Reading is hard. It wasn’t always, but now, it is. You know that feeling: you finally sit down with a book you’ve heard great things about—Song of Achilles, for example—and then it hits you. Your brain doesn’t work the same anymore. You’re no longer that wide-eyed child, eagerly tearing through books like they’re a bag of candy. Your brain has been trained to skim, scroll, and hop from one thing to the next.
So, each night ends the same way. You reach for your phone, scroll mindlessly for forty-five minutes, and fall asleep while wondering where your curiosity disappeared off to.
Don’t worry; this isn’t a moral failing. It’s inherently a wiring issue, a flaw in your current design. One that runs on, “What have I been training my brain to do all day?”
The good news is that the same science that explains that smooth-brain instinct to reach for your phone can also help you reach for something more nourishing, like books. In his YouTube video, “How to Read More Books,” user Ali Abdaal outlines ten rules to gently retrain your mind to read again. We’ve outlined them below.
Some context
Over the last twenty years, the number of adults who read for pleasure has dwindled. It’s fallen by 40%. It’s reported that today, only about 16% of Americans even pick up a book on any given day.
At the same time, we have never had more content at our fingertips. It’s ironic, isn’t it? We are constantly consuming words: emails, Instagram captions, text messages that are nothing more than veiled scams. Only now, words arrive in bite-sized formats and notifications instead of chapters.
But the research also tells us this: just six minutes of reading can reduce stress by 68%. That’s more than music or a walk around the block. Reading quietly, even for a few minutes, can lower stress, sharpen memory, and improve emotional well-being. In other words, reading builds the kind of cognitive endurance that doomscrolling erodes.
Som why do you keep avoiding it?
Here’s a secret. Most people who “wish they read more” (a.k.a. all of us) do not lack interest. Nor willpower. Our brains have been trained to operate in overstimulation mode, always expecting novelty, speed, and interruptions. It’s a far cry from the stillness, focus, and flow that reading requires, certainly. These ten habits work because they help reduce the mental effort it takes to begin reading. They can feel almost like a gentle kind of magic, slowly making it easier and more comfortable to stay with a text just a little longer. Enjoy.
Rule 1: Put the book where your brain is tired
Place your book or e-reader on your nightstand tonight. Charge your phone in another room.
That’s it! That’s the whole rule.
Behavioral scientists call this micro-shift “choice architecture.” Developed by economists Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein, this theory demonstrates that small, subtle changes to your physical environment can profoundly alter your behavior, with little to no impact on your freedom. It requires little conscious effort. You are making the easiest option also the most nourishing one.
By bedtime, your brain is running on automatic habit mode. It reaches for whatever’s closest, most familiar. Over time, that tiny swap makes reading feel like the natural way to end the day. Your brain begins to associate printed words with rest and comfort, not effort.
Rule 2: Make your home screen a little library
The average person picks up their phone dozens, if not hundreds, of times per day.
Phew. Each glance at your screen, every flash of artificial LED light, represents a mental crossroads.
If the first thing your eyes land on is a social app, your fingers will go there before your conscious mind even checks in. However, if the first thing you see is your Kindle, your brain gets a different cue. Research refers to this instinct as “habit stacking” and “cue design.” The idea is to take something your brain already does (picking up your phone to scroll) and sneakily insert reading, gently redirecting the automatic cue. This way, each idle moment—waiting in line, commuting on public transit, a quiet moment in the morning—becomes a reading window.
So, your favorite reading app deserves prime digital real estate—the middle of your home page—while distracting apps are buried away in a folder, two or three swipes away.
Rule 3: Let audiobooks borrow your most boring moments
Commuting. Washing dishes. Dusting the annoying decorative trim at the bottom of the walls.
These moments are tedious, irksome. But they’re also perfect opportunities to treat your brains to the worlds of Tolkien, Woolf, and García Márquez. This represents habit stacking at its purest. The technique, pioneered by behavioral researcher BJ Fogg and popularized by James Clear’s Atomic Habits, exploits the brain’s existing neural pathways. Since the anchor habit (commuting, exercising) is already wired into daily routine, the desired behavior (listening to a book) simply rides in on the coattails of the existing habit.
Plus, it’s a great way to devour literature: if you spend even half an hour a day listening to audiobooks, you can easily finish 15–20 books per year.
Rule 4: Serve your brain a reading menu
School taught us to be faithful, monogamous readers. One book at a time. Cover to cover, start to finish. And no switching. Too bad adult brains don’t work that way.
The reality? Your energy shifts. Your focus changes. Some days, your mind craves ideas and changes. You want nothing more than to read about how basketball can help you succeed in life. Other times, you wish to get lost in the strange, bizarre universe depicted in Ottessa Moshfegh’s Lapvona.
The tactic: keep two to five books going at once; give your brain choices. Perhaps a novel, like 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami. A challenging work of nonfiction. A cozy audiobook, maybe one read by the actual author, like Ina Garten does in Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir. Plus, something short and fun for tired nights.
Self-determination theory, a foundational framework in motivational psychology, highlights autonomy as the key driver of lasting engagement. Choice matters.
