NOFAP BOOK CLUB / BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS FOR EVERYONE

I have always been an avid reader. Last year I read a little over 40 books. I had the same plan this year but because I fell into my habits. Again after a 150 day streak, I have only been able to read 8 books so far even though we are almost 4 months into this year. My challenge is to start reading anywhere between 6-8 books a month from now taking time out of my daily schedule.



Now, reading these many books is not feasible for everyone and therefore I want you to try taking a reading rest. Get a book, set a timer and see how fast you can read one page. The average reading speed is about 300. Words per minute. That’s about one page of an average novel. Don’t be disheartened if you read a little slower.



Now, here is how I distribute my time. I read about one hour in the morning after waking up and one hour before bed. That amounts to nearly 120 pages. In about 3-4 days, I can finish a 300-400 page novel depending on how dense it is and how much I enjoyed it. Not everyone has 2 hours of free time a day but I’m sure you can take out one hour or even half an hour everyday to read given how beneficial it is.



I really want someone to start a book club with but since none of my friends read, I want to start one here. Are you guys up for it?



Here are some of the books I suggest we read -



Man’s search for meaning -

This book is only 160 pages long and is thus great for people short on time. I will paste the descriptions of the books here on. A prominent Viennese psychiatrist before the war, Viktor Frankl was uniquely able to observe the way that he and other inmates coped with the experience of being in Auschwitz. He noticed that it was the men who comforted others and who gave away their last piece of bread who survived the longest - and who offered proof that everything can be taken away from us except the ability to choose our attitude in any given set of circumstances.

The sort of person the prisoner became was the result of an inner decision and not of camp influences alone. Only those who allowed their inner hold on their moral and spiritual selves to subside eventually fell victim to the camp's degenerating influence -

while those who made a victory of those experiences turned them into an inner triumph.

Frankl came to believe that man's deepest desire is to search for meaning and purpose. This outstanding work offers us all a way to transcend suffering and find significance in the art of living.





12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos -

Jordan Peterson has helped millions of people, young and old, men and women, aim at a life of responsibility and meaning. Now he can help you.



Drawing on his own work as a clinical psychologist and on lessons from humanity's oldest myths and stories, Peterson offers twelve profound and realistic principles to live by. After all, as he reminds us, we each have a vital role to play in the unfolding destiny of the world.



Deep, rewarding and enlightening, 12 Rules for Life is a lifeboat built solidly for stormy seas: ancient wisdom applied to our contemporary problems



A Little Life -

When four graduates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they're broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their centre of gravity. Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he'll not only be unable to overcome – but that will define his life forever.



The Midnight Library -

Between life and death there is a library. When Nora seed finds herself in the midnight library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change. The books in the midnight library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren’t always what she imagined they’d be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger. Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: What is the best way to live?.





Creativity, Inc.: -

Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration - As a young man, Ed Catmull had a dream: to make the world’s first computer-animated movie. He nurtured that dream first as a Ph.D. student at the University of Utah, where many computer science pioneers got their start, and then forged an early partnership with George Lucas that led, indirectly, to his founding Pixar with Steve Jobs and John Lasseter in 1986. Nine years later and against all odds, Toy Story was released, changing animation forever.

Since then, Pixar has dominated the world of animation, producing such beloved films as Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Up, and WALL-E, which have gone on to set box-office records and garner twenty-seven Academy Awards. The joyousness of the storytelling, the inventive plots, the emotional authenticity: In some ways, Pixar movies are an object lesson in what creativity really is. Now, in this book, Catmull reveals the ideals and techniques, honed over years, that have made Pixar so widely admired―and so profitable.

Creativity, Inc. is a book for managers who want to lead their employees to new heights, a manual for anyone who strives for originality, and the first-ever, all-access trip into the nerve center of Pixar Animation Studios―into the story meetings, the postmortems, and the ‘Braintrust’ sessions where art is born. It is, at heart, a book about how to build and sustain a creative culture―but it is also, as Pixar co-founder and president Ed Catmull writes, ‘an expression of the ideas that I believe make the best in us possible



No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention -

These are some of the ground rules if you work at Netflix. They are part of a unique cultural experiment that explains how the company has transformed itself at lightning speed from a DVD mail order service into a streaming superpower - with 190 million fervent subscribers and a market capitalisation that rivals the likes of Disney.



Finally Reed Hastings, Netflix Chairman and CEO, is sharing the secrets that have revolutionised the entertainment and tech industries. With INSEAD business school professor Erin Meyer, he will explore his leadership philosophy - which begins by rejecting the accepted beliefs under which most companies operate - and how it plays out in practice at Netflix.



From unlimited holidays to abolishing approvals, Netflix offers a fundamentally different way to run any organisation, one far more in tune with an ever-changing fast-paced world. For anyone interested in creativity, productivity and innovation, the Netflix culture is something close to a holy grail. This book will make it, and its creator, fully accessible for the first time.



All the Light we Cannot See -

When Marie Laure goes blind, aged six, her father builds her a model of their Paris neighbourhood, so she can memorise it with her fingers and then navigate the real streets. But when the Germans occupy Paris, father and daughter flee to Saint-Malo on the Brittany coast, where Marie-Laure’s agoraphobic great uncle lives in a tall, narrow house by the sea wall.



