First post even though I’ve had an account for months. So basically I have ADHD and am autistic, on top of that I’ve always struggled with self discipline and motivation. All of this has been made worse by a traumatic event causing me severe depression that I can’t seem to get out of. I genuinely want to read theory to become a better Marxist but I can barely manage a few pages at a time before giving up. Any ideas?
Audiobooks while doing menial tasks (like cleaning).
Capital (all volumes) is available online for free.
If that’s still too much then I recommend Prof David Harvey’s lectures on Capital Volume I (he has some on II/III as well, but I will suffice). They’re also freely available on YouTube, etc.
I would actually recommend audiobook/reading and then listening to Harvey’s lectures for further context. He’s not perfect by any means, but he does offer a lot of insight and additional context due to his experience over a super long career teaching courses In physical universities. Remember to consider that he has biases, as we all do, and his commentary and vision are limited, as we all are.
Reading and studying Capital, at least the first volume, is absolutely critical imo to anyone who calls themself a Marxist. Of course other books are foundational as well, but that one book, if you study it and pay attention, will get you most of the way.
do you find youtube format videos easier to digest?
Id also say dont be too hard on yourself to get through theory quickly, theory takes an entire lifetime to digest and understand as often reading it isnt enough, you need to read it then go out and expeirence life and then understand how it fits into it.
I would say even one page of theory a day is enough, build it up slowly over time and dont rush yourself.
One thing I found helped me was finding a specific place and time to help turn it into a routine. Like if you say, every day in the evening, you sit on the couch and read even just one or two pages. I find the key is just to keep doing it, and it doesn’t matter how long you do it as long as you start forming the habit. Eventually, you it becomes a routine, and you can start working on expanding the time you spend on it.
Bear with me: stop trying!
Trying to become disciplined takes a lot of energy. There’s an easier way. Create an environment in which reading theory is the easier option. Set things up so that reading theory is the easiest thing to do.
Do you prefer physical or digital or a mixture? [Store] reading materials close to the place where you’re going to be able to pick them up and get stuck in with the time available and in that setting.
So you might have a physical copy of Capital in a quiet place with a chair but no TV and poor WiFi connection. Reading the book becomes the easier, preferable option to trying to browse the internet. If you can’t do this, create it. Set your phone, if possible, to go on Aeroplane mode at a certain time of day. Or do it manually – you won’t miss anything; it’ll all be there when you log back on. Or leave your phone somewhere else, where you’d have to move to get it.
If you use a computer, save pdfs on your desktop. Save links to websites on your desktop. You could arrange them in columns, with short pieces on the left and long pieces on the right. Then if you have ten mins, open a source on the left. If you have more time, open one on the right.
Bookmark websites. Add them to your shortcut bar. ‘Add to home screen’ on your phone and move some of these around in your screen so it’s as easy to click a work of theory on Prolewiki as it is to open your messages.
If you browse e.g. Marxists.org, you’ll find loads of texts of different lengths. It’s okay just to browse. Keep a note of shorter works and bookmark/save them as suggested above. You might read a short letter on the bus or the toilet or while waiting for the kettle to boil. You won’t get through e.g. Capital in that time and you’re likely to get frustrated if you try. Short works that are easy to read in chunks include letters, interviews, FAQ format.
Discipline is useful but it’s overrated and we tend to see it upside down. Self-discipline comes from being disciplined practice. It’s a lot harder to discipline ourselves in order to become disciplined. It also becomes a lot easier to be disciplined as you become more familiar with the subject. Familiar topics, even if technical, can be read as easily as fiction; it doesn’t need discipline if you can find a way to make it so easy that you become increasingly familiar without letting yourself realise that you’re 👻reading theory🎃.
Also, a leaf out of self-determination theory: you will grasp conceptual ideas a lot quicker and be far more motivated if you choose the material. There are reading lists. But if this feels like someone else is deciding what you’re supposed to read, you probably won’t do it if you struggle with paying attention as described, and it will be harder than it needs to be. So find out what you’re interested in and read Marxist authors talking about that topic. Q: what are you interested in?
If something doesn’t grab your attention, move on and come back to it later. The more familiar a topic is, the more motivated you’ll be to engage with it. It’s okay to read a little here and a little there. It’s also okay to start anywhere in the book that looks interesting. One day you should finish the important texts. It doesn’t have to be today or next week.
One trick is trying to read one word a day. It’s a very low target. But you’ll find that if you go to the effort of reading that one word, you’ll read another and another. You might only read a paragraph in the end. But enough days like that and you’ve read what you set out to read. (This also works with writing, btw.)
