The Power of Reading

“Think before you speak. Read before you think.” – Fran Lebowitz

 

For centuries the only real and portable means of media has been the written word. There it is. Symbols on page or a piece of stone or skin or what have you. Completely inscrutable to the uninitiated but holding a world of meaning for those that are. It is all too easy to overlook the power of just what the written word is. Although it is really an extension of our speech it is also a means of preserving it for often far, far beyond the extent of our own lifetime. It lets us see into the thoughts and lives of those in our past and share our own experiences with those in the future. Something I will be forever grateful to my parents for is for instilling in me their habit of reading. It is a uniquely human capacity and something without which would be living in a very different world. It is also largely responsible for our ability to preserve and transmit the principles and developments of our culture (to say nothing of its innovations). Reading is

Imagine the philosophers and innovators of our past (the Beethovens and Einsteins, the Lao Tzus and Platos of the world) ever attaining or being able to share what they learned without having the ability to both receive and transmit the written word. Our world, then, really could be said to contain a kind of matrix running through its past, present and extending into its future as it comes to pass composed entirely of the various languages of the planet in written form. Pretty cool to think about.

Admittedly, during these past 5 years while juggling the twin responsibilities of family and business (not easily done when you work for yourself and have 3 children within 5 years), I have let my once voracious reading habit decline. Until recently, that is. It turns out, taking on a new and difficult task like learning to code (which I've recently done) requires A LOT of Googling which, in a world where the internet is still largely text-based, means a lot of reading. There are a massive amount of benefits to your daily life in learning to code but I won't go into them here. Here, I just want to share with you what I've rediscovered about reading and why it's important to consistently make time to do it.

Reading is:

the only real shortcut

a means of organizing your mind

a way of learning from masters in less time than it took them to gain the same knowledge

a way of staying sharp and curious

a great past time that nourishes you