¶ Intro / Opening
Books are here to serve you. and not the other way around. And just because you bought a book is not a legally binding contract that you have to read the entire thing, I use a two minute rule, because like the hardest part of reading is actually sitting down to start, you want to focus more on consistency than intensity. So if you tell yourself like I have to read one hour every day, you're just setting up yourself
to fail. But if you say, I'm going to, I just need to read two minutes every day, no matter how busy you are, you can find two minutes in your day to read. And then once you sit down and start reading, if the next chapter you're reading is just not relevant to you or not interesting. You can just skip ahead and like continue reading the book, like you don't have to read 100% of a book to consider read or useful. You could kind of skip ahead or yeah, just find which which one chapter you want
to read. And with that.
Welcome to successful with ADHD. I'm Brooke Shipman. Let's get started. Hi, everybody, and welcome back to successful with ADHD. Today, I'm thrilled to have book reviewer Alex y kowski. Here he is a creative Alex and books and his book review summaries and reading tips have gained him over a million followers across social media. So you might recognize him from Alex and books with an under slash on
Instagram. And today, I'm hoping to highlight Alex's Reading System, which has helped millions of neurotypical and neurodivergent readers alike. And I know with ADHD, we have a hard time very often with reading, Getting Started finishing, getting lost in translation with focus. So very warm. Welcome, Alex.
¶ Alex and I reveal how his Reading System uniquely aids readers with ADHD, making reading more accessible and enjoyable.
Thanks so much for having me, Brooke, super happy to be here and happy to help people, you know, teach them how to become better readers. So excited to talk about this topic. Awesome,
awesome. It's very important for everyone. And I believe also with the way technology is going, there are less and less readers out there. It's not as required to read from a text as when you and I are growing up as kids. So this is more important than ever.
¶ We discuss the alarming trend of declining book readership and the unmatched benefits of reading in today's digital era.
For sure. I just saw some recent reading stats in 2023 46% of Americans read the zero books. So if you just read one book last year, you're ahead of basically like 50% of people. And also like the trend of how many people read daily has been falling ever since 2014. So I think in 2014, it was around 24%. And now it's down to like 14%. So definitely a downward trend of like, how many people read books. So if you do read books, there's so many advantages that you get from it.
That is really, you know, is book reading books, one of the few like life hacks, I would say,
wow. So one thing that you said, I mean, there's a lot of things that you just said that stuck out to me. But one thing is that almost half of the people did not read one book last year.
Yeah, that's how that's how rare reading is. Yeah.
Why do you think that is?
I think definitely social media and technology have made it even harder to like, sit down and read a book like, you know, now reading a book you have to is competing for your time and attention from Netflix from Tik Tok from YouTube from all these other like easy dopamine sources. So if you think about it, like before smartphones, and social media, there wasn't that much other things you could do, maybe listen, music, maybe watch the show, but also, you know, TV
wasn't on demand. It wasn't instant streaming, instant access. So it's harder than ever before to like, sit down and read a book. But the benefits are just as as strong, if not more stronger than ever before as well.
Yeah, attention spans have definitely shortened for everyone, not just people with ADHD. And tell it can you tell us a little bit about the benefits of reading because I think that is helpful for people who are using technology or are getting information from, you know, social media, which is not a bad thing, but are using that instead of reading? Yeah,
¶ Alex outlines the comprehensive benefits of reading, from stress reduction to cognitive enhancement.
so there's a lot of benefits to reading everything from you know, helps reduce stress. People that read tend to like live longer, tend to be more like cognitive, ly active. So prevents like Alzheimer's and other like cognitive diseases is a good question of like correlation or causation. But people that tend to, you know, read, more books tend to make more money in life, or have like higher earning careers. The hack of reading books that someone spent 10 years researching this
one topic. And basically for $10, and a couple hours, you can basically download everything they know, by reading their book, any topic you want to learn about whether it's productivity, self help, Diet, Fitness exercise, or like psychology, it's like you know, there's a book written by an expert just like how you wrote your book. And like, you can basically download a person's brain just by reading you know what they wrote. Anything you
want to learn about. There's a book out there that will teach you everything you need to know about it.
Yeah, and Alex was lucky enough that he reviewed activate your ADHD potential and you did it in less tend to weeks, right?