Rule 5: You are allowed to quit
We’ve all been there. It’s the book of the year. You see it stacked up in piles like a shrine to reading in every bookstore window you pass. Everyone can’t stop raving about this book. But you can’t bring yourself to read past the first fifty pages.
Guilt creeps in. You don’t want to abandon this novel; you’ll seem like a quitter. The better option? Stop reading altogether.
Notice the sunk cost fallacy at work: the deeply human, deeply imperfect belief that the more you’ve invested in something, the harder it is to walk away—even when walking away is clearly the right choice.
Give yourself a break. Destroy the bias! Realign with your intrinsic motivation: the genuine desire to know what happens next.
Rule 6: Start with what feels easy
Hey, so I don’t know if you know this: not every book you read has to be Ulysses by James Joyce. Start with whatever books pique your interest, effortlessly. Genre fiction. Thrillers. Romance. Fantasy. Short stories. So-called “literary prestige” is what’s standing between you and your ultimate reading goals.
The problem is this: if you start your reading life at the steepest part of the mountain, books start to feel like work. Flow theory, developed by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, suggests that the “optimal experience” happens when skill level and challenge level are perfectly synced. If the book’s too difficult, and it seems like every page requires a dictionary, anxiety strikes. Too easy? Boredom.
So, take this as your invitation to read anything you love. You’re building the neural pathways and attention span that will eventually lead to Joyce’s epic later on.
Rule 7: Let your progress be visible
Reading is such a personal, private experience. That’s a beautiful thing. It can also make progress feel invisible, even to you.
Tracking your reads with an account, like Goodreads, or in a notebook, changes that. Now, instead of “out of sight, out of mind,” you can see a list of titles. A little progress bar. A challenge you’re proud to celebrate. You’re gamifying the system, and wow, does it feel good.
Psychologists have long noted that our minds do not like open loops, unfinished mental threads that your brain keeps revisiting because they feel incomplete or unresolved. It’s called the Zeigarnik effect, and it’s why checking off a bullet point on your to-do list feels so satisfying.
Welcome to the gamification of reading: annual challenges, completion badges, public reviews, and community rankings leverage extrinsic rewards to supplement intrinsic motivation. Over time, your brain begins to associate reading with these tasty little rewards, and books start to feel smoother, lighter, and more enjoyable.
Rule 8: It’s okay to go a little faster
There is no moral virtue in reading slowly. Sure, it’s nice to sit with a sentence, to luxuriate in its prose as the language washes over you like a warm breeze.
But for audiobooks, a slightly faster pace can actually improve your sense of momentum. Your mind will wander less frequently because it has to pay attention to keep up. Many find that listening at 1.25x or 1.5x speed (approximately 225–275 words per minute) is the sweet spot. This is because the average audiobook reader takes their time. They enunciate, sometimes frustratingly so, at 150–160 words per minute—well below the typical adult’s listening comprehension.
But remember, there’s a delicate balance at play here. Do not jump to extremes. Play at the edges. Notice where you still feel present with the material. Let that be your guide.
Rule 9: Remove the “should I buy this?” option
Whenever someone recommends a book—in a conversation, on a podcast, in an article—and your brain goes, ‘Oh, that sounds good,” don’t think. Get your hands on it immediately. Buy it or download it on the spot.
Think about it, how many times have you been told about an excellent book…then did nothing about it? Life moved on, and the recommendation evaporated. Lost to the tabs, shuffled to the “saved for later” cart.
Decision fatigue, the progressive depletion of the brain’s capacity to make high-quality decisions after repeated choices, is real. By the end of the day, your brain is tired. Eliminating the decision about whether to buy a book removes friction at the exact moment you’re likely to balk. A fantastic book can lead to an entire new world: one good idea can shift a career, a relationship, and your connection to the universe.
Rule 10: You are a reader. Think of yourself as one
Stop calling yourself someone who “wants to read more” and start seeing yourself as a reader. You are a person for whom books are just a normal part of everyday life.
When researchers study habits, they keep finding the same thing: the story you tell yourself about who you are matters more than sheer willpower. How someone sees themselves (“who I am”) is a very strong predictor of whether they will change their behavior or keep going.
Reading works in this way. Once that story shifts, countless tiny decisions follow. If you believe you are a reader, reaching for a book in a spare moment feels natural. Suddenly, scrolling before bed feels off. A person who views themself as a reader will notice new ways to read: during a delay at the airport, a lunch break, or in the morning while drinking coffee; not because they’re forcing themselves to, but because that’s simply who they are.
Gently rewiring your reading life
Right now, your brain might be trained for short bursts of attention, quick hits of novelty, and constantly switching between tabs. It’s tired, and that makes starting a new chapter feel even more daunting.
But brains are pliable. They change in response to what we repeatedly do. Besides, this was never about hitting some impressive “books per year” quota. You’re taking back your time and filling it with an activity that’s actually nourishing.
A book on the nightstand replacing a phone. A reading app on the home screen. A lovely audiobook playing through your headphones as you vacuum your apartment or walk around the block. Together, these small actions steadily send a message to your mind: reading is safe, familiar, and rewarding. Over time, that message becomes a feeling.
And before you know it, you are not forcing yourself to read more.
You are simply living like someone who already does.
