The internet age has officially taken hold. When it comes to education and entertainment, many of us would now rather open a browser than a book.
But before you entirely neglect those books on your dusted shelves, take some time to realize they are still your best source of wisdom.
Reading books not only helps you go through that trying phase of life called education, but can also give you stimulating and enriching experiences that no amount of internet-ing ever will.
Here are some of the best reasons for taking up reading now.
1. It can save you from Alzheimer’s
People in their 70s who constantly engaged in intellectually challenging activities in their younger years are less likely to have Alzheimer’s disease.
2. It will ease you into sleep
We’re not talking about reading from a laptop or tablet. The kind of light emitted from electronic devices can actually mess with your internal body clock and cut into your sleep. Read from a good old book instead. It relaxes your brain and puts your body into sleep mode. Make sure you have a bedside lamp you can switch off though — no one likes to crawl out of bed after a long read when they’d like nothing better than to just doze off.
3. It improves your focus and concentration
Do you think reading is boring? It really isn’t. The reason many people find reading boring is because it requires focus and concentration, which most people tend to not have the patience for. But here’s the thing. Once you start immersing yourself into printed text your attention span will rapidly improve.
4. It will make you wise
Reading exposes you to a wider range of emotions, culture, awareness, sensibility, and knowledge. It can even cure loneliness. It does help you live with a little bit more happiness and wisdom.
5. It will help your comprehension
While we all know how to read and will likely know how to do so for as long as we live, comprehending text is quite a different matter altogether. In this sense, reading is a perishable skill, and if you don’t practice it, you will lose it.
6. It allows us to talk about things we can’t normally talk about
In the words of David Foster Wallace, one of America’s greatest poets: reading is “a way for human beings to talk to each other about stuff we can’t normally talk about.”
We are in a world saturated with information yet barren with wisdom. Reading takes us into a world where we can talk about things we normally don’t talk about.
7. It makes you attractive
Reading enhances your verbal skills and general intelligence, which in turn improve your social skills and, consequently, your attractiveness.
More importantly, readers are more likely to hold opinions and beliefs of their own. They’re able to accommodate other ideas without losing their own. Who doesn’t want to date someone like that?
8. It makes you well-rounded
Reading fiction, in particular, opens your mind up to many different possibilities, and eliminates the black-or-white, yes-or-no way of approaching problems. It enhances your ability to withhold judgment and seek alternative explanations.
9. It enhances memory
When it comes to improving your memory skills, nothing beats reading. Because of its innately slow pace, reading gives you more time to think and comprehend. As a result, you increase your learning capacity and memory skills.
10. It makes you worry less about the future
Fear and apprehension are rooted in uncertainty. Reading helps quell that uncertainty by sharpening our ability to logically infer the future. It’s does not teach you how to see the future in any mystic way. But it will increase your ability to predict how events will unfold.
11. It will make you discover yourself
Readings will expose you to many things you can identify with, leading to deeper self-discovery. Why is this helpful? In the words of literary critic Harold Bloom, “Until you become yourself, what benefit can you be to others.”
12. It will let you live as many lives as you please
In the words of George R.R. Martin — ‘A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only once.’
Read on.