Every year I keep track of what I read. I have tried, in previous years, to pre-plan my reading schedule… that doesn’t work out very well! There is always the “required reading” to do for Management Team meetings, church planning, personal development, etc. which throws the schedule out of wack!

The old plan isn’t working… I need a new plan… here it is….

Several years ago I identified five areas that I was going to dedicate my reading to:

1) Leadership

2) Theology

3) Church

4) Bio/autobiographies

5) “Other” (e.g. books on preaching, parenting, and prosperity… ok, ok, stupid alliteration
     but it worked… 😉

This year (in planning for 2007) I think I am going to shoot for seven books in each category. This will do a couple of things:

1) It will assure a balance in the reading schedule (I tend to have favorite and
     least favorite subjects – e.g. least favorite is bio/autobiographies).

2) It will allow for some flexibility in the picking of the reading material (for
     instance, if a new “hot” book comes out that I want to read… I can because I have not
     pre-determined what I will read I have simply determined the number of books per
     category)

OK, a couple of other things about the reading schedule…

1) Dead guys are valuable! The “ancients” (e.g. Jacob Arminius; John Wesley; John
     Maxwell – KIDDING) have something of value to say… SO READ THEM!

2) Times they are a changin’ so don’t limit yourself to books written in the past!
     There is a LOT of good stuff being written today… be discerning but read it!

3) Finally, a piece of wisdom from Steven Sample, for every book you choose to read
     you choose not to read hundreds of others so choose wisely! (My summary
     of his thinking in chapter four of The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership)