How to Read Better (Tips for Non-Fiction Reading)

Sam Matla
Personal Development

“I don’t know anyone who’s wise who doesn’t read a lot.” —Charlie Munger

There’s reading, and then there’s reading well. This is a collection of advice on how to do the latter. Principles for not only reading morebooks, but better ones too. And growing in knowledge, understanding and wisdom by doing so.

You don’t need to finish every book

“The number of books completed is a vanity metric. As you know more, you leave more books unfinished. Focus on new concepts with predictive power.” – Naval Ravikant

I used to power my way through every book, even if I was bored or unimpressed with it. I held tight to the misplaced virtue of “finishing what you start.” And I wasted a lot of time doing this.

What I didn’t understand is that there are many good reasons to not finish books:

You “got the point.” For example, in the case of modern bestsellers which take an idea and repeat it over 10 chapters with slight variation, you can usually read the first couple chapters and get the point. Further reading beyond that leads to diminishing returns.
You feel compelled to take action on what you’ve read. If one of your goals with reading is to inspire and guide action, then you should not ignore inspiration to act. This applies especially to those reading self-help and business books. Reading such material without taking action on it is mental masturbation.
The opportunity cost of finishing average books is extremely high. There are many great books. You will never be able to read them all because you have so little time. Why force yourself to read an average book when you could read a great one?

A better metric to focus on (if you must focus on one) is pages read instead of books finished. The person who reads 100 pages a day (36,500 pages), but only “finishes” 10 books per year reads far more than the person who finishes 20 books per year (~7,000 pages).

You should finish some books, even if it’s a grind.

Some books are easy to read and finish. You don’t need to power through them because they take you on a ride that you don’t want to get off.

Other books are not easy to read or finish. Sometimes it’s because they suck. Sometimes they don’t suck, they’re just demanding.

But there’s value in pushing your way through hard books. You’re forced to apply greater focus, which leads to improved comprehension and retention. You exercise discipline and commitment, both traits that transfer across other areas of your life. You hone your ability to concentrate on one thing for extended periods of time.

How do you decide which books to power through and which to abandon? That’s on you. For me, there are two characteristics of the books I grind through and push myself to finish:

They’re on subjects I’m deeply curious about. I won’t finish a difficult book if I’m not curious about the topic. I’ve tried many times. I also believe curiosity should be the primary driver of what you read anyway (more on that later).
They are widely accepted to be worth reading. For example, books from The Western Canon should be finished more often than not.

Dedicate intentional, focused time to reading hard books.

To use a good book as a sedative is conspicuous waste. To fall asleep or, what is the same, to let your mind wander during the hours you planned to devote to reading for profit—that is, primarily for understanding—is clearly to defeat your own ends.

Mortimer J. Adler, Charles Van Doren (How to Read a Book)

God laughed at me when I placed Gödel, Escher, Bach on my nightstand to read before bed. I lasted a few minutes before reaching for sci-fi book that was a much lighter and easier read.

Hard books are worth it, but they require active, awake reading, as Adler and Van Doren explain in How to Read a Book:

If your aim in reading is to profit from it—to grow somehow in mind or spirit—you have to keep awake. That means reading as actively as possible. It means making an effort—an effort for which you expect to be repaid.

Reading GEB before going to sleep never worked for me because I lacked the mental energy at that point in the day to make any serious effort. If you want to tackle a tome, and profit from it, then you have to treat it like work. Because it is. It’s a high leverage activity. Treat it with the respect it deserves.

Read multiple books at once

Going back to the pages read > books finished principle, an easy way to read more is to keep multiple books on rotation.

If you only allow yourself to read one book at a time, then it’s likely that won’t read much at all. For example, my current “big” read is Barzun’s From Dawn to Decadence, a 900-page history of the western world. Rarely do I feel like reading it every day. Certainly not in the morning before work. If it was the only book I allowed myself to read, then I’d spend a lot less time reading overall.

With multiple books on rotation, you pick up whatever you feel like at any given time. And naturally you end up reading more. If you’re tired, you opt for the fiction book you’re halfway through instead of watching Netflix. If you have hours ahead of you on a rainy Sunday afternoon, you might make progress on the difficult “big” book you’ve been inching your way through.

Is there a limit to how many books you should read at once? I don’t know. Probably not. Who cares as long as you’re reading often. The best books will draw you back to them.

Opt for older books over newer books

Time is the great filter. And if a book has remained relatively popular for 30+ years, it’s probably worth reading.

Again, opportunity cost. New books might be good too. But you don’t know for sure because they haven’t gone through the time filter yet. And so you’re taking more of a risk by purchasing and reading them (again, you should quit reading average books as soon as you discover they are average). Old books are pre-selected. You can trust that they have more to offer you based on the fact that they’re still around.

For example, there is likely nothing novel about the latest generic self-help book that hasn’t been written about before in a better, more timeless way. Reading Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics will teach you more about self-help than “How to be a boss bitch” — or whatever the latest bestseller is.

One reason people avoidreading older books is because they’re generally harder to read. But the fact that they’re difficult is exactly why you should read them…

Reading hard books grows you in ways easy books cannot

Tell someone to read ancient philosophy instead of the latest self-help book that poorly re-hashes ancient philosophical truths, and they might respond with, “Yeah, but that stuff is hard to read. This isn’t.”

Now, I’m not denying there’s value in syntheses of old works. I’m appreciative of it. I’ve learned a lot from modern syntheses that are easier to understand.

But if that’s all you read, then you’re missing out.

There’s a certain level of difficulty that forces you to focus on the text in a way that easy-to-consume books don’t. You have to engage with them. You have to re-read the same sentence or paragraph several times to really get the meaning. It strains your brain. It’s hard. It makes you tired.

