on this year.

***

That’s it. Just two simple habits. I don’t want to give you too many things or something too complicated to do. These two habits are certainly doable. They are simple, yet they can do a lot for your personal growth.

Happy New Year!

For updates and interesting links, please follow me on Twitter.

Photo by Vinoth Chandar

Note: This is a guest post from Marcus Taylor of Get Noticed

Have you ever considered that trying new experiences, such as eating new foods and trying new restaurants can make you more successful? Probably not, but there is in fact a very clear and profound link between the two.

Over the past few months I’ve been doing a lot of research whilst writing Get Noticed around the topic of how important trying new experiences are in meeting new people and ultimately developing strong relationships. The initial part of that link is that trying new experiences improves your communication skills. The second part of the link is that improving your communication skills has a positive impact on your social and financial success.

Research by The Dale Carnegie Foundation suggests that roughly 85% of our social and financial success in life is determined by our communication skills.

Many people have asked me what the link between communication skills and financial success is – the truth is that there are a multitude of links, but the most obvious explanation is that every monetary transaction requires two humans to interact in one form or another (be it a customer buying from a merchant, an advertiser paying to reach an audience, or an employer paying an employee). Communication skills facilitate these relationships and allow you to influence people’s decisions, therefore making these skills a valuable asset.

Here are five ways in which trying new experiences, such as going to a new restaurant, can impact your success.

1. Trying new experiences can get you a job

A survey conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers asked 1,000 employers what the most important skills for a job candidate were, the results showed that out of over ten different factors, communication skills were by far the most important.

In a world where smartphone addiction and anti-social networking prevail, communication skills are becoming an ever increasingly valuable asset for businesses who rely on human communication to win business.

2. Trying new experiences helps you connect with people

One of the most prominent aspects of your communication abilities is being able to develop rapport and deepen conversations with people you meet by identifying common interests and similarities between the two of you.

I was recently speaking with a client who mentioned that she was going out for dinner to try Kangaroo steak, and just several days beforehand I had tried Kangaroo for the first time. I told her that I’d recently tried it and that it was thoroughly recommendable, and we ended up having a rather extensive conversation about Australia and exotic foods. Without identifying that common ground, there’s a chance I may have missed the chance to develop rapport with her.

It may sound tenuous, but frequently trying out new experiences, such as eating new foods as just one example, is an excellent way for improving your social and financial success by building on your bank of conversational material that you will carry around for the rest of your life. That bank of material will help you when connecting with employers, customers, business partners, or even just friends who might eventually have a profound impact on your success.

3. Trying new experiences makes you appear more interesting

People who are well travelled and have experienced a greater deal of new experiences are typically much easier to hold an exciting conversation with as they can relate to more of the things you enjoy or have done. Being well experienced also makes you appear to be more interesting, which helps attract people into your life.

Be one of those people. The next time you think about going to that place you go to every weekend out of routine, stop and think about trying somewhere new, the experience might just help you build rapport with someone who might change your life.

4. Trying new experiences is inspirational

If you do the same old thing week in week out you’re going to struggle to find inspiration more so than a person who goes to new places, explores the world and actively seeks inspiration in the form of experiences.

Inspiration is what gives us desire, persistence and creativity. All great ideas were inspired from experiencing something. If you want to turbocharge your creativity and inspiration, start by trying some new experiences.

5. Trying new experiences grows your comfort zone

In April this year I decided to go skydiving from 13,000ft, not because I’ve also loved the idea and not because I’m an adrenaline junkie, but because I have a persistent urge to smash my comfort zone, and it seemed very far out of my comfort zone.

I once read a quote from a source I cannot remember which suggested that once expanded, our comfort zones never shrink to their previous size.

When you try new things, even as little as trying a new dish that you’ve never had before you expand your comfort zone, which makes other day-to-day challenges seem less significant.

In my case, if I am asked to do something seemingly challenging I just think to myself “this is nothing, I’ve jumped out of a plane before”.

