Read: The One Superpower That Pays Forever

You can read 100 books and outperform 1,000 people in life.

Sounds like a bold claim. But it’s not.

Most people stop learning once they leave school. They read only when forced to. But if you fall in love with reading, truly reading, you unlock one of the highest forms of personal leverage. You gain wisdom that compounds over time. You start to see what others don’t. That’s your edge.

A single book can give you decades of someone else’s experience. You can borrow the minds of history’s greatest thinkers, creators, and leaders, all for less than the price of lunch. If you take reading seriously, it will pay dividends for the rest of your life. So why doesn’t everyone do it?

The Problem Is Not You, It’s the Way You Were Taught

In school, reading was a chore. You read to score marks, not to expand your mind. You memorised facts. You summarised chapters. You analysed texts to please an examiner. Somewhere along the way, reading became transactional. It became a task, not a joy.

But that isn’t real reading.

Real reading is fuel for the soul. It’s a way to grow. To solve problems. To understand the world, and yourself, more clearly. Once you reconnect with that purpose, reading becomes something you want to do, not something you have to do.

How to Fall in Love With Reading Again

You don’t need motivation. You need the right relationship with books. Here's how to reignite that spark:

• Follow Your Curiosity, Not a Reading List

  Don’t start with a list of “top 100 books” just because someone on the internet told you to. Start with what fascinates you right now. Interested in money? Read about investing. Wondering how to live better? Try philosophy or psychology. Curiosity is your compass.

  
  

• Give Yourself Permission to Quit

  If a book doesn’t grab you after 20 pages, drop it. Life’s too short to slog through bad writing. Great books pull you in. Trust your instinct. Let go of the guilt. Move on.

  
  

• Read More Than One Book at a Time

  You don’t eat the same meal every day, your mind doesn’t need the same content all week either. Keep a mix. One heavy book, one light one. Something timeless, something fun. Switch between them depending on your energy.

  
  

• Remove the Barriers

  Make reading effortless. Audiobooks on your commute. Kindle in your bag. Short essays when you're tired. The format doesn’t matter. The learning does.

  
  

Choosing the Right Books

Not all books are created equal. The good ones stay with you. Here’s how to spot them:

• Timeless is better than trendy

  A book that’s still read 20 or 100 years after it was written probably holds real value. Popular books fade. Classics endure.

  
  

• Look for lived experience

  Choose authors who’ve done the work, not just written about it. The best books come from people who’ve lived what they teach.

• Look for insight, not filler

  Good books are dense with ideas. If you want to underline every page, you’re on the right track. Reread those ones.

Making It Stick

Reading isn’t a competition. You don’t win by finishing the most books. You win by remembering and applying what you read.

• Pause and reflect

  Ask yourself, “How does this apply to my life right now?” Don’t rush to the next chapter. Let the message sink in.

  
  

• Explain it in your own words

  If you can teach it simply, you’ve understood it. Try summarising what you’ve learned to someone else.

  p.s. If you've read my book, you would have noticed that I'm big on this. The ability to synthesise and verbalise what you have read is a highly effective learning strategy of academic subjects in school.

• Link ideas across books

  The more you read, the more you’ll notice connections. Psychology helps you understand leadership. History helps you navigate politics. Everything is connected. The more you read, the clearer the world becomes.

The Real Wealth: Wisdom That Compounds

Most people read for entertainment. And that’s fine. But if you read with purpose (i.e. to grow, to think better, to act better), reading becomes your superpower.

Books don’t just teach you what to do. They show you who you can become. At the end of the day, reading allows you to gain access to the best minds, the clearest thinking, and the ideas that build real freedom.