My free time is a constant battle between reading more, and reading less.

There is so much content out there that I’m interested in. Authors, bloggers, reporters, TV shows, movies, YouTube videos, musicians, etc. It’s an ongoing joke among my friends that I always have too many browser windows open, and that’s because there’s always so much I want to absorb. My RSS is full of content that I’ll never get to. I have to wipe it periodically to avoid the guilt.

That’s the other side. It’s when I mark my RSS feeds as all read, or even delete some of them. It’s when I abandon a site I’ve been following for a long time, put aside a book I’m not enjoying, drop a TV show that’s a slog to get through, or close an article that isn’t worth reading. Yin and yang, push and pull – it’s always a battle.

Nowadays I try to lean towards less, with the exception of anime, where I still feel like I have a responsibility to be well-versed. This has resulted in less variety in what I read, and I recognize that. Sometimes I have to go out and seek new sources just so my worldview doesn’t grow stagnant. I try to do that less than I feel is necessary, though. I have more important things to do.

Time is valuable. It’s the ultimate finite resource, and the only one we’ll never get back if we squander it. I enjoy reading and learning, but there has to be time for working and doing.

Read more or less. Whatever you decide, decide. But whatever you do, try not to get so wrapped up in consuming media that it becomes an item on your to-do list. That’s probably a bad sign.