Having an expanded comfort zone will help you in so many walks of life, especially in your career as it allows you to comfortably manage what other people would be too afraid to do. You will be calmer around problems and issues because you will have developed a bigger perspective.

Concluding thoughts

It’s hard to measure the financial or social impact that going out for a dinner at a new local restaurant will have, but what do you have to lose? Turning the opportunity down may not harm your social and financial life in any way but it’s more likely to make it stagnate, whereas you never know the impact that trying a new place may have on you over in the long run. My challenge to you is to set yourself a goal to try something new, whether it’s one new thing a month, a week, or even per day.

I’d be interested to know how you get on, so if you do try this feel free to share your experiences with me either on Twitter (@MarcusATaylor) or e-mail (Marcus at wegetnoticed dot com), I’d love to hear :)

Marcus Taylor is the co-author of Get Noticed, a book that explains how you can be in the right place at the right time, all the time, to meet the people who will improve your life. Marcus is also head of social media at SEOptimise.

Photo by I-5 Design & Manufacture

If you wanted to learn a subject in the university, there is a structured way to do that. For example, to learn economics you might start with Economics 101 in which you have to read book A, do assignment B, and so on. If you followed the path, you are more or less guaranteed to have a good understanding of the subject.

But how can we learn about life? How can we learn about the best ways to live our lives?

This may be the most important subject to learn, yet there is no curriculum on it (even if there is one, I doubt it’s good enough).

So what should we do?

I believe that one of the best ways to learn about life is to study the lives of exceptional people. Find those who live great lives and learn how they do it. And the way to do that? Read their biographies. That’s why I have increasing interest in reading biographies. For me, biographies are among the best books to read.

Why You Should Read Biographies

There are many benefits you will get from reading biographies. Here are four:

1. It teaches you about the pitfalls to avoid

There are pitfalls on the way success. Instead of learning about them the hard way, why don’t you learn from those before you? Biographies can teach you about what make people fail in the past so that you can avoid them in the first place. Of course, it’s impossible to avoid failure altogether (I’ll talk about it in the next point), but at least you can save yourself a lot of time.

2. It teaches you about how to respond to failure

No matter how good you try, you will still fail. It’s simply inevitable (if you have never failed, maybe you aim too low). So, even more important than learning about the pitfalls is learning about how to respond to failure.

Great people can teach you a lot about it. Why? Because one important reason for their greatness is the way they respond to failure. It’s not that they never fail; it’s that they have the right response to failure. Reading their biographies will help you form the right mindset about failure so that you, too, can respond correctly.

3. It opens your mind about what is possible

This is one of the most important things about reading biographies. Often we limit ourselves and think too small. We might think that we will never do anything big in our lives.

But the truth is, every big thing in this world has a small beginning.  Wal-Mart, for example, started as a single shop in a small town. Who would have guessed that years later they will become one of the biggest businesses in the world? Reading the story of how something with a humble beginning grows big and changes the world is really inspiring.

You might be doing something that looks small today. Perhaps you have never dreamed that it will become big someday. But reading the biographies of these people will open your mind about what is possible. It will inspire you to dream big.

4. It teaches you about the great principles to live by

Behind extraordinary people are extraordinary principles. They live by them and that’s why they become extraordinary. The principles set them apart and make them stand out in the crowd.

Reading their biographies can teach you about these extraordinary principles. Sometimes they are not explicitly stated, but by studying their lives you can discover the unstated principles that drive them.

True, lasting success comes from the inside out, not the other way around. That’s why these principles are treasures. Make finding them your focus when reading biographies and strive to apply them in your life. Then your life, too, will become extraordinary, starting from the inside.

Photo by Linda Yvonne

“Chance favors the prepared mind.”
Louis Pasteur

Do you agree with the quote above? I definitely do. Instead of believing in pure luck, I believe that luck is what happens when opportunities come to those who are prepared for them.

