During a recent vacation, I spent a lot of time reading. I discovered some wonderful new authors and rediscovered the joy of allowing my mind to be taken into another world for a while. I normally get nearly all of my books from the local library. Although it’s a small library, it almost always has the books I’m looking for. I have no idea where they put them all, especially as renovations have reduced the bookshelf space and increased the computer and workspace. My fear is that, by the time I retire and have even more time to read, the library will just be a computer lab! In any case, I suppose this blog is both a plug for reading and a plug for the library more specifically.
A couple of summers ago, I read a book called The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains, by Nicholas G. Carr, in which the author decried the effects of the Internet (and ubiquitous electronic devices) on our ability to sustain attention, really delve into what we read, think deeply about things, and so forth. When we have little bits of information at the ready whenever we want it, we’re likely to flit from topic to topic, surf the hyperlinks before even finishing what we were reading, and read to simply grab nuggets of information before going off somewhere else. When we read a book, however, we don’t generally go forward and backward in the book, look for paragraphs we’d rather be reading, or search for more stimulating passages. For better or worse, we’re stuck with the story we’re reading, and to really get the most out of it, we have to take some time and delve into it, let go of distractions, and allow our minds to be absorbed for a period. Reading is, in some ways, a practice of mindfulness. With kids, a dog, and lots of activity going on around the house, I often have to redirect my attention back to what I’m reading (or I go outside on the patio and shut the door!), just like I do when I sit and try to mindfully observe my breathing. Reading books encourages focused, sustained attention, and a degree of depth in our immersion in a particular subject or story. I would suggest that we’re likely to maximize these benefits when we read books on paper. These days, ebooks are everywhere, and this makes it a lot easier to read books wherever we are; however, when we read on an electronic device, we often experience many interruptions in the form of notifications, alerts, calls, and other attention grabbers. We also can easily switch to an Internet browser or app whenever we want to. I believe this undermines our ability to focus on one thing for a sustained period, which is largely why I stopped reading books on my iPhone and went back to good old fashioned paper books a few years ago.
Now to the wonders of the library. OK, so if reading real books is a pretty good idea, and I think it is, how do you read a lot without going broke? I probably read 1-3 novels per week, and if I had to buy them all, I could be paying $3,000 or more per year. As a book author myself, I wouldn’t mind if everyone spent that much on books! That said, if I had to buy all of my books, I’d inevitably read a lot less. I started going to the library consistently about 15 years ago, when we were living near Seattle, where they had a fabulous interlibrary loan system. Within the first 6 months, I’d read more books than I’d read over the previous 3 years or so. I continue to go to the library maybe 2-3 times per week, and beyond the ease of free books, I also find it a way to connect with the broader community, as a lot of people congregate there for various programs or simply to sit and read or get some work done. One barrier to the use of the library, however, is that it involves some planning and delay of gratification. I often look up a book I really want to read, only to find that it has been loaned out, and I’d be #36 in line to get them. If I wanted to, I could just buy the book on iBooks right away. Instead, I put a hold on it, find what’s available now, and stack up my holds so I can have a steady stream of great books to read as time goes on. This kind of planning and delay of gratification reminds me a lot of money management. We might be able to buy what we want right now, but how does that affect our ability to go on that longed-for vacation to Hawaii or Europe later on? Therefore, beyond the many benefits of reading books and the relief on our pocketbooks and social benefits of the library, I would suggest that using our public libraries might even make us better at planning for the future and curbing our immediate impulses – something we all need some help with from time to time. ~ Alexander L. Chapman Ph.D., R.Psych.