Reading is a Super-Power
We live in the golden age of storytelling. TV-shows and mini-series have mind-boggling cinematic quality. Streaming providers are creating their own studios—companies like Apple, Netflix, Hulu, and HBO are producing a stunning breadth of engaging content. All can be taken easily and without leaving the house.
Social networking apps and smartphone games continuously increase in quality and addictiveness. High-performance cellphones are a ubiquitous sunk cost that enables everyone from the young to the elderly to play addicting games. Just like streaming, cellphone games are low-friction because everyone owns the hardware. From the perspective of a app company, Apple and Google have handed them a customer base on a silver platter. If you have the resources to make a quality app, hundreds of millions of devices are ready for your content. Gone are the days of requiring consumers to buy a game console.
Television, social networking, and smartphone games have a common thread. They are well-developed industries with specialists who know how to make their content addictive. In the physical world, food manufacturers employ scientists to make their chips as tasty and addictive as possible to ensure repeat sales. Likewise, social-media companies pay enormous salaries to scientists to accomplish these same ends.
Week over week, these scientists make seemingly minor changes to the platform and track their users activity. If Facebook makes a tweak to the platform and users spend an extra minute per visit, they keep that change. Through this iterative research by highly competent engineers, tech companies arrive at the most psychologically addictive product possible.
With powerful companies jockeying for our attention and money, it’s easy to understand why reading is less popular. There’s stiff competition for our focus and free time.
Through the years, I’ve transitioned my free time from videogames to reading. I love the benefits of exercising while listening to audiobooks. Likewise, I enjoy listening to an engaging story while on a road trip.
The first-person storytelling of a novel is different than that of television. On a screen, you watch people interact with each other, but you can’t actually get inside the head of the protagonist—you can only observe their actions and expressions. This limitation of the screen is why many film adaptations are a disappointment. The Shawshank Redemption is the example that proves the rule.
Books fall into many categories. There are narratives that are intended to be experienced, self help books that are designed to convey ideas, and histories that record the events of time. All of these books have the possibility of being life-changing for a reader.
A genuine curiosity makes the reader open to being able to digest what they need to hear at that moment.
Reading books outside of one’s wheelhouse is the best way to create deep inter-disciplinary connections. These connections deepen our humanity and make us more able to live in the world .
Books are written by humans for humans. Reading is a uniquely human experience and was the first true mass-media. In a world where face time with unique people is rare, writing provided the first intimate connection with someone at a distance.
Books have the privilege of being timeless. Although it is difficult to read books that were written outside of one’s context, reading a biography or autobiography can connect us with the deceased in a way that is otherwise impossible.
I love reading and average more than one book per week. Reading is an addiction that snowballs once you get started. When you’re reading one book per month, you look around at your friends and want to tell them about the incredible thoughts, ideas, and stories that you experienced.
Reading more than one book at a time can be an interesting experience.
The brain makes connections and draws common themes between disparate works. Reading Nietzsche while reading US history can paint a color on human motivations and morality that is more insightful than reading them serially.
More than anything, reading opens our minds to possibilities, ideas, and imagination.
An author’s written works are distilled from the most interesting parts of their life. An academic will write a book about their subject matter—the part of their life that differs from regular life. In this way, libraries of the world contain the most interesting parts of humanity.
Getting started doesn’t have to be daunting. Books can seem like a large commitment that require changing our daily routine. This doesn’t have to be the case. The following is some practical advice to help you on your way.
- Pick the best book you can, preferably one recommended by a friend who knows you well. I have created a book recommendation podcast to help readers pick a good book.
- You don’t have to read the book. Audiobooks today are high-quality and produced talented narrators that can add to the experience. For example: Jim Dale’s narration of Harry Potter makes the series completely addictive.
- You don’t have to finish a book. If you have made it 20% through a book and it is unfulfilling, switch to another book. It could be a bad book or a bad fit for you. There is no shame in finding a book that is a better match.
- Scribble, underline, highlight, and take notes. Most books are only read once. While reading, write in the book. This makes reading a more engaging experience and you will get more out of it.
- Understand the kind of book that you are reading. How to Read a Book does a good job of describing this. If you’re reading a novel, it’s important to not skip any parts. If it’s a self-help book, understand that it is a disposable work with a few key ideas—take what you can and don’t feel like you have to read every page.
- It’s not a competition. While reading can be incredibly fulfilling, reading doesn’t make you better or worse than anyone else. Reading should help you to connect with others. Don’t feel bad if you haven’t read in a while. Be kind to yourself.
