How to read a How To book

How-To books are books that guide you to train yourself in a specific skill, or improve yourself in a specific knowledge area. Reading them is one of the best investments you will make.

Here are some tips on how to read a How To book:

* Read in the bathroom - Keep a book or two in the bathroom and read a couple of pages or chapter every session. I actually finished several books over the course of a month or two, all in the bathroom!

* Don't feel compelled to finish a bad book - If a book starts out good but turns bad in the middle, or if it stops providing you real value in the middle, don't feel guilty about not finishing it. Just get what you need and move on.

* Don't be afraid to call a bad book a bad book - If you discovered you made a wrong judgment as to the reading value of a certain book, don't feel too bad. Just dump the book and move on, no sense in wasting more time and money by reading it.

* Skip around - Not every book needs to be read from cover to cover. Some of the best books I've read, I've skipped from chapter to chapter, reading the most interesting parts first, until eventually I discovered I actually went through every page.

* Read it twice - For truly great books, such as those that are revolutionary and result in drastic improvements in your life, read them twice to make sure you absorb all the ideas. I've read each of my most favorite books of all time at least twice.

* Share it with a friend - Read a good book? Tell a friend about it. Buy one for him if necessary if it really is that good.

* Don't rush - Never go through a book in haste wanting to "get it over with". If for one reason or another you find yourself rushing through one, take a break, put a bookmark, start reading something else until you can devote your full attention to it.

* Read while commercials are on - Better to skip the bad TV programs in the first place (or avoid using the TV as a "time-filler"). But if you do watch TV, particularly pro sports like basketball or baseball, you can get a lot of reading done during the commercials. Sometimes the book becomes more interesting and you continue reading even when the commercials are over.

* Do not read beauty magazines, they will make you feel ugly - Just kidding, I just copied that line from Mary Schmich's classic essay 'Wear Sunscreen'.

Happy reading.