But that process, that difficulty, is providing you with something valuable: mental growth, depth of understanding, real knowledge.

It also sticks with you. When you concentrate hard to understand what you’re reading, it attaches to you in a way that easy books don’t. It shapes you.

Don’t feel guilty for buying more books than you can read

Often when someone comes to my house for the first time and sees my bookshelves, they’ll sarcastically ask, “so… you’ve read all of these?”

To which I’ll sarcastically respond, “Haven’t read any. They’re just to make me look smart.”

The truth is, most of the books on my shelf remain unread. Many of them will remain so forever. And I’m okay with that.

Unread books serve a purpose, as Nassim Taleb points out in The Black Swan. They keep you curious & humble.

“…a private library is not an ego-boosting appendage but a research tool. Read books are far less valuable than unread ones. The library should contain as much of what you do not know as your financial means, mortgage rates, and the currently tight real-estate market allows you to put there. You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. Let us call this collection of unread books an antilibrary.” —Nassim Taleb

Physical > digital, but digital > nothing

I don’t care much for the physical vs digital book debate. If digital gets people to read more, then that’s great.

But given the choice, I’ll almost always take a physical copy of a book over the Kindle version. Aesthetics and vibes are reason enough, but also note-taking, marginalia (which is horrible on Kindle), and true ownership of unchangeable material.

The one benefit digital has over physical is instant access, which I love. If I want to read a book now, then I’ll buy it on Kindle. If it’s a good book, I often find myself buying a physical copy too.

I wish I’d spent more money upfront to buy physical versions of the books I have on Kindle

Write about what you read

You don’t have to start a newsletter or blog, but you should at least write your own notes, summaries, and thoughts on what you’ve read. You’ll retain more of what you read and you’ll become a better thinker.

It also moves you along the spectrum from consumption to production. One of the traps that book-addicts like myself fall into is endless learning and consumption without the output to match it.

“Writing organizes and clarifies our thoughts. Writing is how we think our way into a subject and make it our own. Writing enables us to find out what we know—and what we don’t know—about whatever we’re trying to learn.” —William Zinsser (Writing To Learn)

But, speaking of retention…

You won’t retain everything, and that’s fine.

Trying to capture, organize and memorize as much as possible is a waste of time. I also think it’s misguided.

Books shape your mind in ways that you can’t quantify. There are books that have profoundly impacted me, but I can’t quote passages to you—it’s the general themes and concepts that have stuck in my head, which is the form of retention I truly care about.

Another way to take this advice: relax. Trust that by reading more and reading deeply, you’ll naturally retain what you need to retain.

“I cannot remember the books I’ve read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson

Let curiosity drive your reading

I’m convinced that curiosity is one of the best filters and decision-making tools that we have. Your subconscious self knows more than you conscious self, and you should trust it.

That means going down the rabbit-holes that interest you. Reading books from the bibliography of the book you just finished and enjoyed. Exploring new topics that seem out of left field.

Some of the most productive times in my life, both in reading (consumption) and writing (output) have been when I’m deeply curious about topics. These periods are never planned, they arise naturally out of what I’m already reading. Something grabs at me and pulls me in deeper, and instead of fighting it like I did when I was younger, I just let it pull me in. I’m always rewarded for it.

Re-reading books is high ROI

“For those familiar with the idea of nonlinear effects from Antifragile, learning is rooted in repetition and convexity, meaning that the reading of a single text twice is more profitable than reading two different things once, provided of course that said text has some depth of content.” — Nassim Taleb

If you read a book that has a profound impact on you, then you should read it again.

There are books that I read on an annual basis because I want to drill their concepts into my head. If I go too long without reading them again, I start to forget those concepts.

Also, books change over time as you do. Different ideas and sentences pop out to you in ways they didn’t in the past. As you move through life and rack up experiences, you read with a slightly different lens each time. The best books are companions, and should be conversed with throughout your life.

Highlight less (the skill of selection)

If you have a low threshold for what you highlight and take notes on, then your collection of passages and notes will be low signal.

It might feel good to highlight the shit out of a book. But does it actually make you smarter or add any value? No. It’s noise.

You want to highlight what you can’t avoid highlighting. I can’t find the source, but IIRC Ryan Holiday’s assistant Billy Oppenheimer talks about how he places his pen across the other side of the room while reading. If he wants to highlight a passage, he needs to physically get up, walk to the other side of the room, and grab the pen. A small amount of friction creates a better filter for selecting only the best.

Another practice, shared by Holiday and many other writers, is to let your highlighted/read books “sit” before coming back to them and processing your notes. When you’re reading a book, everything seems interesting and novel. You highlight more than you should. But when you revisit those highlights after some time has passed (say, a week), then you can judge their quality more objectively.

Don’t read yourself into inaction

One of my greatest struggles in life has been reading and consuming around the thing instead of doing the thing. This particularly applies to business and creative projects.

It’s what I call The Learning Loop, as explained in this video.

While there’s immense value in reading widely and deeply, you must not let it become a source of procrastination.

One of the ways this manifests itself is when you find yourself reading a lot of generic stuff that repeats itself, or when you’re reading what you already know. For example, if you’re working your way through the Western Canon, you might be procrastinating. But if you’re reading the “top 20 business books in 2024” while trying to build your first business, then you’re definitely procrastinating and you should really take action in the world and get feedback.

Read for understanding, wisdom and enjoyment. Don’t read as a proxy for real action and tinkering in the world. It won’t work. And it will leave you feeling incredibly dissatisfied (source: me spending more time than I would like doing exactly this—with great regret).

That’s it. The advice I wish I’d been given earlier. Take it with a grain of salt. It’s unsolicited after all.

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