To increase your “luck factor”, there are two things you should do:

1. Prepare yourself for opportunities so that you can take advantage of them when they come.
2. Put yourself in a position that makes it easier for opportunities to come.

While both of them are important, I think the first one is more important. Why? Because what makes the difference is whether or not you can take advantage of the opportunities. What’s the use of getting a lot of opportunities if you can’t take advantage of them?

So, because the first point is more important, I will focus on it here.

Preparation Takes Time

There is one important characteristic of preparation that you must understand: it takes time. You can’t prepare for something big overnight. In fact, bigger opportunities require bigger preparation. Just think about the level of preparation it takes to go to the Olympics. Those who want to go to the Olympics must prepare themselves for years, often from an early age.

That’s why it’s important that you prepare for future opportunities. Don’t wait until they come before you start preparing for them. It would have been too late by then. Prepare yourself early and you will be ready by the time they come.

Three Ways to Prepare Yourself

Here are three ways to prepare yourself for future opportunities:

1. Be curious

Curiosity makes you eager to know more about the world out there. If you are curious, you won’t be satisfied with what you already know. You will want to know more. As a result, you will see more potential opportunities.

It’s like being in a building with windows. The more windows the building has, the more you can see what’s out there.

2. Educate yourself

When you find something interesting, start educating yourself about it. Don’t worry if you can’t do anything about it right now. Remember, you are preparing for the future.

In my case, there are a few things I’m interested in which I still can’t work on at the moment. So what I do is I educate myself about them.

For example, I have a dream that someday I might have a game studio. As I wrote in Eight Random Things About Me, I often wrote simple games when I learned computer programming. Who knows, perhaps I could have my own game studio someday. While that might still be years away, I start educating myself about it so that I would be ready when the opportunity came.

So educate yourself in whatever it is that you find interesting. Read blogs, subscribe to magazines, watch videos, read books. Build a “prepared mind” that luck favors.

3. Build an “opportunity fund”

Warren Buffet makes sure that Berkshire Hathaway has at least $10 billion in cash in reserves. Why? So that when the opportunity comes for an attractive deal, Berkshire can immediately act on it. If they didn’t have the money, the opportunity could be gone forever.

Similarly, you should prepare an “opportunity fund.” Prepare certain amount of money that you can use to take advantage of the opportunities that come your way. Don’t let opportunities slip by just because you don’t have the cash to act on it.

***

So that’s how you prepare yourself for future opportunities. Don’t wait until it’s too late. Prepare yourself early and years from now people will be amazed at how “lucky” you are.

Photo by Nicholas_T

We live in an exciting time. Never before in the history are there so many resources available for individuals. Never before in the history are there so many opportunities for us. Here, in the 21st century, lack of resources or opportunities is no longer a problem. The problem is how to take advantage of them.

Let’s see some of the things you have today:

1. Knowledge at your fingertips
   With just a few keystrokes or mouse clicks, you can get to know almost anything. You don’t need to go to the library for that. You don’t need to call an expert. In most cases, you just need to go to Wikipedia. If Wikipedia doesn’t have it, Google is there for you. This is not to mention the many other resources available.
2. Easy communication
   Communicating with people from halfway around the world is just about as easy as communicating with someone next door. Not only that, you can choose the mode of communication you like. Between Twitter, Skype and Facebook, there are many flavors of communication you can choose from.
3. A voice
   For many years, individuals can only be passive recipients. In the age of radio, newspaper, and television, you were just a consumer. You couldn’t have a voice. But now you can. Everyone can start their own blog or YouTube channel and have a worldwide audience. You can become the producer and not just a consumer.

Of course, in this kind of world, we need a new way to learn. The strategy that worked well in the 20th century may no longer work today. We need to know how to learn the 21st-century way.