Yeah, I've gotten to the point where, like, if I really want to, I could read a book, like, in a day, you know, two days. But of course, like, you know, you want to balance how fast you read with how much you enjoy it. So I would say a good rule of thumb is like, if you really want to get through a book, kind of spaced it out through throughout the week, and there's actually studies behind
this. So like, if you binge watch a show, you're not going to remember as much, and you're not going to enjoy as much as if you space it out. And the same thing goes for reading. So you know, instead of trying to read, you know, seven hours in one day, it's a lot better to read one hour every day for seven days. Now, I'll help you remember more of what you read. And you also enjoy the process a lot more.
Yeah, I appreciate you saying that. A lot of my clients come to me and say, I am not successful, because I can't sit down and read more than one page in a book or, you know, I have to read for X amount of time every day. And I completely agree with you. I mean, besides the fact that like binging a book, as you're saying, is not as effective as doing one hour a day, even doing less than one hour a day is fine. As long as you touch the book,
for sure, I use a two minute rule, because like the hardest part of reading is actually sitting down to start. So I told myself, like, I only have to eat for two minutes a day. And that's still a great way to kind of like, trick your brain. And even though like, like I know, this trick is still works every time. So like, I'll just sit down and you know, read for two minutes. And after those two minutes are up, either I'll you know, stop and say like,
Okay, I'm done for today. Or what happens most of the time is like, okay, the book is like really interesting. And it kind of like sucks you in. And you end up reading for like 1015 or 20 minutes or sometimes, you know, like a few days ago, I sat down to read for two minutes, I ended up reading for an hour. But yeah, you want to be you want to focus more on consistency than intensity. So if you tell yourself like I have to read one hour every day, you're just setting up yourself
to fail. But if you say, I'm going to I just need to read two minutes every day, no matter how busy you are, you can find two minutes in your day to read. And then once you sit down and start reading, you'll probably enjoy what you're reading, and then you'll end up reading a lot
¶ Practical tips for adapting reading habits to ADHD needs, such as the two-minute rule, are shared by Alex.
longer. Yeah,
that's huge. It's consistency and persistency. We think that consistency has to be this big, scary thing. And it doesn't. I also like for people with ADHD, just having the book that you're reading somewhere that you go to in the morning, if that's your reading time. And it's that visual cue reminder, right? Yeah,
so same thing, like I have a whole like I have a bunch of bookcases where I keep all my books. But the book I'm reading, I keep it outside on like the coffee table or near my bed bed on the nightstand. So that way I see it. And it's also a lot easier to grab it. So you want to make it as easy as possible to read. So by having the plug out where you spend a lot of time such as like, you know, I work, I work remotely at home.
So I have my book nearby here, instead of having it somewhere like in the kitchen, where I might not be too often or you know, in the living room or another room. So I would say yeah, you want to keep your book out in the open so you see it and just keep your book where you spend a lot of time so that we it's easy to access and grab it. Yeah,
I love that. So Alex, do you have ADHD or suspected ADHD? So
¶ Alex shares his personal story, from his initial disinterest in reading to becoming a leading advocate for better reading practices.
I never been actually diagnosed, but I would I like leaning towards Yes. Because when I look back on my childhood, I always had a tough time focusing on the school. Yeah, I always had a tough time being still or sitting down. I was like a very active kid. And I'm still the same way today. Like my girlfriend says, like the same thing. I have trouble, you know, sitting still I have
trouble focusing. You know, when I find something I'm really interested in, then I'm able to like concentrate on it for hours. So if I'm like writing a Twitter thread or newsletter posts, I'm like, Really, into I could spend like a couple hours just focusing and doing that. So
you get hyper focused on the interesting things that bring you dopamine.
Yeah, and but the topics that don't interest me, I have absolutely no time or energy for. Yeah,
it sounds very ADHD, like, I'm not diagnosing you because I can't but if you're checking off a lot of the boxes,
I was definitely lean towards ADHD than not.
Yeah, so not like it would be a problem if you didn't have ADHD being on this podcast, because there's so many valuable tools that you have that you can share with everyone. But for someone who likely has ADHD, were you always a reader?
