reading for retention: twice is better than once

I’ve always been a good reader.  By ‘good’ I mean quick and efficent.  When interested in the material (aka motivated by it) I finish books fast and typically remember key points, characters and plot lines for years.

This is fine for fiction, but over the last year and a half I’ve been doing massive amounts of research, primarily into the “science” of socializing. There is so much information I wish to internalize and retain, that I can’t take chances forgetting something important.

My solution has been creating ‘Cash notes’ after the fact.  This involves annotating key points with those tiny neon post-it flags and then transcribing everything into my computer when I’ve completed the book.

This allows me to condense the 300 page tomes into a much more digestible 5 or 6 pages of typed notes.

Sadly, this has proven hit or miss for one reason:  going overboard.  I tend to hyper-annotate to the point of madness.  A perfect example would be Robert Green’s “The Art of Seduction“.  Perhaps the most seminal work on the subject of maintaining satisfying (re: not boring) relationships ever written, I was eager to absorb every drop of wisdom.

The result?  Close to 100 post-it flags; many referencing entire passages.  I gave up my transcription 4 full pages of notes later, knowing I’d barely made a dent.

Enter my first book review for Urban Monarch.

As mentioned prior, Timothy Ferriss’ brilliant expose on liberating yourself from the corporate grind “The 4 Hour Workweek” arrived at UM headquarters several weeks ago and after Greg handed it off to me I began racing through it.  At first, I planned on following my conventional “Cash notes” strategy for doing my review.  Two chapters in I found myself having so much fun reading it I didn’t want any distractions, especially of the post-it flag variety.

I finished it in record time, spending just a few hours total (the book is close to 300 pages).  Equal parts exhausted and excited at the inspiration within, I knew I’d need another go around to do my review.

So I’m reading it a second time.  I’m half way through the book, and thus far have just 14 flags in use.

The reason is simple; familiarity with the material has allowed me to flag only the TRULY important things I plan to use in my review.

Not only that, but I was able to sit back and ENJOY the first reading, rather than treating it like a text book. 

Lesson learned.