How nonfiction books changed my life.
Books changed my life. They can change yours too.
Let me explain:
From the beginning
From nonfiction reading, you learn, and I'm not counting the fiction "lessons learned". I mean true learning about the real world. Still, not all nonfiction books are created equal, and so to have the vocabulary for the rest of the post I'm defining a nonfiction book (for this post) as a book that immediately affects your real-world actions and experiences. I know this is kind of like the definition for self-help books, but it's different for reasons you'll see later.
Why is this?
What else do nonfiction books do?
- Education.
- The fact that nonfiction books can be boring.
- YouTube- constant video stimulation. Even on just YouTube, you get so many dopamine-driven activities that all compete with each other; only the most dopamine-driving activities are the ones you see. If there's one video that's not stimulating enough you've got 20 other options, all of which competed with other options and had to be more stimulating than all other videos, to choose from.
- Fake social connection- You understand why social media isn't an actual social connection. Even if you use social media in the "best way possible"- text messaging and "communicating" with friends- you're still not actually communicating- an idea supported by many more studies that I'm not going to find.
- Reproduction- The need for love and intimacy is necessary for any human. Just look at Maslow's Hierarchy: he places it alongside breathing, food, and water!
Since nonfiction books don't stimulate dopamine they actively contribute to the opposite: managed dopamine. Now, remember that medication that stopped dopamine unnaturally? One of the biggest interest points of dopamine is that while this unnatural stopping can cause serious side effects, if you regularly don't stimulate yourself with as much dopamine your life just goes up and up and up, explaining my dramatic happiness increase.
Essentially, nonfiction books don't stimulate dopamine, increasing your happiness and productivity.
Ryan Dempsy on Medium attempted a dopamine detox- abstaining from extremely dopamine-stimulating activities- for 1 month. His results:
"I have gotten clearer, this month, on what my direction in life is. I’m still not 100% but I’m working on it. When I cut the distractions, I noticed where my attention was pulled. I have worked in Finance, Accounting and currently English teaching.
None of these things are my real interests or what I want to spend my life doing. I realized that what I really care about is why we do the things we do. I find it fascinating how we process what is going on in life. How some people love their life and other people are miserable.
There are certain things that we can do to make our lives more fulfilling and, for me, this is the most important thing. That is why I started writing and making videos. I wanted to direct this new-found energy in the direction I find most interesting.
I also applied for a master’s program in psychology, to move my career in a direction that is more aligned with my strengths and interests. This was only made possible by cutting out the distractions."
"My personal belief system believes that our natural state of being is one of happiness, contentment and connection. In our society we are seeing rising numbers of people who are unhappy, discontent and feeling disconnected and lonely.
I believe this is because we get in our own way. We don’t allow ourselves the time or space to process what is going on around us because we always think we need to be doing something. If we just cut the distractions for a while, we can process the world around us and let the mind settle down."
But the benefit from reading nonfiction books increases with another key aspect nonfiction brings:
Education.
There's a very big difference between real education and classroom-education and oftentimes people are confused between the two. Real education is education that serves you for life, it's education you're supposed to learn in the real world because you use it in the real world. If you can get enough real education, you're going to be much more successful than somebody who got decades of classroom-education.
You're supposed to be able to learn real education only in the real world, but guess what allows you to learn it super quick and easy?
That's right. Nonfiction.
Imagine being able to learn a lifetime of experience, decades of expertise, in a short few hours. That's the beauty of nonfiction. It just provides so much education!
Let me give a few examples of skills you can learn with nonfiction and for some of these skills, I'll give specific books that address them:
- How to negotiate- Never Split the Difference
- How to get a 4-hour work week and get paid 4x as much- The 4-Hour Work Week
- How to improve your social life- How to Win Friends & Influence People
- How to goal-set and think big- The Magic of Thinking Big
- How to change your routine and what you do every day- Atomic Habits
- How to prioritize and not care what others think- The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F***
- How to earn more money- The Millionaire Fastlane, Every single Robert Kiyasoki book, Think and Grow Rich
- How to reframe your mind to be tougher- Can't Hurt Me
- How to be more at peace with yourself- Think Like A Monk
- What habits you should do- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
- How to live your life based on past actions and current principles- Every religious book (The Bible, Quran, Agamas, Vedas, Tanakh
- How to parent based on past traditions- Hunt, Gather, Parent
- How to find your passion- Your Blue Flame
- How to take action and achieve spiritual success- The Power of Now
- How to account for big decisions in your life- The Big No
- How to take control of your life and set boundaries- Boundaries
- Relationship advice- The 5 Love Languages, Us: Getting Past You and Me to Build a More Loving Relationship
- How to achieve more work in less time- Deep Work
- How to grow your online business- Dot Com Secrets
- How to manage your time- Tiny Habits, The 5AM Club, Eat that Frog!
- Setting foundational rules for life- 12 Rules for Life
- How to be more successful- every book on this list + The Power of One More
- Living in the arctic tundra- We Die Alone
- How to declutter your kitchen- Decluttering Your Kitchen in 5 Easy Steps
DO YOU SEE THIS? I know I always say this when I make lists, but this is only a fraction of the true list. What even is this "true list" I always talk about anyways? That's an introspective question for later.
Back to the topic- there are so many things you can learn from nonfiction books. It's education at its finest. Now, the main piece of advice I hold for nonfiction books is that, although you should try to, you don't have to memorize every lesson from every book. You need to develop a general understanding of what actions you need to take.
Nonfiction reading provides so much education, it's THE reason self-change exists and self-learning exists. Think of nonfiction reading as Khan Academy on steroids, you can change your life and get a school-level education for free and in 11 years less time.
I understand that my use of nonfiction can be kind of related to self-help but, just to clarify, there are many non-self-help nonfiction books that can truly change a life.
Nonfiction books' educational value is truly something. I mean, look at all of the skills you can learn, the way of life you can cultivate to become something amazing! Nonfiction education truly is a treasure.
Thank you so much for reading this post and have a great day!
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