So I actually not and this was surprised a lot of people like growing up like of course, I did enjoy like reading comic books or like picture books. But I remember like, it was like fourth or fifth grade where I got a book. And I open up I'm like, There's no pictures in here. Like, like, what type of book is this? And I think that was like, that was like kind of like the downfall of like my interest in reading. And then it got even worse in middle school in high school. I'm sure
a lot of people can relate. It's like your kind of one year sign books you're not interested in. And also like even though the books are in English, like Shakespeare, like you don't even understand what they're talking about. It's like not relevant to your life. Like what does you know? 13 The old, you know, they're not interested in Shakespeare in romance or play or anything like that, you know. So I think middle school and high school, my reading level is just went completely into zero.
And I actually like hated reading because like I was forced to read all these books, and I was not interested in. And then if I didn't read the book, you know, I might feel the exam or the pop quiz, and I'll make make it even worse. So I think being forced to read books you're not interested in kind of makes everyone hate reading and then like high school. Yeah. And then, yeah, and then it wasn't until halfway through my college years, it was the first day of my business management class.
And this professor walked in, and he had like, nice suit on and he had this gold Rolex. And he said that he got the Rolex as a reward for being at IBM for 25 years. And this was like, back when IBM, IBM was one biggest companies in the world. And he pulled out a book from his briefcase, and he says, This is the most important book I've ever read. And this book made me success successful. And I'm like, okay, like, he seemed like a pretty credible guy, I'm gonna
check out this book. And the book was How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. And up until that time, I didn't know self help books existed. I thought it was like, you know, you have your textbooks, you have your fiction books, and you have your poaching books, I did not know, there was like a self help category. And then I went home, you know, started reading this
book. And he only assigned like, oh, read the first three chapters of the book was so good, because it was as entertaining as a fiction book, but as educational as a textbook, you know, it had these great lessons, but also these great stories to go along with it. So that first night, I literally read, like half the book. And this was someone that you know, hated reading was not interested in reading for years.
And then, um, yeah, so at that point, I discovered like, Oh, if I could learn learn, like communication and social skills from books, especially since I was like a shy, introverted kid, from this book that's literally almost 100 years old, like, what else? Can I learn from reading books? And that's when I discovered the answer was
anything and everything. So if I wanted to get better at fitness, I could read fitness books, if I want to get better at dating relationships, I could read relationship books, but once you like, be more productive, I could read productivity books. And so that was like, the huge unlock to me, when it was like, Oh, wow, this books written by people who are experts at any topic. And the like, for $10. I could just read and learn everything they know. And that concept, just like blew my mind.
I'm like, Why aren't more people reading? And that's kind of, I guess, the turning point in my life.
¶ The book that transformed Alex's view on reading, highlighting the life-changing potential of finding the right book.
Yeah, people are buying courses, they're paying to meet with the person. And if they had the tools to spend $10, and sit down and actually absorb the information from the books, with your tools, that would be I mean, first of all, economically responsible, and it would save them so much time and effort.
Yeah, and all the all they have to do is buy a book and sit down, read it. And that's, that's all you have to do, such as such a life hack. And that's why I'm so like, passionate about this mission about inspiring more people read teaching them how to become better readers. And that's been like my journey for the past few years. Yeah,
so I know, like, if someone is listening with ADHD right now, and they hate reading books, or have trouble starting and finishing and continuing, they might be listening and be like, Yeah, it sounds so simple. All you have to do is sit down and read a book like, Okay, why haven't I tried that before? Right, sarcasm inserted, but just wait until Alec shares some of the tools from his system that has
worked for him. This is someone who did not enjoy reading self development books or textbooks in the past, only graphic novels that had pictures so many of us ADHD ears can relate to that. But just conceptually, how many books have you read this past year, if you don't mind?
So last year, it was 75 books. So I was averaging like almost two books a week, this year, I'm actually look trying to lower that number. Because I'm trying to read better, not just more to the view, spend just all your time reading books, like one book after another book, you're not giving yourself time to like, actually reflect on what you learned and actually go apply what you
learn. So like, you know, I think a lot of people fall into this trap that when they do start reading, they try to read as much as possible or as fast as possible. But that's actually not the goal. It's like you want to read so that way you could apply it. And that that way that improves your life, just the process of just reading books, you know, is helpful, but it's
not the end goal here. So this year, I'm trying to lower that number and focusing on reading better and actually applying more of what I'm learning than just trying to read as many books as possible.
Yeah, so you're going deeper and being accountable to the books. And I heard somewhere that you have to read a book seven times before you really absorb everything from the book.
