Reading
for Personal Development
Reading is
perhaps the most influential of the communication skills in the development of
the individual. Reading, like listening, is a receptive communication skill. It
is done by consciously inputting information into one’s consciousness through
the eyes and the brain. The more of it you do, the better, improved, enhanced,
and versatile you will become.
There is no
way we can talk about reading in isolation of books. Books are the main objects
in a reading exercise, and a very important one too. Explaining the role of the
book in attaining development of any kind, Dr. Alex Ekwueme, cited by Adesanoye
(1995:2), says:
In as much as
education is the backbone of… development, and the book is the principal
element in the educational process, the book deserves a place of honour in
our…(personal) priorities. The book is a passport to the world, an
indispensable vehicle of science, a storehouse and conveyor of culture and
information, and a vital ingredient for development. The importance of books in
the development of man and in the fulfilment of his potential can never,
therefore, be overstressed.
It is a popular saying that “readers are leaders”.
Therefore, anyone who desires to build a life of prominence must cultivate the
habit of reading. Someone, somewhere has documented in a book all you need to
succeed in life or solve a particular problem. The onus, therefore, lies on you
to seek the relevant publications that address your issues, read and apply
their principles. To underscore this position, Rohn (2005b) says:
All
of the books that we will ever need to make us as rich, as healthy, as happy,
as powerful, as sophisticated and as successful as we want to be have already
been written.
People
from all walks of life, people with some of the most incredible life
experiences, people that have gone from pennies to fortune and from failure to
success have taken the time to write down their experience so that we can be
inspired by it [sic], and instructed by it [sic], and so that we can amend our
philosophy by it [sic]. Their contributions enable us to reset our sail based
upon their experiences. They have handed us the gift of their insights so that
we can arrange our plans, if need be, in order to avoid their errors. We can
rearrange our lives based on their wise advice.
However, it is
unfortunate that most people do not read except they are compelled to, usually
for academic reasons. The reading culture, especially in this part of the
world, is at the lowest ebb. People place more importance on other activities
rather than reading. It is in this part of the world that we have many literate
illiterates. These are people who can amply be described by the aphorism that
says “he who does not read has no advantage over him who cannot read”.
Illiteracy consists not only in the inability to read and write alone, rather,
a person who can read and write but who do not put these skills to use is as
illiterate as the one who cannot.
Commenting on
the phenomenon of bad reading culture, Rohn (2005b) says:
The
issue is not that books are too expensive! If a person concludes that the price
of the book is too great, wait until he must pay the price for not buying
it. Wait until he receives the bill for
continued and prolonged ignorance.
There
is very little difference between someone who cannot read and someone who will
not read. The result of either is
ignorance. Those who are serious seekers
of personal development must remove the self-imposed limitations they have placed
on their reading skills and their reading habit.
Proffering a
solution to reverse the trend of deficient reading culture among people across
the world, Carson (1991:203) a world renowned neurosurgeon and author says:
The
biggest reason most people have trouble reading is that they do not do enough
of it- and they do not do it fast enough…
What
is true of many things in life is definitely true of reading: the more you do
it, the easier it gets. And the easier it gets, the more efficiently you can
extract relevant data from the printed page – not just breadth of information
but also depth.
With this background on the essence of reading, let us
now go on to see how we can utilize this skill for different forms of personal
development.