For that, there is one thing to keep in mind: the world is moving fast. What was popular two years ago might no longer be popular today. What is popular today might no longer be popular two years from now. So, to be an effective learner, you must be quick to adapt. You must become a versatilist. Don’t stick with things that no longer work. Change the way you do things as situation demands.

With that in mind, here is what I believe is an effective learning strategy for the 21st century:

1. Stay up to date

Before anything else, you need to know what’s going on in the world today, not just in your field but also in other fields. This is how you see new threats or opportunities coming.

I do that by subscribing to blogs and publications through an RSS reader (I use Google Reader). Some people prefer to use Twitter and that’s fine too. Just use whatever tool that works for you.

The important thing here is to keep the signal-to-noise ratio high. Get rid of the sources that don’t give you enough value for your time.

2. Make assessments of the subjects you come across

When you find something interesting from step 1, look for more information about it. For example, if you find a new term that you are not familiar with, look for the definition and some background information. If you see that a certain field is getting popular, find out more about it and why it’s getting popular.

Your goal here is not to be an expert. Your goal is to know enough about it to understand the impact it might have on your life and the world. Your resources are limited, so you need to assess how good something is before committing more resources to it.

Wikipedia is your friend here. It gives you good background information about practically any topic you want.

3. Immerse yourself in the promising subjects

When you decide that something is promising, allocate more resources (time and money) to it. Buy books, watch online lectures or tutorials, subscribe to related blogs. This is the time to utilize the abundance of resources you have on the Internet.

Here are some good sources of online lectures and videos:

• iTunes U
  With iTunes U, you can find video and audio courses on many subjects. This is useful if you want to get a deep understanding of a subject. I, for instance, followed a course on iTunes U when I learned about application development for the iPhone.
• YouTube
  YouTube has a lot of tutorials on practically any topic you want. Just enter your keywords into the search box and browse the results. If you find something you like, you might want to subscribe to the channel.
• Khan Academy
  Khan Academy a good place to learn about basic science like math or physics. It also has videos on topics like economy and finance. Sal Khan (who makes the videos) is a great teacher who can explain things in a clear and fun way.

In addition, there are Q&A sites out there that you can use to find answers to your questions. Two of them are Stack Exchange and Ask MetaFilter.

The key here is to immerse yourself in the subject. Don’t just use one of the ways above; use as many of them as possible. Even better, don’t just watch or read the lessons. Do the exercises as well.

4. Create real-world projects

Real-world experiences are still your best teacher. Nothing can replace it, not even the abundance of resources mentioned above. Those resources simply help you get into the real world sooner.

One big advantage of living in this age is you can, in most cases, get into the real world much quicker and cheaper than ever before. For example, if you love to write, you can create a free blog in just  a few minutes. If you love to sing, you can record your performance and put it on YouTube in a matter of hours.

So take advantage of it. When you want to truly learn something, create something and put it in the real world. Learn from the feedback and adjust accordingly. Keep doing it and you will learn a lot in the process.

***

That, in my opinion, is how to learn the 21st-century way.

Remember, the world is changing fast. So keep this line from Steve Jobs in mind:

Stay hungry. Stay foolish.

For updates and interesting links, please follow me on Twitter.

Photo by yprime

In August last year I wrote about expanding my personal capacity. I wrote about how – for about two years – I didn’t take new challenges and just kept doing what I had been doing. As a result, I didn’t expand my capacity.

Of course, that’s not a good situation to be in. So, realizing that, I began to work on a new challenge. I’ve been working on it since then and by now I’ve been working on it for several months.

What I didn’t tell you was what the challenge is. Well, now I’m ready to tell you about it :)

My New Challenge

As you might know from my About page, I have a background in computer science. Coding is one of my passions. However, I had been neglecting that passion for years and pursued my other passions instead. I still worked as a lecturer in information technology but there was nothing else I did. I didn’t have any project nor learn new technologies. In short, I just left my coding potential unused.

Realizing this led me to write about discovering your idle potential. Coding was the one for me so I decided to do something with it.

