(upbeat music) - All right. Well, speaking about productivity, we should probably keep going here. Let us move on to our next listener call. - All right, the next question's from Brian from DC actually and it's kind of fitting 'cause he's got a question, goes into detail about physical versus eBooks.

I know you brought it up before, but he talks about some good stuff. So let's take a listen. - Hi, Cal, my name is Brian. I'm a lawyer down in Washington, DC. So I guess in a way we're neighbors. This question has nothing to do with my profession, but I heard you're looking for more questions, so I thought I'd give this one a shot.

I'd be curious in your thoughts on eBooks versus physical books. Instinctually, I always prefer physical books. I like seeing them on bookshelves. I like the visual reminder of the books I've read and the thoughts I've digested. And perhaps most importantly, I like the idea that maybe my kids will see them and be exposed to them, or perhaps one day decide themselves to read some of the books that I found influential.

I know I enjoyed doing that when I was a kid. But I also noticed that ever since I've dusted my Kindle off the shelf, I read a lot more. I think I can read at night while I get the baby to bed. I can take it with me more easily.

I can get library books very easily on that. And so my volume of reading has really gone up. I also have noticed that I'm much more into taking and reviewing notes since I can just export that when I'm done reading. Paradoxically though, that means I very rarely, if ever, go back and reread passages out of the electronic book, like I might in a hard copy book.

And so not a productivity question, but I'd be really curious in your thoughts on eBooks versus hard copy books. Thanks so much. - Well, Brian, I would say use all formats and don't overthink it. I use all formats. They all have their advantages. If we look at the five books I read this month that we talked about earlier in the show, this particular month, two of them are audio books and three of them were physical books.

I would say in a typical month, maybe one audio book, one or two Kindle books, and then two or three physical books. So I have a mix and I don't have a huge rhyme or reason for it. I mean, I do like having a physical library. When you have a reading habit like mine, where you don't overthink it, you just grab things that are interesting, you just, reading's better than non-reading.

I am often taking these books out of my existing library. So if we look back at this week's, this month's books, for example, two of them, two of the books I read in January, Giants by John Stoffer and The Jesuit Guide to Almost Everything by Father Donovan, those were just in my library.

I just looked through my library, I wanna read something else. I just, hey, I should read this. I pulled it off my shelf as if I was in a real library. So I'm a big believer in having a robust library, not just the books you've read, but books you wanna read, and I agree with you that it's good for your kids to see that, and they can see books around and see them as a physical artifact.

But I think it's completely fine to use Kindle as well. If you add real books to Kindle, you're just gonna read more, and then throw audio into that as well, you're gonna read even more. And so I will go to Kindle if, A, I wanna start a book right away and don't wanna wait to have it sent to me, is one reason I'll use Kindle, or two, if I'm going on a trip or something where I don't wanna bring a physical book, or sometimes it's a book I'm not sure about I wanna own, maybe I'll get it on Kindle.

So I would say, don't overthink it, use all the formats, and how you make the decision, you can just do it like me, which is, I don't know, randomly, and it should pretty much work out. All right. By the way, reading with your kid, putting the baby to bed, that really resonates with me.

That's when we bought, my wife and I bought the Kindle Paperwhites. So we had Kindles that were unlit, and it was midnight feedings. We're like, okay, we gotta get a Kindle that you can read while you're holding a baby, or while you're trying to rock a baby to sleep.

And so, yeah, that brings back memories. When I think of my Kindle Mini White, I think about having a baby and being tired. (upbeat music)