Yeah. Seven times definitely a lot. I would say when you come across like a really life changing book or really a book that really blows your mind I would say you probably those types of books I ended up reading maybe like three times over like a long period of time. But yeah, definitely when you come across like a life changing book, a book that it's really like, just change your changes your whole
perspective on life. You definitely want to go back and reread that But because it's kind of like an amazing movie like Inception or the Godfather, where it's like, it's so good, you have to rewatch it because you miss so many gems. And like, every time you watch it, like you discover new things, because it just has so many details. And the same thing goes for bucks. It's like you have to reread it to Gil basically all the wisdom from it. Yeah,
and, you know, as with ADHD, we love rewatching stuff that we love, and really looking at things that we love over and over again, it can become like obsessive to neurotypicals. So if you don't mind, let's get into the nitty gritty like research suggests that anywhere between 25 to 40% of children with ADHD may also have a reading disability or dyslexia. So I know Jim, quick follows
you. And he has limitless he has the speed reading technique that he touches on in that book, and just some other things that I've come across in my previous life as a special education teacher. And now a coach is the audio books and reading at the same time, so it helps you to sustain focus, my stepson does that strategy. And sometimes I do if the words are just like too
much. And I've also heard about like previewing the chapters of a book, especially for a self help book to see which sections you want to read, like, so you don't have to read the whole book. And then of course, there's apps like Blinkist, that just give you the golden nuggets. So this can definitely be helpful for reading. And obviously, I'm not the person
being interviewed here. But I know that there's a lot more that you have to share for people who have reading difficulties, or just people who have difficulty focusing while they're reading.
Yeah, yeah, just like, double tap on a couple of great points you make. Yeah, so one is like listening to audiobooks where you can actually control like, the speed at which the book goes, because some people Yeah, like to listen at, like 2x speed, or their brain just works faster. So they have to listen to like a higher reading speed. And so just maintain focus. I know if I put on buttons, like, you know, point five, reading speed is like way too slow.
Goodness. Yeah, it's like torture. So I think, yeah, you don't want to jump like to like Forex speed. Whereas like, you know, like rabbits talking or chipmunks talking. But you definitely want to like experiment and find like, what listening speed works for you. Another thing? Yeah, like you mentioned is helpful. So you want you could listen to the audiobook and read a physical
book at the same time. And there's a cool feature from Amazon called whisper sync, it syncs the your ebook and your Kindle ebook with Audible Audible audiobook. And you could listen and, you know, read the ebook at the same time. So that's like a really cool feature as well. That's great. I would say you want to treat book summaries, like movie trailers, where it kind of gives you like an overview of what you'll
learn. And then if you find the book summary, interesting, then you want to read the book to dive deeper into it. Because just like what the movie, you know, there's a lot of movie trailers that kind of spoil the plot, but you don't get to know the characters, you don't get to know all the details. So you can't really substitute you know, watching a movie trailer for watching the movie, same thing goes for reading, you can't substitute reading a book summary for reading the actual
book. Sure. Another good one is like I would say you want to skim read, then slow read. So if you're having trouble, like, you know, getting through a chapter, it kind of helps just kind of like skim through it to get like an overview. And then afterward, you know, once you have like, kind of the outline of what the author's talking about, then you want to go through the chapter again, and kind of read it slowly to understand that
better. And then if you're reading on ebooks, it's super helpful, because you could just like highlight or tap on any word, and it'll show the definition of it if you if you don't know what it means. So there's a couple of helpful tips, huh,
that is helpful. I almost feel like it's when you're watching like that Netflix show. And you're like, Oh, I know that character. But I have no idea where they're from. So let me go like IMDB it or google it, and then you find out. It's fun. That's great. I love this skimming and then deep reading, the skimming because we can lose focus, so much. So do we have to chew on every single word in a book. Now, a
good framework is a surgical reading. So you want to look at the table of contents, see what topics interest you, and then go ahead and jump to those topics and just read that. So for example, I got this textbook on how to study better and they had a chapter about how to study and understand nonfiction books better. So I skipped ahead to that chapter,
read it. And I didn't read the rest of the textbook because it covered like all these other topics that weren't just that weren't relevant to like what I want to learn. So I think that's also a great tool where sometimes you just need one chapter in a book in the book and distractible, all about how to not get distracted while reading this chapter about, you know, how to prevent your kids from getting distracted and how to help them focus. But I'm like, Well, I don't have kids
right now. So that chapter is not helpful so I could just skip over it. So also works the other way around, where it's like, if if the next chapter you're reading is just not relevant to you or not interesting. You can just skip ahead and like continue reading the book, like you don't have to read 100% of it. like to consider read are useful, you could kind of skip ahead or yeah, just find which which one chapter you want to read and read that books are here to serve you. and not the
other way around. And just because you bought a book is not a legally binding contract that you have to be the entire thing.
