Easy reading
One of the first things I did when the world went into lockdown in March 2020 was sign up for Audible. I did balk at the price - $15/month for a book I’d never hold - but since we were entering a global pandemic and I had just canceled my newly useless makeup sample subscription, I was able to reconcile myself to at least trying it. Those were the days when we were hilariously tempted to believe “this whole thing” would be over in about two weeks, so I thought I’d cancel it by summertime for sure. I had actually tried Audible in its early days and couldn’t get into it because it somehow didn’t feel like reading to me. Not that I’m a total luddite. Along with many of the world’s Boomers and Gen-Xers, over the last decade plus I’ve switched almost entirely over to reading on a screen. I’ll admit that was an adjustment, that I felt like I’d lost a little something by not holding a book, turning its pages, feeling the spine bend and give under the pressure of progress. But between the overall convenience and paper-saving bonus, reading on my phone felt fine. However, for some reason simply listening to a book oddly felt like cheating, like not enough effort to deserve the reward. And while I have certainly enjoyed Audible’s grandpa, books-on-tape, on car trips as a kid, there are concessions that must be made with that medium. Someone else’s voice, someone else’s inflection, can change interpretation and even meaning. But since I had listened to every single episode of what felt like every single podcast while my ICU nurse husband walk toward the plague, leaving me to endlessly walk our (blissfully oblivious) dogs, and try to remind myself that my shortness-of-breath was just my old friend Panic, I was desperate for a voice other than Dread’s to fill the space inside my head. What I realized, was that as long as I stayed away from fiction and chose only selections that are read by their author, not only did I have a great experience being able to “read” while trekking miles and miles every day, I pretty quickly got hooked on books-on-phone.
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My first download was Atomic Habits by a guy called James Clear. I had lately heard him promoting his book on a circuit of several podcasts that I listen to and those interviews had really resonated with me. It was billed as a book about how to finally make changes to your life that have eluded you - a step-by-step guide to breaking bad habits and building better ones to help you achieve your most impossible goals. This fit with one of many midlife themes I’ve been carrying for several years now as I wrestle my 40s…am I spending my disappearing time wisely? Have I succeeded? How can I pay the mortgage and also live my purpose? Where do I find my purpose? Anyway, aside from the existential rabbit hole, I’ve been fascinated by the ideas around ‘habit change’ for a long time - both as a former smoker and as a dog trainer. I love thinking and talking about behavior and its motivators, and since it didn’t have anything to do with Covid’s spread, it got my first month’s credit.
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Atomic Habits does not disappoint. Aside from having to find some initial grace for this younger-than-me, business-oriented white-guy as he set the stage by talking about his almost-professional (ooh, look at that cute squirrel) baseball career, Mr. Clear DOES deliver on his promise to provide useful instruction for assessing desired change and taking action to make it forking happen. I found myself nodding along and maybe exclaiming as he described feasible techniques to alter your daily life, and how he nearly exactly spelled out the steps I took to finally quit smoking in 2013, after 20 years, 10 of them spent trying to stop. The methods that took me a decade to realize and implement were now here in a book, streaming easily into my ears, attainable in mere minutes - and while multi-tasking! Kind of amazed, I got a little verklempt. The systems he spells out also resonated really well with how I love talking to people about training their dogs - finding small opportunities that fit your day, slowly building routines that become “muscle memory”. Clear goes through what amounts to a very digestible lesson in basic BF Skinner theories on learning and applied behavior (Antecedent, Behavior, Consequence) techniques - to relay how baby steps and repetition are a simple formula for lasting results.
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“All big things come from small beginnings. The seed of every habit is a single, tiny decision. But as that decision is repeated, a habit sprouts and grows stronger. Roots entrench themselves and branches grow. The task of breaking a bad habit is like uprooting a powerful oak within us. And the task of building a good habit is like cultivating a delicate flower one day at a time.” - James Clear, Atomic Habits
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After having listened to this book, I’m not even sure I would have gotten as much out of it the old-fashioned way as I did “reading” it while pounding the pavement and (probably also) folding laundry, watering plants and driving to the store for bananas every 5-6 days. In fact, being able to absorb the author’s ideas while also accomplishing the basic shit-that-must-be-done, made for even higher reward than creasing the binding and folding down pages. Though I did find myself pressing pause to take notes a few times.
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And of course I can’t help a giggle at the irony that this download turned out to be habit forming itself - my first real drag on Audible. Now, after 18 months, I am as many books in and trying hard not to let myself get up to 2 books a month.
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PS Audible didn’t pay me to say any of this and my assessment of Atomic Habits is far form a full book report, but my overall review is that if you have pondered some tiny or enormous life change, this book is a great listen! The author also has a free weekly email with quotes and tips that I don’t always open but also don’t unsubscribe from: https://sparklp.co/99e41619