Inching Closer...

So right now I'm at that phase of goal setting where I am thinking about doing ALL THE THINGS.

The treadmill isn't my friend. 

See, I get on it and my mind starts to wander and instead of coming up with clever Christmas story ideas (though there is one that's been in there as a start for, oh I don't know, a decade now, that keeps bouncing up with ways to make it work) it's been thinking about 2023 goals. 

Today's doozy is around reading. Like I always set a number, sometimes it's high, sometimes it's low. The year I turned 50 I did that fun every year challenge. But usually it's kind of a throw away goal. I wouldn't even bother if Goodreads didn't prompt me and I am not missing a chance at a gold star. But anyway...I was thinking about reading. And this year I think maybe I'll do a reading challenge in a reading challenge. Set my number but then also every month read one biography/autobiography, read one self help book, read the Fantastic Stranglings Book Club pick and then read 2 free choice books. It's a totally doable number of books, except for the fact that nonfiction tends to take longer to read than fiction, but still should be okay.

So, why these choices you might ask yourself. Or you might not, it just depends on how curious you are being today. Or you know you don't need to ask because when have I ever done anything without over explaining it?

I was thinking about self help books the other day (while on the treadmill, not surprisingly) and I realized that they could be grouped in the book store under "Books You Read in Your 20s and Early 30s" Right? I mean, at least in my experience and in watching friends and now their kids. There is an age where we are all searching for something and we make the mistake of thinking someone else has found it. Or maybe not the mistake that they found something but that that something can apply to us. Weight Loss books. Fitness books. Spiritual Books. Look Better. Do Better. Be Better. You but only Better books. I read a ton of them when I was in my 20s. It's probably why I knew who Marianne Williamson was when she ran for president and everyone else was like...Whoah...did she really just say that?

But while I was thinking of how many I've read, and how some of them truly did shape how I see the world I wondered what I would think now. Like I re-read the Four Agreements a few years ago and realized that though I have taken the actual four agreements with me into my life the book itself made me roll my eyes. So what would I think of other self help style books now? What would it look like at 54/55 to read some of these books? Would I be able to get anything out of them or would I find them all to be just so awful I couldn't stand it? And then I saw that there is a book out there called The Fifth Agreement where the author of The Four Agreements revisits the earlier book with his son and they comment on it and add one more agreement. Which is almost exactly what I had been thinking about so... One Self Help Book a month. They don't have to be ones I've read before, and honestly I don't think they will be, but The Fifth Agreement is on the list. 

And because they are experiment books I will blog about each one of them after I read them. Not really a book review, but a life experience review. So you know I love that idea. Anything to add to these numbers without having to think too hard about it. 

The biography/autobiography is just that I enjoy them and I only seem to rarely make room to read them. This is sort of a forcing those books into the rotation. I like hearing about people's stories. Sometimes they don't tell a great story (Sorry, Sincy, you are the GOAT where soccer is concerned but not so introspective) Sometimes they are completely captivating (Becoming was a great story, even if it wasn't about Michelle Obama it would have been a great story). Sometimes they are just flat out hilarious (ANYTHING Mindy Kaling writes you should read). But I enjoy them so I want to make sure I'm making room for them. 

The Fantastic Stranglings one is because I'm horrible about quitting things. You all see how often I go back to Picture of the Day or public gratitude, or you know, Facebook itself. Once I start something if it's even slightly enjoyable it's really hard for me to say, okay, this is now done. I did quit the official book club. I found I was getting the hardcover book from the store but then still getting the digital copy because I read everything on my Kindle now and it seemed so wasteful. So now I'm an "honorary" member of the book club. Which is fine. She started it, and I joined during the pandemic to try and keep her shop from going under before she even got a chance to open the doors, and now that things are opened up again she doesn't depend completely on the book clubs for revenue. She being Jenny Lawson, The Bloggess, for anyone who didn't know what The Fantastic Stranglings Book Club was. Aside from the original reason I joined, the reason I don't want to completely leave is she has recommended books I NEVER would have read on my own. Some of them have not been my cup of tea, but some of them have been so so good. 

And then the two free choice were just to round out my numbers. Three books a month isn't much, even with how much more slowly I read nonfiction. But I don't want to put in too many extras because I do read nonfiction more slowly and I don't want to be scrambling to try and keep up. Those two bonus books a month are also floaters. I'm calling them monthly but if for some reason the nonfiction trips me up on time and I can only fit in one more book, that's okay, I can make it up through the year. 

So I think that's going to be the reading piece this time around. 

And you can help. 

Is there an autobiography or biography that you really enjoyed that you think I should read? 
How about your favorite self help book? Or, here's you chance to subtly "fix" me, one you think I especially should read? 

I'm looking forward to this challenge. I think it's going to be an interesting learning year because of these books. I might even hit 55 with a brand new outlook, you never know!

Okay, we know, but we can pretend together.