¶ Alex emphasizes choosing books that meet your needs and interests, freeing readers from the obligation to finish every book.
I love that with ADHD, we have a graveyard of books very often behind us that we have to dust off a year later and be like, Oh, that's right. I started that, I think where I bought it, because it sounded really excited. And a heads up that information. So yeah, what do you recommend to someone who buys the book, and never opens the book, or someone who buys the book and starts the book, but doesn't continue reading the book? Yeah.
So I would say a good rule of thumb is give a book three chapters and then either commit to it or quit. So you kind of want to be you know, the introduction, the first chapter, and then maybe one more chapter that might interest you. And by then you'll probably have a really good idea of whether or not this book is worth reading. It's kind of just like an amazing movie. It's very rare to watch a movie that's super slow for the first hour and a half. And the last 30 minutes are
amazing. The same thing goes for books. Like if you're reading a life changing book, it'll probably like impact you within the first first chapter or the second one. So yeah, if you're give a book, you know, three chapters, and you're like, Wow, this book is amazing. That's a sign that you should commit to it. Because there's going to be more gems later down the road, I like to think about is like three strikes, and you're out.
So if you give a book three chances, and it doesn't win you over, like drop it and pick up a new one. Like that's a fair way to kind of judge a book.
Yeah, yeah, I like that. So don't feel bad that you're, let's say, 50 pages, and you've read the first three chapters, and you hate it. There's no contract. You're right.
For sure. Yeah. And you want to quit boring books to make room for brilliant ones. Because there's, there's 150 million published books out there. So even if only 1% of them are a fit for you, that's over 1 million bucks. And even then it's like, you'll never get through a million bucks in your life, even if you read, you know, 100 books a year. So there will always be more amazing books out there, then you can
read. So if you find yourself reading something boring or not interesting, you want to quit and pick up something better.
Hmm, I like that. So you mentioned having the headphones for audiobooks. You know, play it at whatever speed works with your brain if you're if you think fast. And also let's say you're dyslexic, or you have reading issues, I can help you with the words on the paper book. Do you have any other tools that you recommend without giving away everything that you've written? And then of course, for readers who get distracted? Yeah,
so I grew up with with a speech impediment, so I stutter every now and then it's something I've really worked on over the years, but still comes back every now and then. And what I found that is helpful is to actually read the book out
loud. So there's, you know, there's helpful if you work remotely or at home, and also great ways to work on your like your speech and your you know, talking skills, there's also been studies, I found that if you read out loud, helps store that information and your long term memory because you're, you're reading it, and then you're hearing it. So it's like
double reading at once. So although you read slower, it's more effective, if there's a book out there that you're really enjoying is helpful to practice reading out loud, because it'll help you focus help you remember more, it helps improve your speech as well. So it's like three benefits for the price of one.
I like that. It's interesting. And this is not to try to contradict what you said, and I completely believe and agree with you. When I and this is a different setting. Now when I was in school, whenever the teacher called on me to read out loud, I would always get anxious because I was so worried about how I would read. Yeah, so I would read and it was fine. But I had no idea what I was reading.
Yeah, I feel the same exact way. Like I was sort of sweating. I'm like, oh, no, I'm going to be picked on soon. Like, I hope that you get picked on. But here, you know if you're home alone, or if you're reading to kids, or something like that is a completely stress free environment. Because if you make a mistake, you could just repeat the word. You don't have 30 other classmates that might start laughing or snicker at
you. So yeah, it's definitely a more calm and safe environment to practice reading.
Yes, I love that and teachers who are listening out there, please. I mean, there's neurodiverse learners everywhere. If you have someone who has issues with reading, don't do that popcorn reading thing like popcorn, you're it because that creates so much anxiety, prep the person beforehand that you're going to be calling on them at this time to reduce that anxiety.
