Since my childhood I have always loved learning, especially by reading books. I chose what to read by following my intellectual curiosity, which in retrospect looks like a luxury. Even after I became a professional linguist, I continued to follow this same habit.
But this habit started to change gradually yet surely. I did continue learning by reading books in various areas of linguistics, but I began to read more and more of what I had to read in order to write academic papers rather than what interested me, which became less and less like a luxury and more and more like an obligation.
This habit came to an abrupt end as a result of my spiritual awakening, triggered by a traumatic experience I had about eight years ago. I suddenly lost my interest in intellectual knowledge, including linguistics, and my interest shifted completely to life wisdom.
I can think of at least two main reasons for this radical shift, which many of my former colleagues seemed to frown upon. The first is my realization that intellectual knowledge without life wisdom can be more problematic in certain ways than the lack of both intellectual knowledge and life wisdom. Just imagine a researcher of love who has read and published extensively on love without ever experiencing it!
The second is my observation that academia might not be the best place for nurturing life wisdom, at least in the area of linguistics in the specific environment where I worked. Of course, I did meet some linguists with life wisdom, but I don't think they acquired it within academia.
When I started to learn life wisdom not only from my own life experiences, including this traumatic one, but also through books, another important shift occurred. I found it increasingly difficult to read them and began listening to them using text-to-speech software, in addition to listening to lectures.
It took me some time to realize that reading and listening have close affinities with (cognitive) intelligence and spirituality, respectively, at least as far as I am concerned. I was also able to resume my old habit of following my intuition in choosing books.
Now I'm also reminded of my preference for listening over reading when learning not only spirituality and life wisdom but also languages. In fact, this is more than a mere preference. I have to hear the sounds of a new language when I start learning it.
Even after the initial stage I learn more by listening than by reading. This also seems to explain why I have always found it very difficult to learn ancient languages, as I can't hear their sounds used by living people. Classical Hebrew is an exception as it has never ceased to be recited in various traditional Jewish communities.
I still continue to read books - and a lot, in absolute terms. But unlike before, I now consciously choose when to read rather than listen, as I'm aware of when I can maximize my learning davka by reading, even when the subject is spirituality and life wisdom.
In short, this "complementary distribution" of reading and listening as two modalities of learning from books is not "Torah from Sinai". I try to remain flexible, having been liberated from the "yoke" of writing academic papers.
Now the lost "luxury" of spending time with books has not only been restored but also augmented in that my curiosity is no longer only intellectual but also spiritual. And whichever modality I choose intuitively, one important thing remains the same - my love of learning!