After exploring a few options, I eventually decided to get into application development for the iPhone. I love the iPhone (although what I actually have is an iPod touch) and I love mobile application development. While I needed to make some sacrifices (like having to buy a Mac; I couldn’t use my Windows machine for it), I find the challenge exciting.

Lessons Learned

So here I am, doing application development for the iPhone.

After working on it for a few months, in April I eventually published my first app on the App Store. I’m not ready yet to talk about the app here, but I’d like to share with you the lessons I’ve learned so far. I hope you will find these lessons useful for working on your own challenge.

1. Choose something you are passionate about

I know I’ve talked about it over and over again on this blog. But there’s a good reason for that: passion does make a difference. The journey to success is long and difficult. If you’re not passionate about the process then you might not be able to go through it.

In my case, it wasn’t easy for me to learn to code for the iPhone, let alone building a successful business around it (something I’m still struggling with). But the passion sustains me in the process.

2. There is a price to pay for success

Success doesn’t come cheap. There is a price to pay for it and you must be willing to pay it. Perhaps that means spending a lot of time to learn a new skill. Perhaps that means sacrificing some of the activities you enjoy.  Whatever it is, you must be willing to pay the price if you want to be successful.

3. The race is a marathon, not a sprint

Understanding this principle could make the difference between a victory (albeit taking a long time) and a defeat.

Some people want an overnight success, but there is no such thing as an overnight success. One of the most successful apps for the iPhone is Angry Birds. It might seem like an overnight success, but the truth that is Rovio (the developer) had worked on mobile game development since 2003. When Angry Birds got popular in 2010, the “overnight” success already had seven years of effort behind it!

So, whatever you want to achieve, be prepared for a long journey. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Those who endure will win.

4. Learn from the best players

If you want to be successful, learn from those who have been successful before you. Why should you waste time figuring things out by yourself when someone else has? Learning from the best players in your field will save you a lot of time in the process.

In my case, I learn from the successful apps out there. When I have spare time, I often play with them. What makes them successful? What can I learn from them? It takes time for me to “get it” and I’m not there yet, but I believe I will.

5. Get into the real world as soon as possible

Real-world experience can teach you more than the best books can. So whatever you do, try to get into the real world as soon as you can.

I made a mistake here by reading and thinking too much rather than getting something out there as soon as possible. Now that I have an app on the App Store, I can really feel the market. I can taste the dynamics of the market, not from what other people say, but from my own experience. There’s a big difference between them.

***

My journey in the app development world really expands my capacity. I love it though there is still a long way to go for me.

What about you? What challenge do you take and how do you work on it?

For updates and interesting links, please follow me on Twitter.

Photo by iane machado

If you’ve been following this blog, you might know that I love to read. I’m not a fast reader and I don’t read as much as many other people, but reading is something I enjoy. It opens new worlds to me and widens my perspective.

Recently I found something that pretty much revolutionizes my reading life: Kobo. I first heard about it from a comment by M. A. Tohami (thanks Tohami!). Kobo is an online book store that allows you to buy e-books and read them on a device of your choice.

I know this is an old thing for you who live in the United States and some other countries. Amazon has been doing it since 2007 with the release of Kindle. And Apple has also entered the space in 2010 with iBooks.  But neither the Kindle or iBooks is available in the country where I live, Indonesia. For me, the best available way was to buy physical books from Amazon. There are two problems with it:

1. Shipping cost. Since I live far away from the United States, it costs a lot to ship a book. Shipping costs almost as much as the book itself. This makes getting those books relatively expensive.
2. Shipping time. It takes about three weeks for the books to arrive through postal mail. I could get them sooner using FedEx, but it would cost too much.

Now with Kobo, I can eliminate those two problems. Unlike Kindle or iBooks, Kobo is available here. And, being e-books, there’s no shipping cost or shipping time. The price of most e-books are cheaper than the physical ones at Amazon (most e-books cost $9.99) and I can download them immediately. To read the e-books, I use the Kobo app on my iPod Touch.

