0:05 if i tell you right now that reading is
0:07 good as you probably have heard from
0:10 years growing up for your parents or
0:11 your teachers
0:13 will you agree with me
0:15 most likely right
0:17 so most of us know that reading is good
0:18 for us
0:20 so why is it that we aren't always
0:22 carrying around a book with us like we
0:24 would to something that's supposed to be
0:26 good for us
0:28 well i'm really not here to criticize
0:31 you for not doing so i myself think that
0:33 not everybody has to do that to prove
0:38 let me tell you about my experience with reading
0:39 reading
0:42 growing up i've always loved it i used
0:43 to read
0:46 magazines fairy tales comic books back
0:48 when i was a kid
0:51 back in secondary school i would read
0:54 novels and science books
0:56 then came the peak of my so-called
0:59 reading career in grade 7 where i was
1:01 doubling up the quantity of books i was
1:04 reading and at the same time i became
1:08 extremely selective with what i read
1:10 actually to tell you the truth
1:13 being selective is what i read is just a
1:15 fancy way to cover up the real thing
1:17 that happened back then which is me
1:19 wasting a lot of time questioning
1:22 whether or not i should pick up a book
1:24 let me just describe to you exactly what
1:26 was happening back then i
1:28 i
1:30 stood in front of a stack of books like this
1:30 this
1:32 and i would think well
1:34 if i read this book is that going to
1:36 help me solve my homework no
1:39 then i'm not going to read it
1:41 and i call that being selective because
1:43 i thought that was good but
1:44 but
1:46 eventually i realized that i was not
1:48 being productive at all and i started
1:50 asking myself why
1:52 because i was doing something that was
1:54 supposed to be good which was being selective
1:55 selective
1:57 but then i ended up wasting time instead
2:03 so after
2:05 years of observing and you know
2:08 reflecting on what i did back then i
2:10 have come to notice something in
2:12 teenagers that i would like to call the
2:16 skepticism in the power of reading
2:17 so what is skepticism in the power of
2:20 reading to me
2:22 i would like to define my
2:26 definition of skepticism in reading as
2:28 having doubts in the process of reading or
2:29 or
2:32 thinking of reading as a means to solve
2:34 an immediate problem
2:36 so for this type of skepticism of
2:39 reading or over practical approach to
2:41 reading i classify these people into two types
2:42 types
2:44 the first type are the people who never
2:46 really give reading a chance because
2:48 they cannot possibly think of how
2:51 reading can help them in any way
2:53 the second type of people are those who
2:55 have actually had fierce beliefs in the
2:57 power of books but after not seeing
3:00 themselves getting instant results
3:02 they give up and their belief is
3:05 shattered into strong disbelief
3:06 for both of these types there are some
3:08 mindset shifts that they're going to
3:11 have to make in order to break free from
3:18 now let us get started with the first
3:21 type the over practical
3:24 these people are those who spend time
3:26 sitting to convince themselves that
3:28 reading cannot possibly help them get
3:31 better in any way
3:33 they cannot see how reading this book is
3:35 going to make their lives immediately
3:38 better for example if i'm having this
3:39 really difficult math homework and
3:41 reading this book is not going to help
3:43 then i'm not going to do it
3:47 that is the mindset of people in type 1.
3:49 now if you ask these people if they
3:51 think reading is good
3:53 they're really likely to say yes so they
3:55 do think that reading is good
3:58 but easier said than done they only look
4:00 at the short-term benefits of reading
4:02 which is how it's going to benefit them today
4:03 today
4:05 tomorrow or the day after tomorrow to
4:07 which they do not see any possibility of
4:10 what they read changing anything
4:12 don't get me wrong though these people
4:15 are not lazy in fact on the bright side
4:17 they may be someone who is extremely
4:19 result oriented and particular with what
4:21 they spend their time on
4:24 however as they think of reading as a
4:26 means to solve an immediate problem or
4:28 simply consider it as temporary motivation
4:29 motivation
4:31 they start questioning the process of
4:34 reading if it doesn't actually help them
4:37 for example to solve their homework
4:39 i have been in this position to be
4:40 honest with you
4:42 and while you may think that
4:44 well why is it so hard to convince these
4:46 people to maybe just give reading a chance
4:47 chance
4:49 it's really not that easy
4:50 let me just play it out how a
4:53 conversation with this type of person
4:54 would go
4:57 you would tell them why is it so hard
4:59 just to try reading to see if it works
5:00 for you
5:04 them with their super logic would say
5:06 would you study literature to get better
5:07 at math
5:09 obviously you're not going to study
5:11 literature to get better at math right
5:13 and that is their logic if it doesn't
5:16 help me solve my homework if it doesn't
