These types of articles always give lists of books to read. I understand how important reading books are, but I've almost never been able to read a book about programming and get anything useful out of it; my brain just doesn't retain knowledge (only book that has come close is Head First Design patterns, but that book was trying to help me retain).
Most of what I've learned come from articles on HN, reading source code, classes in school, and my own experience in both personal and work projects.
There are different learning styles. For some (lucky) people, reading it in a book is enough. For you, that may not be enough. If it isn't, then you need to learn how to teach yourself. The book is there to provide technical insight. It is up to you to turn the information into a curriculum that you assign yourself -- little projects or scratch coding things (weekend hacks) that you can do to test out the technique, strategy or technology.
Most of what I've learned come from articles on HN, reading source code, classes in school, and my own experience in both personal and work projects.
How do I overcome this? Or do I even have to?