Read one; buy one

(The picture has nothing to do with the text, sorry about that. But it was so lovely outside today and I had to go play photographer even if it was really cold, but I just love Finland and winter and together they are just perfection.)

Last year I decided to restrict my book buying, and came up with a rule of 'read one book you haven't read yet, and then you can buy one book.' Simple. It worked well, and I was originally going to continue with the same list this year, meaning I would have been able to buy six books at the start of this year. However, I changed my mind about this. I'm going to start all over again.

My birthday is in a week, and I usually get books for Christmas, so this time of the year it isn't really "necessary" for me to buy books, as I have a lot to read anyway. After I have read those books, I will be able to buy more again, and that sounds just fine for me. I have limited space on my bookshelf, because I don't have money to buy another one, nor do I really have the space for it in my room. I don't want to be one of those people who buy ten books every month, because my goal is to have read all / most of my books at some point in life.

I haven't been counting the books I get as gifts, only the ones I buy with my own money, because that's what this really is about; saving money / not spending all of my money on books when I do really need to eat too. It's a really easy way to control my book buying, and it doesn't feel too forced or too big like a total book buying ban would be. This way I still get to go to the bookstore and buy books, get new stories on my shelves to be excited about, instead of just having to avoid bookstores. I'd never be able to keep to my book buying ban, I'd break it after a couple of months I'm sure.

This one is really good if you want to change it at some point. For example, if I read a lot of unread books, I might make the rule 'read two; buy one.' Easy. I don't know if I'd even need the rule, but I do like having something like that to remind me to not buy everything I find even remotely interesting.

So yeah, read one; buy one. I liked it so much last year, that I think this will continue on in my life for a long time. :)

(Oh, by the way, I changed my reading challenge to 35 unread books, and the total in my mind to 50. Because I've already finished two books.)