In another world in Germany, an orphan boy, Werner, is enchanted by a crude radio. He becomes a master at building and fixing radios, a talent ultimately makes him a highly specialised tracker of the Resistance. Werner travels through the heart of Hitler Youth to the far-flung outskirts of Russia, and finally into Saint-Malo, where his path converges with Marie-Laure.



Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.





Norwegian Wood -

When he hears her favourite Beatles song, Toru Watanabe recalls his first love Naoko, the girlfriend of his best friend Kizuki. Immediately he is transported back almost twenty years to his student days in Tokyo, adrift in a world of uneasy friendships, casual sex, passion, loss and desire - to a time when an impetuous young woman called Midori marches into his life and he has to choose between the future and the past.



Are you guys up for it? Do any of these interest you? I’m open tones suggestions. I would love to see all of you take up reading as well.

I have tried including books for all ages and people in all stages from university students to young professionals.



If you guys want to join in, just tell me which book you want to start off with and do suggest some other books as well.

Peace

 

Awesome! Tell me of you like them

 

That's awesome. Which genre of books do you like to read? Self improvement?

That's awesome. Which genre of books do you like to read? Self improvement?

 

I'm glad to hear that! My tips on procrastination might sound a little cliche but here they are-
1) If you are someone who just started out with reading, read multiple books at once. If you start to find a book to be other boring after a while, put it down. Continue another one. It's ok to not finish books especially when you are just starting out. I did the same. It's much better than trying to slog through a book which might end up taking months if you're not motivated.

2) If you really do enjoy the book but are procrastinating, then I'd say just set aside 20 minutes to start reading it again. Once you get in the flow state, it will be Gard for you to stop. If you can afford it, try changing mediums. Now this might sound like a strange tip but say you're reading a paperback novel, try buying the audiobook and listening to the second half. Any change in environment can help.

 

As for reading 40 books an year, here is go about it.

First I'll pull up some numbers(again a little cliche but might help). Most novels have between 50,000–110,000 words. That's roughly between 200 - 400 pages. Now the average reading speed is 200 words per minuet which in most cases translates to one page.
Now if yous set aside 2 hours every day to read, you would be reading about 120 pages a day. It would take you around 3 days to finish a novel. You could go on to read 10 novels in one month. However these are just numbers. to read 40 books an year you only need to read around 1 book a week. Here is how I would go about that -
1) Get an audible subscription. They are worth every penny. Most books on there range from 8-18 hours long. If you listen to one book for half an hour everyday, that's still one book every 4-9 days. You could easily reach 40 books. You can check out Jordan Peterson's podcast with h3h3. He himself says that audiobooks are just as much useful as regular paperbacks. Unlike an actual paperback, if you dont enjoy the book, you can simply return it and get a refund. Same goes for kindle. If you buy a book on there and dont like it, you can return it within 7 days and get a refund.

2)Join a reading community. Discord has some really good reading clubs and they are filled with highly motivated readers. Being surrounded by such people will automatically make you want to read more.

3) Only pick books that you are interested in. Don't go with what some people say you should read. There is no universal tbr list. I fell into this trap early on trying to sludge through classics which were really boring and still somehow pushing myself for some reason. Find books that you enjoy and read them. It does't matter what. Every book whether fictional or non fictional will add some value into your life.

4) Don't underestimate the value of short books. Again, some people assume that short books are more so for kids but trust me there are a lot of shorter books that can add a lot of value to your life. I could recommend you some if you want.

5) Back to my earlier tip, if you find yourself not enjoying a book, put it down. Start another one. Find a book that you truly enjoy.

Now for the books I choose -

1) Sign up for goodreads. It's a free social network for people who like to read. Goodreads releases a newsletter every month with a list of books that were recently released and a few other books which have been doing well. It's a good way to start. Also sign up for the 'Brain Pickings' newsletter. You can get some good suggestions through there.

2) I'm not sure where you live but a book subscription could be a great option. There are services like book of the month which will send you one book every month and these books are often really good.

3) I would suggest you follow Ruby Granger. Ruby is a literature student at the university of Exeter and she often reviews books on her channel. You can get some really good book suggestions from there.

4) Smaller book tubers like rc waldun and Elias are really good if your interests in reading are quite specific. Check them out as well.

If you want any personalised recommendations, you can just message me. I'd be more than happy to help)

 

"Man's search for meaning" is a great book! I have a couple other suggestions which might be useful.

1)Has you read any of Austin Kleon's books? "Show your work", "Steal like an Artist" and Keep Going" are great books and don't take longer than an hour to finish.

2)"Anything you want: 40 Lessons for a New Kind of Entrepreneur" is something I think you will enjoy.

3)This might sound a little cliche but "The Obstacle is the Way" is a great book which benefited me a lot!

4)The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness is a life changer although it is a little longer at around 240 pages I think. It's worth it though I promise.

 

If you want some light hearted fiction, look up "Penguin Modern classics" on Amazon. These books are only about 60-90 pages long. I would suggest "Piers of the Homeless Night" by Jack Kerouac.

"Metamorphosis" By Franz Kafka is a wonderful book although it is not everyone's piece of cake.

Desire by Murakami is something you could try reading but again, it isn't everyone's piece of cake.