This is a habit that affects readers of all kinds, comics or not. We tend to buy more books than we have the time to read. We do it innocently, we really will read it eventually, but we tend to put other obligations before the hobby. With my goals being what they are (creating my own graphic novel) this problem effects my art practice by causing conflict in what I should value more.
A persons time is valuable since it's so finite. Because of this I sometimes find myself doing nothing because I'm so stuck on what is really worth spending my time on. What I fall to doing most often, however, is drawing. The more you draw the better you get, and that's a deal that's hard to turn down. I'm also able to multitask while drawing, something you don't have the ability to do when you are reading. I tend to have plenty of YouTube videos and TV shows to watch so I put them on for background noise while I'm drawing. In the end I have a lot of fun with this and I cross multiple actions off my list.
Reading comics may seem like a waste of time in comparison, but there's an aspect you've probably never thought of. I have listened to lots of professional comic artists give advice and something multiple have confirmed is to read comics. This helps you see what other artists do and learn from them. You can see page layouts, how they organize their panels, storytelling, and of course how the pencilers, inkers, colorists and letterers combine their styles to the advantage of the characters. This is a truly inspiring and fun learning experience, and something I would want to do anyway. As mentioned before I can't multitask while reading them, but because they are shorter than a novel they are easier to spread out throughout a week or two.
Because both drawing and reading the comics are so advantageous to my goals it's always hard to choose one over the other. The reason my growing "to read" pile exists is the multitasking ability drawing gives me. What's the reason for yours? Let me know below!
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