5:18 help me get better at school immediately
5:21 why should i waste hours on it
5:24 so now moving on to the next type which
5:26 is the disbelievers
5:28 these people are interesting as in they
5:30 used to have strong beliefs in books
5:32 they used to be the ones like me
5:34 standing here right now telling you that
5:36 reading is good
5:38 but the thing is after reading several
5:40 times and not seeing themselves turning
5:42 into geniuses overnight
5:43 they give up
5:46 they lose the motivation
5:48 so for this type of people the problem
5:51 really isn't with their expectations for
5:54 results because as leaders we should
5:56 always expect an outcome to come out of
5:59 everything that we do
6:01 the problem is with their degree of
6:03 expectations that they set for their results
6:04 results
6:06 when you read something and you expect
6:08 results to come overnight in reality it
6:10 doesn't turn out that way it can be
6:12 extremely discouraging and even frustrating
6:13 frustrating
6:15 so therefore no matter how strong your
6:18 initial belief in books were
6:20 you eventually just stop believing in
6:22 them and then you refuse by what you
6:24 consider a package of waste of time and
6:27 energy along with a complimentary gift
6:29 of disappointment ever again and that's
6:31 how we arrive at the second type of people
6:35 now
6:36 for both types there are some
6:39 realizations that they are going to have
6:42 to make in order to break themselves
6:44 free from these limiting beliefs
6:46 the problem with type 1 is that they
6:48 limit themselves to only what they think
6:49 can happen
6:52 for example if i'm reading this book i
6:54 need to know exactly how it's going to
6:56 benefit me and i need to see that scenario
6:58 scenario
7:00 but really among the many things that we
7:04 can predict what happens to us failures
7:06 and especially opportunities
7:08 is not one of them
7:10 you should not be overly worried about
7:12 how what you read today will benefit you
7:15 tomorrow and be overly attached to how
7:18 exactly that will play out because we
7:19 don't know
7:21 i know that right now you have the
7:24 energy the time the curiosity to learn
7:26 i don't know if that also holds true for
7:32 back when i was having this problem as well
7:32 well
7:34 there was this story
7:37 that really inspired me to maybe step
7:39 out of my comfort zone to test this
7:41 theory out
7:43 it's a story about steve jobs i came
7:45 across so we know who steve jobs is
7:47 right hello iphone users
7:52 he is the ceo and founder of apple and
7:53 and
7:55 i mean this guy we all know that he is
7:57 really good right he graduated from stanford
7:58 stanford
8:03 he is one of the geniuses that we know
8:06 we know that he runs apple so basically
8:08 he does what has to do with information
8:10 technology and business so we would
8:13 expect a person like this to be stuffed
8:15 with knowledge from business books and
8:17 books on i.t
8:20 but back in university
8:24 he took a calligraphy class just for fun
8:27 so what calligraphy is basically to put
8:30 it simply the art of writing fancy
8:33 letters that you can see in
8:34 cards and birthday cards you know what
8:36 i'm talking about
8:38 he took it just for fun
8:41 and personally for me i would never
8:43 imagine a way calligraphy would help
8:45 with someone who is doing business in
8:47 information and technology
8:49 and maybe he didn't know how that would
8:50 help either
8:52 but eventually
8:54 his knowledge on calligraphy the
8:55 knowledge that he took from that
8:57 calligraphy class
8:59 came into use when he was designing the
9:03 interface for the macbook
9:05 this story really inspired me to maybe
9:07 try out and stop doubting so much of
9:09 whether or not what i'm learning now
9:13 will come to use in the future
9:15 and i've now i've come to learn that
9:17 every single piece of knowledge that you
9:18 are taking in
9:20 will come back to help you at one point
9:21 in your life
9:24 especially when you least expect it
9:27 that is why you should stop doubting so
9:28 much about whether or not you should
9:30 learn something
9:32 be selective with your time but don't be
9:33 so doubtful that you're wasting your
9:36 energy on it
9:38 there's this quote from the book the
9:41 course to be disliked by ichiro kishimi
9:44 and fumitakikoga that i really love
9:47 it is it is about the future as you can
9:49 see on the slide right here
9:50 the lives that lies ahead of you is a
9:53 completely blank page and there is no
9:54 chat that has been laid out for you to follow
9:55 follow
9:57 there is no story there
10:00 i don't want you to be overly obsessed
10:01 with how the future will play out that
10:04 you waste so much of your present time
10:07 doubting instead of being productive
10:09 i don't want you to be worried about
10:11 opportunities not coming
10:13 the question that i want you to ask
10:15 yourself is
10:18 when these opportunities you want come
10:20 are you going to be are you going to be
10:27 now moving on to the second type
10:30 these people are those who
10:33 disbelieve in book just because success
10:36 does not come overnight and they fail to
