Hey what’s going on guys.
Sorry It’s been so long since I’ve made a post, but a lot has happened. I’m now in Washington, USA. Moved back to America but in a completely new/foreign place to me, so the past couple of weeks have been a bit of a learning curve and I also didn’t have a computer (laptop) so I couldn’t really do much.
Anyway, I want to start working more on oikisama so I’m going to start by posting some stuff I already have ready, and I’m going to start with this.
Some swag advice for Reading with Kindle
Here’s a little AJATT tip I’ve got for anyone out there doing immersion based learning and uses a Kindle.
If you are a visual type of person or would rather just watch the video (which I probably would suggest. Then click the link above, or press play on the embedded video :3)
YO send on the tip fam.
Alright Alright, I gotchu bruv
So when you’re reading on Kindle, by default, a number of things show up on the screen.
Normally at the top is the time, then at the bottom right you got the percent.
and finally on the left you have either line count or time left to finish either the book or the chapter.
Somethin like this
Now of course you can change this to whatever you want, and even turn them all off so that they won’t show up on the screen anymore.
Whiiiich, is actually what I would recommend you to do and is the main idea of this tip.
Alright so lissen ye
Make your Kindle look like this:
Why shouldn’t you leave all the other shit on your screen?
Well to put it shortly…
Flow
You see, In psychology there’s a state of mind called the “Flow State”
I’m sure you’ve heard of it.
The flow state is when you’re so impeccably focused on what you’re doing that everything else seems to disappear and you become fully immersed in what you’re doing.
What the hell does that have to do with reading on my Kindle?
Well, its simple.
In my personal belief when you have the time sticking up on the top, the percent on the bottom right, and the line count/how long you have left to finish the book/chapter on the bottom left, you put your self in a situation where its very hard to stay focused, and therefor nearly impossible to get into the “flow state”
Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t the only reason, but I believe this is a very important and useful thing to realise.
If you’ve ever had the experience of being in the “flow state” you know that you seem to almost forget about time completely and the next thing you know however many hours have passed and you didn’t even realize it.
So by that same logic, the more distractions you have around you (and yes, the time is a distraction), the less likely you are going to get into this “flow” state.
Why do you want to be in the “flow state”
Because its fuckin awesome.
Ever had a time when you felt so productive, so active, so focused and determined, that you actually felt satisfied and happy with yourself?
Well, that’s what happens when you get in this Flow State.
Not to mention, your efficiency and also the quality of the activity you’re participating in (in this case, reading) , might as well have been duplicated, because that’s what it feels like.
If you watch/watched the video you’d know. But I reference a time where I was in the flow state while reading.
I was sat outside having a cup of tea reading this book I was really into about lucid dreaming called 無敵の明晰夢
and I was listening to this album from this Japanese instrumental artists whom I really like :
Swag Music Listen to only if you too are Indeed Swag
and before I knew it…
3 hours had gone by and I had finished reading the entire book.
Albeit I had already read maybe 20 % or something before I started reading, but still. Within a few hours (without me realizing it at all) I had finished the entire book in one sitting. Why? Because I was able to enter the state of Flow and maintain that state due to the little to no distractions that I allowed my self.
You don’t need to know the time.
Think about it, if you’re really interested in something and want to fully indulge yourself in it (in this case, reading), why look at the clock?
Its pointless.
All its going to do is make you conscious of how long you’ve reading, and it’s going to make you dwell the activity as a whole.
Stop setting goals for your self
I don’t know if you’re anything like me, but if you are. Then you might use the percent at the bottom right :
to set imaginary goals for yourself while you’re reading.
what I used to do all the time was tell my self “okay, I’m not going to stop reading until I get to this percent”, or “5 more % and I’ll be set” or something like this.
In my opinion, this isn’t good.
When you’re reading, or doing anything. The best way to get fully immersed into what you’re doing is to be generally and intrinsically interested in the exact activity you’re participating in.
If you were truly motivated to read/and or (were) actually interested in what you were reading, you don’t need any arbitrary motivation. All you need is the intent.
I want to read, therefore I’m going to read.
I like this book, therefore I’m going to read more.
It’s as simple as this.
Sometimes by setting these arbitrary goals for yourself, you are actually making yourself prone to “burn out” or dislike the sensation of reading, even if you actually LIKE to read.
For example, I would force my self to read 5-10 more % of the book I was reading even though I already felt like I had read a lot and wasn’t really interested/enjoying the time spent reading anymore
Then, even if I was able to meet my goals and finish the extra 5-10% the actual sensation, how I felt whilst I was reading, was complete and utter shit. Not to mention the quality of what I would’ve actually gotten out of that extra 20-30min or so of reading would’ve nearly nothing.
The opposite of this is also true. Sometimes these arbitrary goals can actually be TOO easy, in that, you finish 10% like you had originally sought out to and so you then stopped reading, even if you felt like “oh wait, I could actually read way more”.
All in all, setting goals for your self is only going to make the process much more slow and painful and there’s little to no benefit.
How to turn off the Time/Percent/Line Count etc.
The easy answer:
For turning off the time
Bottom left
If you press the very bottom left of the screen while you’re reading you can filter through all the different options of things to show, and even turn the time off completely (at least on Kindle Paperwhite)
For turning off the time at the top and everything else:
When you’re reading, if you click the top area on the screen you can see
and Icon that looks like this Aa (two A’s)
If you click on that you can go through and change all the settings, including font, size, orientation, and of course, whether to show the time or not.
In Conclusion
I know this is a small tip, and some people might even think it’s insignificant or maybe you already realized this and have been reading like this, in which case, good job, but I still figured I should make this as its helped me out and I do think its useful.
I hope you benefited from this in someway shape or form, and I appreciate anyone out there who reads this :))) <3
