When deciding what content to dig into (books, podcasts, etc), I’m often faced with an interesting decision: do I want to explore something new, or revisit an old favorite?
Over the last year, I’ve been doing a lot of revisiting in place of new content. I’m still reading a few new books every month, but I’m also working on revisiting old content to help better understand it and solidify it in my brain. My new “Stacking Knowledge” podcast is a great example of that.
I thought more about this today while listening to a new(?) episode of Seth Godin’s “Akimbo” podcast. I wasn’t sure about the word “new” in that sentence, because while it was a fresh podcast in his feed, it began with “this is a special archived episode of Akimbo”, as many of his often do. It’s a rerun.
My initial thought was disappointment. I love Seth’s insights on various topics, and was sad to not have a new one to enjoy. However, this particular episode was a few years old and I had forgotten pretty much everything about it. To me, it was new! While parts of it were familiar, I still picked up quite a bit of info from it even though I had heard it before.
Generally speaking, if I’m consuming content I prefer for it to be new, but I’m slowly changing on that. My strategy for the past few years has been to consume quite a lot of new content, but also to find creative ways to revisit old content (like that podcast, or a book club, or some other event that will force me to dive back in).
It’s a tough balance, but there’s not a wrong answer. If I’m spending time digging into quality content, both the fresh content and the reruns are helping me to become a better person, so the exact mix of the two isn’t important.
Where do you stand on this? Do you intentionally try to focus on new content, or do you frequently revisit your old favorites?
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