# Maintaining a level (aka why do I keep starting new books)

**URL:** <https://forum.beeminder.com/t/maintaining-a-level-aka-why-do-i-keep-starting-new-books/3934>\
**Category:** Akrasia\
**Created:** [May 14, 2018, 6:22pm UTC](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/maintaining-a-level-aka-why-do-i-keep-starting-new-books/3934 "2018-05-14T18:22:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 5

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**Author:** ![shanaqui](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.beeminder.com/shanaqui/32/3513_2.png) [@shanaqui](https://forum.beeminder.com/u/shanaqui)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2018, 9:47am UTC](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/maintaining-a-level-aka-why-do-i-keep-starting-new-books/3934/5 "2018-05-18T09:47:32Z")

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I worry about the perverse incentives point, but I also get so overwhelmed by all the books I’m reading at once that it gets counterproductive, and I never _finish_ them. I’ve got… I think six on the go at the moment, which is actually not as bad as it has been (coughthirtycough) but it’s enough that some are definitely being neglected.

(I do have an incentive system for that – I’ve [gameified my reading list](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cMYWnYnsdwSc2ibXQ9au_hAwX7cz8DKpwNrkrRoiw90/edit#gid=687797097) so I get a certain amount of points based on the length of a book, how long I’ve owned it, how long it took to read it, etc. It mostly works, hence not having thirty books on my currently reading stack, buuuut…)

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