10:38 realize that
10:40 now i also have my personal story with this
10:40 this
10:42 back in grade 8
10:45 i was kind of bad at math
10:47 there was this geometry test where score
10:48 pretty low
10:51 i didn't like that at all so i came home
10:54 i found a geometry book that i would
10:56 read and i expected myself to become
10:58 genius immediately next week
11:00 the following week there was a test
11:01 i did it
11:04 the score got returned it wasn't a lot better
11:05 better
11:08 the week afterward i also did a test
11:10 it also didn't get a lot better than the
11:11 previous one
11:14 so then i came home and i was like yo
11:16 you see obviously reading this book is
11:18 not gonna help because i wasn't even
11:20 reading on the topic that i was doing at
11:22 school back then so i just threw it
11:24 aside and told myself that you know next
11:26 time if i score low on a test just don't
11:30 count to extra reading it doesn't help
11:31 well life really loved throwing
11:33 surprises at us
11:36 right the following semester at school
11:38 we did every single thing that i had
11:41 previously read on
11:43 now it took me an
11:45 entire semester for what i read to be
11:48 useful and it could have been any time frame
11:49 frame
11:50 three months
11:53 six months even a year
11:55 don't set your expectations too high unrealistic
11:56 unrealistic
11:58 think of reading as a process of
12:00 layering your knowledge building layer
12:02 after layer until you're competent
12:04 enough that opportunities start coming
12:06 to you
12:08 i've heard the saying although i don't
12:10 exactly remember where i heard it
12:12 but when you're competent enough what
12:15 you want the opportunities the people
12:18 the networks they will all start coming
12:21 to you your job is not to predict your
12:23 job is to get yourself prepared and
12:26 ready to take those opportunities when
12:32 now just to sum it up you may find
12:34 yourself in one of these two types i
12:36 talked about
12:38 maybe you are just hesitating a lot to
12:40 pick up a book because you cannot
12:43 convince yourself how it's going to help you
12:43 you
12:46 or maybe you have had strong beliefs in
12:48 them but eventually you get disappointed
12:51 because they didn't give you results as
12:53 fast as you expected
12:55 the solution i would like to propose
12:56 here for you
12:58 the first and hardest thing that you are
13:00 going to have to do
13:02 is to shift your mindset
13:04 you need to shift your mindset from the
13:06 mindset of doubting questioning
13:07 questioning
13:11 and over worrying about the future
13:13 to the mindset of learning and focusing
13:17 on the task at hand which is reading
13:19 when you're too busy focusing on
13:21 doubting and questioning which isn't
13:22 really productive
13:24 you're actually going to miss out on a
13:26 lot of knowledge that you should be
13:28 acquiring from reading
13:30 now if you're comfortable with the idea
13:33 of doing a lot of seemingly irrelevant
13:36 reading then you can start small give
13:38 yourself a time frame of maybe three or
13:41 six months and then every month include
13:44 a book that is of the topic that you
13:46 have never read on before
13:48 start with something that may be
13:49 relevant to you maybe start something
13:51 that is in the field of study you intend
13:54 to go for later on
13:56 then every month just try to step out of
13:59 your comfort zone as you go along pick a
14:01 book of a field that you've never tried
14:03 before of something that you've always
14:04 been interested in but you think that
14:07 have nothing to do with you
14:09 i want you to think of this as stepping
14:11 out of your comfort zone
14:13 you don't know if what i'm saying is
14:15 true or not and i do not encourage
14:17 anyone to blindly believe the words of someone
14:19 someone
14:20 until you have actually experienced it yourself
14:22 yourself
14:24 so i would like to invite you to try
14:27 this and see if it works for you
14:29 maybe you'll find that reading is
14:31 actually great and you regret not having
14:34 started it earlier or maybe you would
14:36 just once again confirm that i'm not
14:38 telling the truth at all and it doesn't
14:39 work for you
14:41 either way you're not going to regret
14:43 having seeked out the answer because
14:45 this is stepping out of your comfort
14:47 zone to try out something that you've
14:48 never tried before
14:51 this is seeking the ques the answers for
14:53 the questions that you have and that is
14:56 what leaders do they have to seek
14:57 the answers for the questions that
15:00 nobody else has the courage to go seek for
15:02 for
15:03 either way
15:07 you doing something to test it out
15:09 into the unknown stepping out of your
15:11 comfort zone is really recognizable already
15:13 already
15:15 but if you're the one who's holding
15:16 yourself back
15:18 from receiving the benefits of reading
15:20 that it can bring to you
15:22 now is the time for you to step up from
15:24 these limiting beliefs and become the
15:26 leaders that you have the potentials to be
15:27 be
15:29 thank you [Applause]
