Change What You Read

For those of you sick of hearing about my trip to New Mexico, I will move on soon, I promise. There’s just too much to say (that came up there) related to breakthroughs!

Being in and amongst the poets, memoirists, and novelists for 7 full days was interesting - I have mentioned this before. 

One of the ways in which breakthroughs, and learning in general, happen is through cognitive dissonance. The definition of cognitive dissonance is:

The sense of discomfort people experience when confronted by contradictory ideas.

Dissonance occurs when things feel not quite right, or we realize we are more clueless that we thought. I was in Taos, chatting it up with the other writers, and I could not have felt more DUMB. Hanging around business people, I generally feel “with it” and knowledgeable. I realized that I have not read nearly enough nonbusiness books. There were authors and books that EVERYONE had read and could comment about that I had never heard of. No exaggeration. This happened many times during the seven days while in casual conversations or during the workshops.

Wow, my reading habits are way too narrow! Here’s a few books I got while in Taos and will endeavor to get through in the next month.

What about you? Is your reading habit stuck in a rut? Changing what we read is like changing our context, but much easier. Pick up a book that you would not normally.

If you read literary fiction - pick up a cheesy, funny, lite book, like a Dave Barry novel (Or my favorite, Carl Hiaasen).

If you read a ton of business books - pick up a book of poetry.

If you read mostly national big publishers books, pick up a small press (or self-published) book by a local author.

If you read dozens of magazines and blogs, take a week off and read more for pleasure.