About quick reading and there is a lot of literature available that addresses this topic, so my intention is to explain the tricks or techniques that I have tried and that have worked well for me to achieve a quick reading and understand well what I am reading.
Fast quick reading
You may wonder what is the point of trying to read faster, or that you think that with your usual reading rhythm is enough. But if you’re a book eater like me, I’m sure that more than once you’ve wanted to read faster to be able to read more books in less time. In fact, this insatiable need to read one book after another is what made me study new quick reading techniques.
The books that I was interested in reading were accumulating; first on the bedside table and then on the shelves. I have to admit that I have a sick spot that makes me, although I have a good collection of books to read, if I see a new one that catches my attention I feel the impulse to buy it and leave it in the bedroom for later.
My goal was to get to read faster and more importantly, not run the risk of not understanding well what I read and still enjoy reading. As you know, for what topics I am a bit freaky or out of the ordinary and I like to see how far you can go if you propose: I am my own guinea pig.
Right now I have achieved a good reading pace that allows me to complete more or less one book per week. And it is that what seems to me to be the most normal thing in the world, a while ago it seemed a complete madness because it seemed impossible to read more than one book per month.
First of all I want to clarify that I have every day between 1 and 2 hours to devote to reading, usually in bed just before sleep, which makes it easier to read a book per week.
CARING FOR THE READING ENVIRONMENT
The desire to read many times made me read anywhere, in any way and with the conditions that were. Surely the same thing happened to you on occasion, right? And the fact is that not taking care of the reading environment or not actualizing the moment of reading, means that we are not completely focused, that we do not enjoy reading so much and therefore we do not read as quickly as we could read. Before giving you the quick reading tips, first I recommend you take care of the following aspects to read better:
Reading in quiet places: reading in your living room while the television is on, for example, may not be a good idea. Although you believe that your immersion in reading is total, it is better not to be deceived. The small distractions make you have to interrupt the moment and lose the thread at times. My recommendation is to read in quiet place to be able to do it without interruptions. My favorite moment is before going to bed: no noise, no television, no children, nothing but the book and me.
Good lighting: reading in low light, besides causing a good headache, will not enjoy your reading and you will not concentrate on what you are reading. If you are more aware of trying to see what you read, that of understanding it, you will notice that reading is very heavy. You already read in the living room, in the living room, in the bed or in the place where you usually read regularly, try to make the lighting correct. It does not hurt to light the book with a small desk lamp if you can do it. If you are what you like to read in bed, I recommend using a mini flashlight for books that allows you to read with less light. I use a Moleskin flashlight that you can use as a bookmark and that is attached to the pages in the form of a clip. It is also charged by connecting it to the USB port of a computer, so unlike other flashlights for books you do not have to buy batteries constantly. The only drawback is that these types of flashlights do not emit too much light and serve as reinforcement rather than anything else.
Good attitude: I recently commented with a friend how nostalgic I am for reading, since even being a person with a very technological profile, I like to buy books on paper. He explained that he prefers to read on Kindle because if the book is too heavy his arms get tired when he puts up with it. “Especially if you’re lying down, the book overcomes you and goes to your face,” he told me. All that is solved with a good posture at the time of reading.
Having said all this, now I am going to give you my advice to read faster although I tell you that they are not simple.
HOW TO READ FASTER
Start only with one of the reading techniques and as you learn it, try the rest:
Eliminate sub vocalization
Sub vocalization consists of mentally repeating what we are reading. It is a natural reflex act that everyone does when reading and that makes us not read as fast as we could. The question is that it is difficult to eliminate sub vocalization because it is something that we have deeply rooted. At the beginning of trying to eliminate sub vocalization I read and practically did not know anything. I needed a lot of practice to get to read without mentally repeating what I was reading and being able to find out what I was reading. If you manage to eliminate this habit you will see that only with this will you read much faster.
Jumps between groups of words
The second advice is to not read the sentences word by word. It is about making small jumps with the sight when reading the sentences and mentally grouping small groups of between 2 and 3 (or 4) words. This is the most complicated advice to carry out, but like the previous one, it only requires practice. Let’s see an example with a phrase:
TIPS TO READ · MUCH FASTER · AND TRY TO UNDERSTAND · WHAT WE READ.
Look at the previous sentence. Instead of trying to read it from beginning to end, start reading the sentence and try to make small mental “pictures” of the red dots. Try using your peripheral view to read the words closest to the points.
Use a guide
Do you remember when we were little when learning to read we used the finger as a guide? We have always been told not to follow the reading with your finger … Now I propose that you do something similar: use your finger, a pen or a ruler to indicate the words you are reading. This advice together with the previous two makes you go much faster reading.
Do not reread
I think we reread unconsciously for two reasons: sometimes because we do not pay all the attention we should while we read, and sometimes because we know that if we do not know what we are reading, nothing happens, we go back and read it again. If we consciously try to be 100% concentrated in reading and avoid rereading, we will see how we gain much more time and therefore we will read faster.
These are the methods that have worked particularly well for me to improve my reading speed, although they may not work well for you. You just need to test them and see if you can improve or not.
You already know that the intuition for what things is not a good guide, so I recommend reading the page of a book with your usual reading method and time, then re-read using these tricks and also time to see the difference. This way you will know if you can read faster you will have the certainty that you have achieved it and not the intuition, that sometimes makes us see what it is not.
HOW TO READ A BOOK A DAY
Very recently I discovered an application that has countless non-fiction books summarized only with the most interesting information in each book, so you can read it in 15 minutes.
If you are too lazy to read, you also have the audio version so you can listen while you work, play sports, take the dog out or sunbathe on the beach.
These summaries contain only interesting information, without straw, and straight to the point.
Sound good right?
With this app you can read (or listen to) a book a day without going crazy 🙂
Imagine everything you can learn every day without effort.
Follow the words
You can use a pencil or toothpick to guide your reading. The objective is that your eyes ‘reach’ the words you are pointing out. This simple exercise will increase your reading speed considerably. Practice a lot and take your eyes to the limit. Try to go faster and faster and discover the maximum point where you do not sacrifice the retention of the words. Sure you will be surprised.
Never return
How many times do we return some lines above or even go back to the previous page because we did not understand something important? This is, in fact, a reading error. Learn to trust your eyes and yourself and you will be surprised at your ability to understand much more than you think. So you already know: never, never, never look back. With this simple exercise you will teach your brain to understand everything you are reading.
Finally, surely, at some point in your life, you have been offered one of the many quick reading courses that promise to read up to a thousand words per minute, perfectly understanding the entire text. If an adult reads on average 200 words every 60 seconds , this means that one of these programs will help you to increase the speed of your quick reading. It sounds tempting, especially when the inbox of our mail keeps adding unread messages and the office reports continue to multiply. Reading faster without sacrificing retention is a dream for many. But beyond the complicated techniques and exercise portfolios, there are very simple techniques that can help you step on the accelerator when reading a document. Maybe you will not manage to read Ana Karenina in eight hours, but, without a doubt, you will improve considerably.
