The Magic of Books 📚

How to Discover the Joy in Reading

When I mention that I love to read, I often receive responses such as "good for you, I should read more" or "I want to read more, but I just can't get into it." I wonder of these people - if they want to read, what is the obstacle?

Why read at all? This quote by Carl Sagan articulates the magic of books:

“What an astonishing thing a book is. It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of fun dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never really knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.”

The quote is from a beautiful book entitled “For Small Creatures Such as We” by Sasha Sagan (Carl’s daughter).

We read a book and our minds are changed. Our emotions are changed. We become more intelligent, more articulate, more thoughtful, more grateful, more motivated, more empathetic, whatever it may be. We inch closer to truth. We look at these “fun dark squiggles”, have a conversation with a person that we never knew, and we are changed.

The key insight is that the quality of our thoughts determines the quality of our life. And it is within our power to influence the quality of our thoughts. An example is helpful. Let’s say you make a poor investment. You will likely have negative thoughts and emotions about that event - regret, self-deprecation, loss. It’s the emotions and thoughts that cause the degradation of happiness, not the event itself. We could easily reframe the perceived negative event as a positive or neutral event - we’ve learned what doesn’t work, we’ve become smarter, wiser. It’s the quality of our thinking, the stories we tell ourselves, that influence our experience.

If the quality of our thoughts determines the quality of our life, then we should endeavour to improve our thinking. That's where reading comes in. Reading is like superfood for the mind. It nourishes our brain, leading to higher quality thinking and emotions. Alternatively, social media and most news media is junk food for the mind. These activities result in lower quality thinking, increased anxiety, distorted views of the nature of life. They don’t help us live better.

So how do we read more? “We don’t have time” we say. False. We have time. It’s that we don’t prioritize it. We aren’t compelled to spend our time with books. So how do we become compelled? Forcing it won’t work. We must make it feel like something other than a chore. We must discover the joy in reading.

Here are five practical tactics to help you discover the joy in reading:

1. Find books that speak to you. The are over 100 million books in print. There are books that will resonate with you. Find them. Ask friends for recommendations. Fiction or non-fiction, it doesn't matter. Make it easy to fall in love with books by finding those that speak to you. Explore different genres until you find a spark - biographies, historical fiction, science fiction, romance novels. Whatever gets you started.

2. Start with easy reads. Don't be a hero by tackling Darwin straight away. The key to building any skill is to start small, make progress, get some wins, be consistent in your practice and then build from there.

3. Choose your format. Determine how you best consume books. There are many options today—Kindle, audiobook, physical book. Find your preferred method and embrace it. I recently heard someone denigrate audiobooks, referring to them as ‘not really reading’. Bullshit.

4. Put the book down. I feel no obligation to finish books. With over 100 million books in print, why struggle through when I could simply pick up another? If at any point - page 5, page 50, or page 250 - a book begins to lose your interest, drop it! Reading should be enjoyable, not work.

5. Build a habit. Life is about trade-offs. If you want to develop a reading habit, you'll need to find time, energy and consistency. Saying "yes" to reading means saying "no" to something else. Maybe it's less television or less scrolling. Whatever you choose, finding time to read will take time from somewhere.

If even one person discovers the joy of reading because of this post, I've accomplished my goal. To that end, we need to get some great books in your queue. Here’s a list of enjoyable reads that I recommend. Of course, just because I like them doesn’t mean that you will!

Fiction:

1. The Pearl, John Steinbeck - super fast read about the perils of becoming attached to monetary wealth. A wonderful short story you can easily read in one week.

2. Siddhartha, Herman Hess - I read this book every year. It’s the story of a boy’s search for purpose in life. I gain a wonderful new perspective on life every time I read it.

3. All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr - Pulitzer Prize winner. A fictional account of the converging lives of a young girl and boy in World War II (soon to be a Netflix limited series).

4. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley - A classic written in 1932 finds us in a dystopian world where humans appear to have solved for all pain and suffering.

5. Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir - Earth is facing existential calamity. An unexpected astronaut heads to a distant galaxy to try to save it.

Non-fiction:

1. Stillness Is the Key, Ryan Holiday - This was the book that introduced me to Stoic Philosophy. Very accessible with modern examples of tactics for living better.

2. Why We Sleep, Matthew Walker - The seminal book on sleep and how this physiological ritual of unconsciousness is the key to unlocking our health and happiness.

3. Ride of a Lifetime, Bob Iger - Biography of one of the most remarkable CEOs and business leaders of the 21st Century. I did the audiobook.

4. Total Recall, Arnold Schwarzenegger - The story of The Governator. A remarkable life from the poverty of post-war Austria to Hollywood and beyond. Also did the audiobook.

I will leave you with this quote from Ludwig Wittgenstein:

“The limits of my language mean the limits of my world"

With books at our side, our world is limitless.