Not only does it cost less time and money to get the books, but also I prefer to read e-books this way than reading physical books. Here are three reasons why:

1. I can easily bring the books everywhere. Since all the books are in my iPod touch, I can simply put the device into my pocket and bring it everywhere I go. Whenever I have spare time during the day (for example, while waiting in a queue), I can take the device and read a book.
2. The size is smaller. The size of the iPod Touch is smaller than a physical book. This makes reading more convenient for me. I can hold the device with just one hand and use my finger to flip through the pages.
3. I can read in any position I want. The screen itself has a light source, so I don’t depend on external light for reading. This means that I can read in practically any position and condition. In bed, before sleeping, I often read a few pages. Sometimes I even read in the dark.

All in all, I now read more than before because it’s more convenient to read.

One more advantage I haven’t mentioned is space. Physical books take space, but e-books don’t. Replacing physical books with e-books mean that I would save a significant amount of space in the years to come.

What about you? Do you prefer to read e-books or physical books?

Photo by caseydavid

Many people talk about how reading books can expand your knowledge and improve your life. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course. Reading books is indeed good. But there is one aspect of it that many people tend to forget: the value of rereading books.

I believe that not only should you read books you’ve never read, but also you should reread books you’ve already read. In fact, I’d argue that rereading books is just as important as reading new ones.

Why You Should Reread Books

Here are some reasons why rereading books is good:

1. It reminds you of the good ideas

Research shows that in just 24 hours people would forget most of what they’ve read. You might get a lot of good ideas from a book, but it’s easy to forget most of them. Rereading a book helps you refresh those ideas in your mind.

2. It helps you notice the ideas you didn’t notice before

Just as it’s easy to forget ideas, it’s also easy to have some ideas skip your attention when you first read a book. Rereading the book helps you notice them.

3. It gives you a new perspective

Rereading a book allows you to see it with fresh eyes. The ideas that didn’t make sense before could now make sense. The things that didn’t matter before could now be connected to your experience.

4. It helps you apply the ideas

This, in my opinion, is the most important reason of all. Why? Because the primary value of reading is the application and not the reading itself. Mere reading could expand your knowledge but application could change your life. By rereading a book, you can see which parts of it you have applied and which parts haven’t. You can then focus your effort on the parts that need more work.

How to Reread Books

Now that you’ve seen the why, let’s see the how. Here are some tips on rereading books:

1. Choose the right books

Just as not all books are worth reading, so are not all books worth rereading. Don’t just reread any book. Read only those that can give you the most value for your time. One good way to filter them is by finding those that you want to apply. The more you want to apply a book, the more important it is to reread.

2. Read only the important parts

You don’t need to reread the entire book. That will take too much time. Besides, you might get lost in the details. Instead, apply the 80-20 rule and read only the important parts of the book. This is one reason why you should highlight the good parts of a book when you first read it. By doing so, you can read just those parts when you reread it.

3. Look for actionable ideas

Since the primary value of reading is the application, you should look for actionable ideas when you reread a book. Perhaps you didn’t recognize some of them when you first read it. Or perhaps you already forget some of them. In either case, look for ideas that you can use to improve your life.

4. Focus your effort

Since there are potentially many actionable ideas, you should focus your effort on those that can make the most difference. Don’t try to do too much and spread yourself too thin. Instead, apply the 80-20 rule and focus on the important ones. Later, when you’ve successfully applied them, you can work on the other ideas.

Photo by Zitona

2009 feels like only a few months ago, but we have reached the end of 2010. It’s quick, isn’t it?

This time of the year is always good to reflect on our lives. What have you done well this year? What should you improve? I’m sure you’ve learned something. So I’d like to ask you:

What lessons have you learned in 2010?

Please share your answer in the comments. I wish you a great 2011!

Photo by tibchris