Yeah, I think I think I just had a little bit of like PTSD flashback too much.
Oh, gosh. So what about so we talked about tips for people who want to start reading books? I'm curious. So we're talking a lot about self help books now. What about for people who don't like self help books? More in the graphic novel? Or maybe in the fiction realm? What are your thoughts about? Yeah,
yeah, there's a great quote by navall Raava Khan says, Read what you love until you love to read. And that really stuck with me. Another way to think about it is like, read what interests you. And you'll always be interested in reading. Any topic that you know you're curious about wants to learn more about follow that
curiosity. If you want to read books, about like World War two airplanes read about that, if you want to read books, you know about philosophy or psychology, like follow your natural curiosity, into what interests you, that way, you'll enjoy reading a lot more.
That's so great. It's so great, especially for students, if you have a child who has to read because they have a requirement by their teacher to read X amount of books give them if they love soccer, give them you know, a magazine on soccer, or a short book on soccer, whatever it is, right. But
if you give me a book, about, you know, maybe a soccer player, that's not gonna be as interesting to me, because I just, you know, was never tuned
to soccer. So yeah, if you're, if your child loves ping pong, give them a book about the world's best ping pong player, or a tennis given book about the world's best tennis player, like whatever they're interested in, find the book about that topic, give it to them, and they'll love it a lot more than you giving them what book you think they should rethink.
Exactly. And it doesn't matter if it's, you know, a lower reading level either, if that's where they are, and meet them where they are. And same thing with us adults, too. For
sure, I think that's one mistake. We kind of make in the educational system where it's like, we expect 13 or 14 year old kids to know Shakespeare, or like, Dante's Inferno, like, these books are way too advanced, do you like now that you know, I'm getting closer to 30 Like, now I'm kind of more interested in philosophy and learning more about the classics. But as like a, you know, 1516 year old kid, all I cared about was like video games
of basketball. But if you gave me a book about basketball, then I'd probably actually read a versus a book about, you know, Macbeth or something like that.
Like that, too. Exactly. So I think you might have answered this, because you're going deeper into the books. But what are your thoughts about reading more than one book at a time, just like we might watch more than one show at a time?
Yeah, that's something I'd recommend. And that's actually the analogy I use. So I'd recommend to have at least two books, Max three, I like to call it like you want to have a snack and a meal bucks. So sometimes, you know, sometimes you allow the time and you're super hungry, and you want to have like a meal like you know, steak, potato and broccoli. Other times you don't have a lot of time where you're not that hungry. You just want to have a snack like an apple with peanut
butter. The same thing goes for reading, there's some days where you have a lot of time and energy like it's the weekend, maybe then you want to read like a philosophy book, or like a really in depth fiction book like Warren Piece or something. But sometimes you only have five minutes to read. So you want to read maybe just like a simple storybook are like the easy one page nonfiction book like daily stoic where it's like one page
per day. And that that you could read in five minutes, because only one page you want to play like your food diets, your reading diet, where you want to have a snack book, something short and easy that you can pick up anytime. And then a meal book something like more in depth, like when you have more time and
energy to read. And the reason why I say like three books Max, because the same thing with like watching a show, if you're watching, like you know, four shows at a time, you start to confuse the characters confuse the plot and you forget the backstory. Same thing goes for reading. And so I'd say you want to have at least two books, your snack and meal book, and maybe one more book on the go, like have a ebook on your phone or an
audiobook on your phone. So that way, if you find yourself someplace, and you don't have your physical books, that way, you have something to read in the meantime, I think
that's great. You know, you don't store more information than you can in your brain. But you still stay interested. And it's practical depending on where you are in your car or at home, or whatever mood you're in. I love that. Yeah. One thing that you just shared on your social media account that resonated so much with me is that if you want to think like everyone else read the same books if you want to think differently, read different books go way back to like the originals, right? The
Oh, geez. And I think that's huge. Like I also recommend this in networking and professional development, right? Like, if you want to be the best or be bigger in your business. You have to look outside your network for me it's outside of ADHD coaches right for you and might be outside of book reviewers and learn some of the tips and strategies that don't come into your network. So I think that's brilliant. Was there more that you can share about that?
