Why Casual Reading is Not a Waste of Time
And why reading for leisure actually has huge benefits
Especially in the communities around productivity and self-improvement, there seems to be a growing dislike of leisurely reading. Apparently, reading is supposed to be a means to an end. You read specific books, mostly about self-development, to make yourself better. Ideally you take notes while doing it. Or you completely move away from reading books in search of more effective and optimized ways of consuming knowledge (which in most YouTube videos on the topic incidentally leads to an Audible ad).
There is nothing inherently wrong with this approach, I think reading like this can be very helpful. Especially if you are short on time, or feel like you have too many other things to do, it is completely understandable. But still it misses out on a lot of benefits.
In the eyes of many concerned with productivity, reading fiction, or even casually reading non-fiction is seen as a waste of time. Why bother reading something that does not directly translate into improvements in your life? Why bother reading something if you will forget half the content a week from now anyway?
While understandable, this approach is shortsighted. True, you might not be able to recite every point of something you wrote verbatim of you did not take any notes, but there are still many benefits.
Firstly, reading exposes you to language. Not short snippets of language like if you are browsing social media or engaging in small talk, but long, fully formulated and interlinked sentences. This can only be good for your ability to use language.
If you are confronted with different writing styles, different formats and different authors, your understanding of language gets broader.
Consequently, you have a wider variety of language to draw from when writing or speaking. I am not saying that simply reading a lot will make you a great speaker, but it will give you a broader range of building blocks you can use.
This is especially true for those of us who are writers. By engaging with excellent writing, you slowly absorb it. If you read pieces written by skilled writers, your own ability to create great writing improves, as your brain starts to recognize what makes great writing great.
But even if you are not a writer, I would consider writing (and using language in general) as a meta-skill that can benefit you no matter which sector you are in.
Secondly, you train your mind to visualize. When compared to movies or TV shows, reading text will not give you any visual input. All pictures and scenes develop in your head. If you think about it, that is amazing. You see letters on paper, and these translate into vivid scenes only with the power of your mind.
Like a muscle, the more you exercise your mind, the better it becomes. And strong visualization skills will help you work through problems more easily. There is also a link being explored now between visualization ability and working memory, which would just add to the benefits.
Thirdly, and this plays into the first two points, leisurely reading allows for more reading volume. If you only have your scheduled fifteen minutes a day to read a self-improvement book while taking notes, you must choose the book very deliberately.
However, if you read just for the joy of reading, you do not have to be so picky. As you will get through books much quicker, you can be more explorative, looking into topics and opinions you might have otherwise not thought about.
I believe this is a very important point. If you only read a very small number of books, you will most likely select ones that confirm ideas or beliefs you are already holding. We humans tend to pick sources that confirm what we believe — this is called confirmation bias.
Reading your way through a broad variety of books helps to burst this bubble of self-confirmation. By facing different opinions and angles on an issue, you can refine your personal standpoint on it. While facing opinions that are different or even diametrically opposed to yours is uncomfortable it allows you to develop your own standpoint.
Reading is the enemy of ignorance. So read pieces you don’t agree with. Engage with opposing viewpoints and refine your own. Maybe you find out your take on an issue was wrong. Great, you got the opportunity to improve it in a comfortable and safe setting. Or maybe you realize you were already on the right track. Excellent, you get the opportunity to develop stronger arguments and understand the opposing views.
As an additional benefit, reading for leisure can be an amazing way to relax and decompress from a long workday. It offers the possibility to get away from a screen, to block out the noise of the outside world for a bit, and to completely immerse yourself in an idea or story. You reap all the benefits I just mentioned, while decreasing your stress, in an activity that feels more like free time than like work.
I set myself the life goal of reading 1000 books (somewhat inspired by YouTuber and blogger Thomas Frank). I do not have any further criteria. Not if the books are fiction or non-fiction, not any specific genre or area, not even any specific language. But reading 1000 books, any books, will expose me to at least a thousand different ideas. It will allow me to take a deep dive into a thousand concepts, a thousand viewpoints.
Of course, I will still try to choose books that are interesting or beneficial for me. But even if I just read for entertainment, or even if I disagree with a books message, I know that the simple act of reading is helping me to improve as a person.
I urge you to do the same. Start being open to more new ideas. Immerse yourself in the minds of great thinkers. And you might just come out as a better person on the other end.
So don’t overthink it, just pick up a book and start reading.