I rarely: read cover-to-cover; start at the beginning; or finish one book before I start another. I start wherever looks most interesting or is most related to something that I know well. I have multiple texts on the go at once. If I get bored, I pick up something else. I often have a theme [in] mind and read the relevant parts in multiple texts about that theme and ignore the rest.
I can be ‘disciplined’ when I need to be, but if I don’t need to be, I don’t force it. The advantage is that because I read in the way that I do, I’ve often already dipped into a text before I sit down to finish it. This means I’m familiar with most of the major texts even if I haven’t read them in full before. This makes things a lot easier when I need to finish a particular text.
I often find that [some] theory is too complicated or theoretical. It’s hard to keep going when texts are difficult. If a text is particularly difficult: (1) skip that section until you come to an easier one – you can go back to the more difficult parts later, when you know more about what’s being said; or (2) let your subconscious do the hard work for you – stop reading, leave it for an hour or a day or a week, etc, then read it again and you’ll see that your mind had started to make sense of the text.
You could also focus on finishing chapters/sections rather than whole books, as a more realistic target to start with.
Essentially, the more you engage, the easier it all becomes. So the trick is to do anything that helps you to engage and keeps you engaged. If you need it, I’m giving you permission: make it easy, it doesn’t have to be a chore.
Hey, thanks for typing all that. Pretty helpful actually, I’ll do my best to implement it as much as I can.
Glad you found it helpful. If some of these tricks don’t work for you, that’s fine, too, but I hope some of them do help.
PS I noticed some typos and fixed them in square brackets to make them easier to spot.
I also have a hard time forcing myself to read theory. I listen to audio versions while doing other things, but I need to take notes and discuss it with others to truly understand a text. It might be helpful to join a reading group like the GenZedong/GenZhou theory discussion group on Matrix; at the moment, we read at a slow pace and have biweekly discussions (in addition to any impromptu conversations in the meantime, although the bulk tends to be every other weekend)
https://lemmygrad.ml/post/1710144
I’m making this thing. It’s not by any means complete, but maybe it helps?
It’s… Dry, and mechanical. But it exists.
And then there’s the study group in lemmygrad, which is… A bit slow, but you can start the posts and do your own reviews. Probably will cause people to join you. :)
How would you like to read/study it?
I will agree that many things are really hard to understand without context. I was reading Lenin on what is to be done, and the multiple groups he mentions just don’t make any sense to me.
Maybe it should trigger me to make notes and go after the names. But life happens, you know?
Anyway, that’s my struggle, you’re not alone. :)
Audiobooks and some meditative activity/chore?
Listen to audiobooks on repeat. If you miss things on your first listen, you’ll pick it up on your third or fifth listen.
I have ADHD too. Audiobooks are a terrible way for me to digest any information. I get used to the narrator and tune them out with ease without even realising it, then bam, no information being absorbed. I spend so much time rewinding that I might as well do it the hard way and get some books.
I’m so fucking guilty of this too. I’ve been in a huge reading kick lately but also “tune out” the text sometimes and realize I’ve read whole paragraph without paying attention. What I’ve found is actually helping is to read something first, then hut the audio book after to help clear things up and to get a better understanding.
I will say with how some of the older stuff is written, it’s helpful to hear someone else read it. Especially with how Engels, for example can write multi-page paragraphs.
I’ve done the read/audio combo for both State and Revolution, and Reform or Revolution and, though I’m not a mater of the texts, it’s really helped me get a more rounded understanding.
I believe I may have some kind of ADHD or level of it. Definitely a bit autistic as well.
Have difficulty staying on track when reading (though it’s getting better the more I consistently read) but definitely have waaay more trouble with audio playing in the background (like you said it just tunes out). Reading has brought me more success, as well as videos that I actually dedicate my attention to.
What have you tried to read? Getting a handle on some ADHD symptoms while you learn at your own pace and in your own way. You can learn a lot reading the intros to socialist theory and listening to audio books. Join a book club and join up with other people who read theory. The first step to change is wanting to change, and you will never be a Marxist, you can only participate in the process of becoming a Marxist. Be nice to yourself, and get the fuck away from your phone and it will happen. If you need a discord book club I can recommend one.
Do the few pages then and don’t compare yourself to others. We all read at different paces.
I would start with the small pamphlets like Wage Labor and Capital, Rent of Land, as well as Value Price and Profit which are short reads and take notes on them in whatever way is easiest as if you’re going to explain to yourself later. If you read 1 page of theory of those a day that’s major progress, a larger work like Capital is best done with a reading group, or at least a study guide of some form so it isn’t so stressful if you’re not used to reading big books alone.
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