Yes, the framework of you want to master rule the rules before you break them so like if you're new to reading, like Yeah, go for the best selling book because that's like proven that people love that book. Like you know, if you just get into productivity or nonfiction go for atomic habits. That book is the number one best seller sold 20 20 million copies, like that's the safe
bet. But if you Been in that space for a while, that's when you want to venture out and read the books that no one else is reading. Because like, now you know how to read, you know how to find your books, and you know a lot about that topic. So that's when you kind of want to break the rules and go for something else, something
different. But if you're like a brand new reader, I wouldn't advise you to go to the bookstore and pick a book, no one's reading, the chances are you won't be interested in it. And like, you won't know much about it. So yeah, I would say, you know, if you need a reading, go for the bestsellers go for the books that everyone else is reading, because they're proven
to be like good reads. But if you've been in that space for a while, that's when you want to venture out the same thing, like you said, you know, once you master like ADHD, then you could venture out into other topics.
I like that. And you've read so many books. I mean, you said you read 76 last year. And you've been doing this since 2016 2017.
is when I started? Yeah. Yeah, that's a long time. So
i They say it takes five years to master a profession. So you're past that, right? Yeah.
So I definitely spent over five years, I would say, studying the art of reading. And now I'm sharing like everything I've learned online and in the course, like you said, so yeah, it's been a long journey.
Yeah, I want to touch on your course for sure. And I want to also ask you, before we get into the art of reading, if you don't mind, since you've read so many books, and you've read older books, as well, what draws you into new self help books that might share some of the same strategies as the books from hundreds of years ago?
Yeah, so I would say a good framework is like you either want to read really new books, or really old books, because the old books are like timeless wisdom. So the books like, you know, meditations, or the art of war, or something, there's books that are 2000 years old, they just have timeless wisdom that everyone that reads them will find
something useful in it. And then on the flip side of that coin is like, you want to read the newest books, because we're always making new discoveries, and like science, technology, all of that. So especially like when it comes to the health space, there's always new studies coming out and new research coming out. So you want to read like, the newest books to see, like what, you know, we'll have people change their mind about, you know, what's
going on in the world. Now, I know, like my parents, you know, if you ask them for health advice, they're kind of stuck in like the 80s and 90s, of what they learned, because they stopped reading. So their health advices is like pretty, pretty outdated. But you know, if you read a new book, or like if you listen to like the human Kuperman podcast, that's like the latest cutting edge of like science of health and
productivity. So yeah, I think good framework is either read, you know, for timeless problems, like you know, how to be happy or something that we timeless books for modern problems, like if you want to learn about, you know, rocket ships, or AI or something like that, that's when you want to read modern books. Yeah,
that makes sense. So tell me about the system that you've created the art of reading.
Yeah. So you know, I get questions in DMS all the times, like, you know, how do I stay focus? How do I take notes and books, you know how to find them. These are books, I kept getting all these questions in DMS. So that's when I started like creating content about like, how to become a better reader. And now I decided to basically pack all my, you know, five plus years of reading tips,
tricks and tactics. And so this one course, is about 23 lessons, each video is like pretty short, like five to 10 minutes, and basically share all my best reading tips in this one course. So that way, like whenever someone asked me, like, oh, how do I do this? Or how do I do that? It's like, okay, here's a course. And you can learn every single thing I know about reading. And this one course, we recently passed 180 students, and a lot of people I left a like love five star reviews. And
when did you open the course. So I did like a soft launch earlier this year. But I've been working on this course for like 10 months, because I kind of had all this knowledge in my head. But getting out there like recording the lessons and then also like re recording lessons. That was like a whole Pro. Yeah. Yeah.
And then you have audio issues, and then you like stutter on a word, and you have to go back. So frustrating.
So that was definitely, that was definitely a whole process in itself. But now I can say like, Oh, if you want to become better reader, this is like the best resource you could find. Because I've also taken a lot of other reading courses. But those courses kind of cover one that cover like speed reading, which people think is like the ultimate reading hack.
But like, as we talked about, like, the faster you read, the less you remember, the less you understand, it's not about just reading more about reading better. I've taken a lot of other reading courses, and I haven't found anything similar to this. I'm happy, you know, it's out there, people are enjoying it. And the whole mission is just to teach people how to become better readers with it.
And it's called The Art of reading, correct? Yeah. Where can people find your course or find you if they're interested in learning more.
