How reading fuels my writing

Plus, five book recommendations that span every genre.

When people ask me how I learned to write, I always point to my reading habits.

I’ve been reading about 50 books a year since I was 16 years old. Around that time I started the morning routine I carry with me to this day — workout, read, journal. Starting early in the day meant school and work never interrupted my steady diet of books.

By dedicating time to reading in the morning, I could read slowly, take notes, and re-read books while still maintaining a relatively high volume over time.

My reading routine has faltered with starting a business this year, however. I’m on pace for about half my normal amount of reading in 2024.

At the same time, though, I have published more work than ever — blog posts, financial reporting, video content. This will be my most productive year yet as a creator and journalist.

On balance, I don’t this shift is such a bad thing. Work unfolds in sprints and seasons. It is my first time building a startup, after all, and that comes with a different rhythm. I wear a lot more hats on a given day than in previous years, and de-prioritizing reading in recent months has been the right decision.

That said, my instincts tell me that I’d be better for it over next decade to lean into more reading, not less.

A foundation of books has shaped every personal and professional milestone to this point.

To be clear, I’m able to write as much as I do today not because I’m spending less time reading, but because a decade of reading underscores everything I choose to focus on.

Like investing in the stock market, taking in a book a week is a powerful lesson in compounding. The dividends I’ve earned from past reading is what fuels the “returns” I now see in my writing, even if what I’m investing has pared lately.

Writing is simply thinking made concrete.

So without great books, I’d be much less adept at thinking.

Here are a few books I’ve enjoyed lately:

• Private Equity by Carrie Sun - An easy-to-read memoir by the former executive assistant to the billionaire CEO of Tiger Global that is full of insights on the highest level of achievement and the sacrifice required at the top. (Link)

• How to Live an Extraordinary Life by Anthony Pompliano - This is a wise, concise and digestible collection of letters my co-founder wrote to his children about relationships and family, investing and building businesses, and the value of time. (Link)

• The Lords of Easy Money: How the Federal Reserve Broke the American Economy by Chris Leonard - I report on the Fed almost every week for Opening Bell Daily, but this book was an inside scoop on the last several decades of monetary policy, told through individual players in the central bank. (Link)

• When Money Dies: The nightmare of deficit spending, devaluation, and hyperinflation in Weimar Germany - The story of 1923 Germany when it took a wheelbarrow full of cash just to buy lunch because the local currency had turned to nothing. Still relevant today as the US emerges from its own bout with inflation. (Link)

• Nobody Wants to Read your Sh*t by Steven Pressfield - A quick read that combines lessons from screenwriting, advertising, and penning fiction novels into a playbook about producing compelling writing. One key takeaway: The best writers maintains empathy for their audience. (Link)

I’ll be reading a lot more in the coming months. Hopefully it makes everything I write better. Let me know if you want me to share more about what I’m reading, and how I plan to spend more time in books.

Happy Thanksgiving and I’ll talk to you next week.

Phil Rosen
Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Opening Bell Daily