One of the best ways to make incremental progress during your other 8 hours is to learn. There are all sorts of newfangled websites that can teach you a thing or two
— some with nifty videos and others with PowerPoint presentations. Call
me old school, but I think one of the easiest and most economical ways
to learn is by reading a book.
But I discovered something over the weekend that’s better than a bookstore and even better (gasp!) than Amazon.com.
Stick with me because I’m going to introduce you to new terms and
concepts that you won’t be familiar with. It might take some time to
digest what I’m explaining, but hang in there — it will be well worth
it.
A friend of mine told me about a place not far from my house that
seemed too good to be true. Even after confirming it wasn’t April 1st,
I was still unconvinced. Always up for a challenge, I thought I’d run
my own MythBusters experiment. So I buckled my three year-old daughter
into her car seat and we set our sights on this mythical place.
About ten minutes later we arrived at a peculiar looking building. We
parked and set off on foot. We reached the entrance and I started to
have second thoughts. “Is this safe for a three year old? Is this some
kind of trap?” My fearless daughter grabbed my hand and said, “Come on
Daddy” as we crossed the entrance.
I smelled something. Something strangely familiar and comforting. And
then I saw it. It was breathtaking. Row after row after row of books.
They had every book I could want. And not just books but DVDs,
magazines, newspapers, music CDs, and even (pinch me if I’m dreaming)
audiobooks.
The story gets better. Much better. After filling my hands with books
for my daughter and me, we went to buy them. The price tags were a
little confusing, so I asked the checkout person what the deal was. He
told me it was some new decimal pricing system or something. I didn’t
understand much of what he said, but I had already decided I wanted the
books so I threw down my credit card. “Fill this out,” he remarked, and
handed me some sort of membership club form. “Is this like a Costco
card,” I asked. “Yes, something like that Sir.”
He handed me a membership card and then told me to enjoy my books.
“How much do I owe you?” I asked. “Nothing, just return them by July 5th,”
he shot back. I drove home in a daze. Questions raced through my mind. I
decided to do some research. I googled “L-i-b-r-a-r-y” and got a few
hits. The sites made it seem like these “libraries” are all over the
place, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned, you can’t trust everything
you read on the Internet.
All I know, is that I’m never leaving home without my library card
again. It is an amazing place with tons of free information. I can
“checkout” (that’s their clever term for renting) books, audiobooks,
CDs, movies, everything! My guess is that Netflix will
sue them for some kind of patent infringement on the whole renting
thing, but until then, I’m loving libraries and you should find out if you have a library in your town. You can even find the nearest library to carry a specific book, CD, or DVD.
Think about it. For $10 or $20, you can learn from an expert. You can
read the latest trends and learn the newest theories. An expert may
charge $300+ and hour or $10,000 for a keynote address, but you can
learn so much more by reading their book for free from a library. That’s
time well spent.
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