If I look around my apartment, I can find twenty or more books that I’ve never opened. Some were bought recently, others have been lying around for years. The Japanese have a name for this buying and piling up of books: “Tsundoku”.

But it makes me wonder, why does it happen?

Piling up

Firstly, I blame a rule that I heard from Ryan Holiday, who signs off every newsletter he sends with the following: “if I saw a book that interested me I’d never let time or money or anything else prevent me from having it.” Reading does use up time, money and energy. But it doesn’t take a lot of those things. It also tends to give back. “Even one (good) idea makes it worth” buying books, writes Ramit Sethi. I agree.

The problem is, the more you read, the more you want to read. Authors reference other authors. Books reference other books. If I like an author, I will want to read other things they’ve written. The same applies to other interesting themes, concepts, ideas or recommendations I come across. With these two forces in play, and the fact that I’m not a particularly fast reader, makes Tsundoku inevitable.

Thankfully, it’s not a big problem. Books weigh down a home with their steadiness like a good table or cabinet. Interesting titles or covers catch your eye and can remind you of a story or an idea. This is especially true of unread books, which are always asking you “are you ready to read me yet?”

Hanging out

Maybe they pile up because some of these books just need a bit more time. In Be Here Now (1970), Ram Dass suggests to “hang out” with famously dense books like the Tao Te Ching or the Bhagavad Gita as a sort of spiritual practice. He explains how to do this:

“take one passage—perhaps a phrase—certainly no more than a page. Read and re-read and re-re-read it. Then let your thoughts work around it. Paraphrase it. See how it applies to others and to yourself. Note if and how it differs from the way in which you usually think about things . . . different assumptions, etc. What are its implications regarding your own journey? Read it again. What laws of nature is it reflecting? Then, sitting quietly, let your mind associate to the passage. And then be quiet. Certainly a half hour a day is not too long to spend on this exercise.”

“Hanging out” is a sensible approach not just for ancient books like The Old Testament, but anything intellectually intimidating or that has a radically different viewpoint to you. It’s a bit like spending 30 minutes talking to a stranger about their life. You really have no hope of even scratching the surface of who they are as a person. But with maybe one or two good questions, one might get a little bit of a better understanding.

Settling down

But then there’s the books I don’t even want to hang out with. They just sit there. I can’t even read a page of them. For whatever reason, they’re just not something I’m able to digest yet, so I need to leave them be, within reach, for some unknown amount of time.

Maybe it’s laziness, or fear that stops me from picking them up. Maybe deep down I know I’ll dislike them, and stop reading after a few pages. Or maybe my subconscious has already started reading without me, just like it quietly solves problems while we are busy gardening or walking the dog.

If you do this too, I wouldn’t be worried. Let them stack up. Don’t feel pressure or an obligation to read them. Read something else that looks more appetising, or just wait. Keep them around, nearby. And I’m sure at some point in the future, even if it’s years later, you’ll read them at the exact right time.

Also published on Substack