It all started with a New Year\u2019s resolution\u2014you know, the kind that starts strong but loses steam. At the beginning of 2023, I set the goal to read one book each month. It felt ambitious, but realistic. I even prepared a list and ordered the first three books in advance. The first quarter was all planned, and I was ready to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I kicked things off strong, finishing the first book before January ended. It was a short one, but I figured it would give me a motivational boost\u2014and it did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then came the second book: four times longer, with dense information that needed time to digest. By the end of February, I was only halfway through, and my motivation was slipping. I\u2019m not the type to quit, but I knew I needed to change something if I wanted to keep going.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My original plan was to read during my commute. But reading on the bus? Not the easiest. Too many distractions, too little focus. So I switched to reading only on my way home, where things were quieter, but that halved my reading time\u2014and my progress slowed even more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Everything changed one Saturday morning. I was on my usual hike, I listen to an interview with Cliff Weitzman, the founder of Speechify. Cliff has dyslexia and struggled with reading, so he built a text-to-voice app that converts PDFs, books, and anything on the internet into audio. It helps people like him learn faster and with less effort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I reached the top of the mountain, I found myself smiling. Do you know that feeling when clarity hits you unexpectedly? When you’ve been wrestling with a problem for ages and suddenly the solution feels so simple? That was it for me. The books weren\u2019t the problem\u2014it was the way I was trying to consume them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That moment changed everything. I subscribed to Audible that same week, and now I finish at least one book a week. Audiobooks took some time to get used to, and I did a lot of experimenting to find my rhythm, but I\u2019m happy to report that after a year of listening\u2014and over 100 books later\u2014there\u2019s still more to improve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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