Good Reads Challenge 2019
I decided to join the Good Reads Challenge for 2019, as I wanted to read more this year. I wanted to spend less time watching TV or doing nothing and I thought if I was reading that I would be relaxing, learning and doing one of my favourite hobbies all at the same time. How's that for balance?!
I set myself a small challenge to start with, just 52 books, one a week, because I knew that was possible, it was what I read last year without a challenge, it was what I was comfortable with... it wasn't replacing the time I spent doing nothing, however. This was just the time I would normally spend.
It was only after I was asked how it is that I read so fast, on one of my Facebook/Instagram posts that I realised that I hadn't been taking the challenge that seriously. I mean, it's true. I do read fast. I read around 450-550 words per minute depending upon what test I'm taking.
So after a couple of days, I increased my challenge to something a little more daring. I went for two books a week and gave myself a challenge of reading 104 books this year.
Yes, sure I did read a book a day for the first week of January, but that was when we had still got to get back into normal our routine, we weren't back at School, we were still in that strange twilight time where routine doesn't exist and it didn't matter if I spent three hours reading a book!
Reading two books a week, once the children are back at School and I'm back to volunteering is a different matter. The prospect of that does actually scare me because I don't just want to read Teen Fiction that Top Ender passes on to me or stories that Dan Jon wants me to read too. I want to read some non-fiction books, I want to read histories, I want to learn and grow and that will probably slow my reading pace down a little because I'll actually have to think!
If I want to have balance in my life, I can't spend my life reading.
I need to be exercising, I need to be spending time cleaning, I need to be cooking for my family and doing my volunteer work and learning and all those other things that I want to fill my life with. I won't have time for sitting staring into space or wasting my time if I want to do all of those things and read two books a week.
I'm excited!
I set myself a small challenge to start with, just 52 books, one a week, because I knew that was possible, it was what I read last year without a challenge, it was what I was comfortable with... it wasn't replacing the time I spent doing nothing, however. This was just the time I would normally spend.
It was only after I was asked how it is that I read so fast, on one of my Facebook/Instagram posts that I realised that I hadn't been taking the challenge that seriously. I mean, it's true. I do read fast. I read around 450-550 words per minute depending upon what test I'm taking.
So after a couple of days, I increased my challenge to something a little more daring. I went for two books a week and gave myself a challenge of reading 104 books this year.
Reading two books a week, once the children are back at School and I'm back to volunteering is a different matter. The prospect of that does actually scare me because I don't just want to read Teen Fiction that Top Ender passes on to me or stories that Dan Jon wants me to read too. I want to read some non-fiction books, I want to read histories, I want to learn and grow and that will probably slow my reading pace down a little because I'll actually have to think!
If I want to have balance in my life, I can't spend my life reading.
I need to be exercising, I need to be spending time cleaning, I need to be cooking for my family and doing my volunteer work and learning and all those other things that I want to fill my life with. I won't have time for sitting staring into space or wasting my time if I want to do all of those things and read two books a week.
I'm excited!