Read books, Change your mind
This is my ode to reading.
Reading is a bit of a hidden gem. It’s not hidden in the sense that no one knows about it, it’s hidden because the power of reading is far greater than commonly understood. I reckon that reading does similar things to your brain as mind altering drugs, only reading is a bit more gentle. Reading leads you to a deeper understanding of yourself and it can provide the most direct paths to altering your life.
Reading changes how your mind processes information, it enhances your ability to connect far-reaching ideas, makes you more creative, deepens your quality of thinking, opens your heart to more empathy, clarifies your understanding of reality, improves concentration, slows your heart rate, builds self-confidence, forces you to sit still, improves your speaking abilities, and it allows you to imagine the future and the past more concretely. Good books show you shortcuts through the universe, light lanterns in the mind’s mazes, hacks for the wide world. A book is another person’s mind, because writing is thinking - tamed and slow cooked. A wise book can be the missing link between solitude and understanding. Books alters your neural makeup; reading new ideas reroutes how thoughts travel in your mind, opening up new ways of thinking that were not previously available.
I feel fortunate to have discovered a love for reading, it has proven the most effective way to hack life. I feel a duty to spread the word, to sell people on reading, to tell folks how and why it can be such a game changer.
I love to hear inspiring and successful people speak on their reading habits, it makes their uncommon journeys more relatable. Reading is the distance from point A to B, from normalcy to greatness. While in prison, Malcolm X transformed himself from a street hustler to an intellectual social justice hero. Reading helped him do so:
There was a sizable number of well-read inmates, especially the popular debaters. Some were said by many to be practically walking encyclopedias. They were almost celebrities. No university would ask any student to devour literature as I did when this new world opened to me, of being able to read and understand. I read more in my room than in the library itself. An inmate who was known to read a lot could check out more than the permitted maximum number of books. I preferred reading in the total isolation of my own room. When I had progressed to really serious reading, every night at 10pm I would be outraged with the ‘lights out.’ It always seemed to catch me right in the middle of something engrossing. Fortunately, right outside my door was a corridor light that cast a glow into my room. The glow was enough to read by, once my eyes adjusted to it. So when ‘lights out’ came I would continue reading in that glow. At one hour intervals the night guards paced past every room. Each time I heard the approaching footsteps, I jumped into bed and feigned sleep. And as soon as the guard passed, I got back out of bed onto the floor area of that light glow, where I read for another fifty-eight minutes - until the guard approached again. That went on until three or four every morning.
While CEO of Microsoft, Bill Gates used to take ‘Think Weeks.’ Once or twice a year, he and his wife would retreat to a remote cabin where Gates would read books of interest and project pitches from Microsoft employees, sometimes reading over 18 hours a day for a week or two. Reading was the main event of these retreats - the immersive reading and exposure to new ideas would generate ideas for months or years back in the working world.
The more books you read, the more your mind draws connections between topics and mediums, often with no conscious effort. The more (healthy) information you put in your mind, the more informed your mental model of the world will be.
So… what to read? At first it doesn’t matter, read what excites you. Wander a book store and buy 3 things that speak to you or do it at the library for free. You can read every word or you can skip pages/chapters. Don’t police yourself into finishing something that does not inspire you, just move on to the next book. You can finish what you start or you can drop any book freely. Reading should be a calming, inspiring, and invigorating activity.
If you’re looking for ways to level up or to wind down… read. May you remain open to what lies on the next page.