Book Reading Challenges – Yay or Nay? - Sonali Dabade

Goodreads is a socializing site for bookworms, to put it in a nutshell. Anyone on there will know you can set your reading goal for every year and they call it the Goodreads Reading Challenge. It is one of the most popular book reading challenges. For example, you can set a goal of 12 books a year or 52 books a year, whatever you are comfortable with. And every time you finish a book, you can update it in Goodreads, which will update your count.

Book Reading Challenges – Before:

While millions of people undertake book reading challenges, it would be prudent to understand whether you will be comfortable with them before taking them up. The guidelines to participating in such challenges are not binding. It is more of staying true to yourself than anything else. But then, in today’s time and age, when living is becoming more of a battle, it is the impulsiveness that is treasured.

The Yay for Book Reading Challenges:

Book reading challenges are encouraging for people who want to improve their reading speed and skills. They are more or less like any resolutions that you make in your life, only less binding and less likely to have any consequences on your personal life. However, if you think about it, in a way, book reading does improve your personality and ultimately your way of life. For those who get excited by the thought of books and having reading marathons, these book reading challenges are exactly what they are named. Reading challenges give them a way to exceed their own expectations by setting goals and trying to reach them before the soft deadline. And if your TBR pile is sky-high and you are eager to polish it off, taking up one of the many book reading challenges could assist you in doing this.

The Nay for Book Reading Challenges:

On the other hand, if the very thought of putting a number to your reading fills you with dread, don’t take it up. It would be better off that way. For those readers who feel intimidated by book reading challenges and look upon it as a necessary compulsion, I have one thing to say: Don’t! Book reading challenges are not something that you force upon yourself despite your not wanting to. They are meant to keep you on track and boost your confidence. If they are doing the opposite by pressurizing and suffocating you, know that you don’t have to do it. Even if you have started on a challenge and don’t feel like doing it anymore, give it up. Listen to yourself. Nobody will judge you for doing so. Or, you can take the alternate route and forget all about the challenge. Every book that you read henceforth, update your list. But don’t look upon it as something you have to do. Update whatever you read. Who knows, by the end of your challenge, you’ll be closer to it than you expected. And what better a motivation than to know that you have exceeded your own expectations? Following this, you can either choose to continue your challenge for next year, or not. It travels back to the same point again – you do not have to force yourself to do this.

Yay or Nay? You Decide!

My advice would be: take up book reading challenges only if you are comfortable doing so. Even then, if you lose interest halfway through or think that you cannot go ahead, there is nothing to be lost. Nobody is going to judge you if you don’t participate in the book reading challenges.