New Year’s Resolutions

It’s been awhile.

The last 18 months have not – for reasons that I don’t think need any clarification – been easy. As it became clear it was much more of a marathon than a sprint, and combined with some quarantines and isolations, I sort of buried myself in work and lost my pleasure in reading. Which I previously didn’t even think was possible, but there were months (even months in a row) where I just couldn’t finish a book. I would pick up the book every evening, as is my custom, and then just drop it again, with one page read, or maybe two of it was a good night. I was just feeling tired, I think, and Netflix or some simple games at the time felt like a better way to unwind after yet another busy day.

It was actually not until at the end of the year, I was confronted with a reading challenge that I had started at the beginning of the year with a couple of friends that was on the verge of utter failure now that my – normally quite substantial – reading had fallen away. So, I decided to give it one more try. Despite only finishing a single book in the month up to the Christmas holidays, I decided to read the remainder of my challenge pledge (which was another 15 books) over the holidays (December 22 – December 31). My friends must have thought I might have finally lost it, since my total for the year at that time was just about 60 books. So, I planned to fit 20% of my yearly reading in just over one week. In the biggest reading slump of my life. It was potentially a recipe for massive failure.

Outwardly, I presented with confidence as I am known to do a last hurrah in the final week of December. On the inside, however, I was having some serious doubts. It was not like I had not tried to read in the previous months, to no avail. But as we like to say, a challenge would not be a challenge if it is not a challenge, so I set out and gave it a try. Only one condition for the books, they needed to fit my ROOT (Read Our Own Tomes) challenge (obtained prior to the start of 2021). Before going through some stats, let’s just say it was a blast. It was much better than anticipated, I finished with a couple of hours to spare, and most importantly I’m back to reading it seems. I can’t start to express how happy this is making me.

And these were the books that helped me a) complete the challange and b) start reading again:

Making reading plans for the next year (coming in a next blog), looking for new books to read or maybe finally clearing some books from the shelves… And, last but not least, also taking up the blogging again. Books are fun, but it is so much more fun when you can share it with others. So, I would like to apologize for my long absence and hope you won’t mind me bothering you with some more bookish posts in the new year!

Best wishes to all! May your wishes come true and may you find only the good books in 2022!