So you'll find me all over social media. Or you could just type in Alex and books into Google, and I'll pop up on like, everywhere else. I have Alex ebooks.com. And I also have like a free newsletter. So every week, I basically read a book, and I summarize three key points from it. And also I share three ways you could apply the book. So it's not just about like reading and understanding what you're learning. It's all it's also about, like how can I apply
what I've learned? So that's like the framework and I've summarized over like, 200 bucks now So that's basically my weekly newsletter, where it's like, yeah, have you booked every week? just summarize the book and share, like how you could apply it as well.
Wow. So it's Alex, the blankest newsletter. Here's your application for that's great. You don't even need to read it, you just have to read my quick summary and then how to apply it. I've loved that. Yeah, I love that. And I think everyone deep down inside really wants to be a reader. I don't know anyone who I mean, I know people who hate reading, but I think they all want to
acquire information, right? And if reading is going to help you with your cognitive abilities, and it's going to expand things, and it's going to help you from, you know, getting dementia and age well, like why wouldn't people want that? So if they go to your course and watch these digestible videos, I think that would be a great start for anyone. And like you said, it's very different from what else is out there. So that's awesome.
I would say yeah, if you're not a reader, it's just because you haven't found the right book. Like, that's the way I consider myself. And I know, you know, tons of other people. I talked to people on Twitter on Instagram all the time. I asked them, like, what's the book that medians for reader and everyone has that one specific book, that's like, after reading this one book, that's when I became a
reader. So yeah, if you think you're not a reader, just know that there's a book out there that will completely change your mind. And, you know, we talked about all the benefits of reading. So it is that reading is good for you. You just haven't found that one book. If you listen to the podcast, and you pick up a book and like that books, not interesting it not interesting, you know, quit it and pick up a new one. Once you're out in the real world.
There's no There's no pop quiz, like you don't have to finish this book. Or if you if you don't like the notion of quitting books, I like to say, put the book on pause. So it might be a case of like the right book, just the wrong time. So put the book on pause. You can always come back to it later. Yes,
that's great. And what was your one book that changed your life?
So it was How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie?
Yeah, you mentioned that Okay. Awesome. Awesome. Any other last remaining thoughts before we close out today? Just
Just one more good tip. If you're starting your reading journey, start with short books. Because I remember, you know, when I first started, I'm like, Okay, what I read, let me just find like a best selling or classic book. So I actually bought a copy of like, Warren Peters come like, oh, you know, maybe, oh, my
gosh, the longest book, and the most dry book ever.
I did not look at how long the book was. So when it came, it was like a textbook because I think it's like 1300 pages. And I'm like this book has already taken take me all year to read. So I immediately refunded returned and refunded it. So I would say there's so many like, amazing short books out there, like, you know, the compound effect or Man's Search for Meaning or iki guy, like these life changing books that are like 2200 pages or less, or
like 150 pages or less. So definitely, if you're just starting out your reading journey, pick up a short book, instead of long one, because it'll just be a lot less intimidating to start. And it's kind of funny to think that book is intimidating. But if you saw like 1000 page book, you'd be a little scared to know, thank
you. Absolutely. Believe it or not my seventh graders reading that book. He's an amazing reader. And I have zero interest in reading that. And right now I'm reading the Body Keeps the Score. And that's also like a textbook to me. So I've been using the strategies. We've talked about listening and reading at the same time and putting it down because it's hard to get through. But it's an amazing
book. Yeah, yeah, we're breaking up the book until like, Okay, I'm just gonna read, you know, one chapter today, or like 20 pages today to make it like digestible. Instead of saying, like, oh, I have to get through this book in a week like, like, the bigger the book, the more time you need to like Space out your reading, and like, get through it.
Awesome. Well, thank you, Alex, for being here. Remember Alex and books anywhere you google him, you go on Instagram, go on social media for read his content. He has great summaries, I follow him and check out his course art of reading. I know I will be too. And thank you so much for being here. Yeah,
but thank you, Brooke. I don't get to talk this like this much in depth about like no ADHD, or like reading tests. So this was a super fun and I think people really enjoy these readings have so I really appreciate this opportunity to share some written tests with your audience.
Thank you for being here. Thanks for listening to this episode of successful with ADHD. I hope it helps you on your journey. And if you need any additional support for you or a loved one with ADHD, feel free to reach out to us at coaching with brooke.com and all social media platforms at coaching with Brooke and remember, it's Brooke with Annie. Thanks again for listening. See you next time.