The surgical reading strategy: How to get more out of books (by reading less)
We all must do a ton of reading to reach our goals. However, a LOT of that reading is wasted. How can we reduce the waste and have more time to get things done? That’s the subject of this week’s article.
In 1927, Gloria Swanson, a Hollywood starlet, was offered a million dollar movie contract. She turned it down.
When asked why, she said, "I would have been the second or third person in movie history to sign a million dollar contract, but I was the very first to turn one down."
This quote made headlines around the world and added to her fame. Swanson’s example is a paradox in action. By saying no, she achieved more.
There are other times when we achieve more with a simple no. One of those areas concerns reading. But how can we learn more by reading less? We do that by practicing surgical reading.
So, what exactly is surgical reading?
It’s reading only what you need to reach your goals or solve your problems. It’s surgical because we are often cutting out all the stuff we don’t need and keeping the rest. This doesn’t apply to the novel you’d leisurely read on the beach. It’s a strategy most suited for non-fiction we read to improve our work and our lives.
Surgical reading ensures that you apply what you read.
It prevents you from wasting time on books that won’t help you make progress in important areas of your life. Most people feel pressured to keep reading a book even if they know most of the ideas or it turns out to be otherwise unhelpful. Surgical readers, don’t do this.
We stop reading anything that is unhelpful.
We don’t feel obligated to finish a book just because we started it. We don’t complete an article just because we are halfway through. We may have paid our money but we don’t have to spend any more time unless we’re getting value.
How do you do surgical reading?
To practice surgical reading it’s helpful to start with the following three steps. Once you get the hang of them, you won’t need steps since you’ll have freed yourself from the curse of obligatory reading.
Here are the steps.
1) Know your goals or problems. That means you have to have set goals and have identified obstacles to reaching them. Without this awareness, it’s hard to do the next step.
2) Skim the book for information related to your goals/problems. This often means looking through the table of contents and maybe reading the introduction, too. That gives you what you need for the next step.
3) Filter. Only read that which helps achieve a goal, solve a problem or overcome an obstacle. If it doesn’t pass that test skip it. And this applies to each section of a book, too. There’s no need to read 200 pages if only one chapter helps you accomplish your goal.
What does this look like in real life?
Earlier this year, I used surgical reading with The PARA Method by Tiago Forte. The book teaches a system for organizing all your digital information using four folders. I’d already implemented the system myself before reading the book.
Then why read it?
I intended to teach a group of people how to use PARA in online workshops and I wanted to see what I could learn that might help me better accomplish that goal.
I read the table of contents and saw the book had 15 chapters. I decided to skip the two introductory chapters and focus my reading on these three:
- Chapter 3: The Sixty-Second PARA Setup Guide.
- Chapter 4: Five Key Tips for Making Organizing Easy.
- Chapter 5: How to Maintain Your PARA System.
Each of these chapters teaches an element that I feel beginners should learn early when organizing their digital information. Reading them took little time and was extremely helpful in creating my workshops. The rest of the book would have just taken up extra time without helping me reach the goal.
But should all my non-fiction reading be so goal-focused?
In short, no. I read Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond just because I love understanding history. My teacher, Sean D’Souza, read Morgan Housel’s book The Psychology of Money even though the information was not new to him. He loved the book because it was so artfully written.
Just be clear when you’re reading for entertainment and when you’re reading to improve your performance. When there’s a goal, read surgically. When you want to relax, just read leisurely.
But if I read surgically, won’t I miss out on a nugget of insight in the part of a book I don't read?
Maybe, but imagine all the nuggets you’ll miss out on by spending too much time on book after book after book. Information is not scarce in today’s world. You’ll have more than one chance to find the information that you need. Don’t force yourself to finish a book with little value in the hopes you find one tasty morsel.
To sum up
Surgical reading is reading focused on helping you reach goals and solve problems. It’s surgical because we cut out everything we don’t need and keep the rest.
Surgical reading gives you more time to apply what you’ve read and to put your energy into more useful reading.
It doesn’t apply to any reading you do for interest or fun.
We were all taught to finish what we start. As we’ve seen, that may not be the best strategy when it comes to reading. Sometimes, it’s better to be a bit like Gloria Swanson and say “no.” That way, we are able to pursue greater opportunities for learning.
Next step
With all the knowledge you gain from surgical reading, you might start to think, “How can I package my insights in the form of a course?”
To do that, you must first develop a Winning Course Idea. But creating course ideas, let alone good ones, is far from obvious. You want to create something that will sell, help others and which you feel proud to create. Learn how to do that in my article “How to Create a Winning Course Idea.”