What Is Fake Reading Syndrome And How To Deal With It?

The fake reading syndrome, although not an actual disorder or medical condition, is a state of being that afflicts many readers. It’s basically characterized by skimming over books in a way that enables you to finish reading quickly without absorbing anything. You may either read parts without processing or truly understanding them, or may skip parts entirely. Regardless, here we will discuss what is fake reading syndrome and how to deal with it?

Highlight and annotate books

Highlighting, annotating and keeping copious notes about the book you read can force you to be present in the moment while reading them. Your attention is unlikely to waver if you know you need to take in every word meaningfully and make sense of it mentally. It will also ground you within the fictional world of the book and enhance the experience.

Refrain from doing anything else while reading

Multitasking while reading may sound like a great way to work and practice a hobby but it is probably not very productive. It’s likely that you’ll end up doing neither very well. Given the limited attention spans of humans, it’s best to devote a little time but your full attention to a book to derive the most out of it.

Gently revert your attention to your book when you slip

Daydreaming is inevitable even for the most seasoned of readers. So when that happens, it’s best to take a step back and become aware of it. Since you cannot avoid it, accept it and bring your awareness to it. This will break the cycle of distraction and gently revert your attention to the text, which you can begin rereading from the part you lost your focus at.

Mindfully refrain from skipping arduous descriptions

It happens to everyone – the temptation to skip past parts that are boring, descriptive or dealing with your least favourite character. But if you do that, you wont get the full experience of the book, and will succumb to fake reading. So whenever that temptation does arise, try to not act on it as far as possible.

Practice meditation and other mindfulness activities

If you find your attention drifting away way too much, it might be that the problem is bigger than just reading. You might want to re-evaluate and assess your attention span and make changes accordingly. If you find that you often lose focus while doing other activities too, you may want to try out some mindfulness activities such as meditation.

Notice the pace of your reading

A great way to assess if you’re falling prey to the fake reading syndrome is to observe the pace at which you read. If you read extraordinarily fast and end up finishing books in no time, that might just be the case. And if you don’t remember a lot of the plot and characters, it definitely is – and you need to work on your reading style.

Make reading visible and accountable

A great way to stop yourself from skipping and skimming is to use reinforcement. Add a personal ‘punishment’ for doing it and a ‘reward’ for not. So every time you catch yourself falling prey, you might want to skip a round of evening tea, or when you don’t, you might want to treat yourself to a chocolate. Also practicing in the presence of others can be a reinforcement.

Track your emotions as you read

Your emotions are actually a great tracker of how engaged you are with the book. If you feel nothing even though the book is objectively good, you’re probably not taking it in in the most effective manner. The best thing in this case is to consciously force yourself to attend to every little word and its meaning.

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