Reading is one of the simple pleasures of life. It is something that instantly breaks you away from the hustle and bustle, offering you a completely refreshing experience. It does not matter how old you are, taking out the time to read can change your life in more ways than you could ever imagine. To help offer you an insight, here are ten benefits of reading.
1. Exercises Your Brain
Reading is a great way to exercise your brain and keep it going. Much like your body, your brain needs a little workout every now and then. We should all try to read for at least 10 to 15 minutes every day (hopefully more!), as it can help push your brain and get it going. This in return helps boost your brain function, while offering a special focus which builds up your memory function.
2. Free Entertainment
There is only so much you can watch on TV. There comes a point where you are out of things to watch and wonder what other entertainment options are available. Rather than watching something that doesn’t interest you, you can easily pick up a book or article that interests you. Keeping you entertained for hours, many articles, short stories or novels bring great insight on things that you may find interesting. Additionally, muc reading material can come free of cost if you search online. Alternatively, you can even make your way to the nearest library and enjoy a relaxing reading time in a quiet spot.
3. Focus & Concentration
One of the few things you get to master when reading is focus and concentration. This is something that can be incredibly hard to control, but certainly something you can easily learn. Another perk of reading is that it helps you focus on a task at hand, which comes about from concentrating on the storyline. Once you develop interest, your focus and concentration will grow naturally. Make sure you find that quiet spot – whether at the library, at home or in a park for example – somewhere you can easily shut the world out and focus on the material.
4. Improves Literacy
It does not matter how educated you are, reading can help boost literacy without taking on any extra classes. It is a gateway to vocabulary and helps introduce you to a whole new world. Additionally, reading can help boost effective communication, and even improve your writing skills. For instance, when reading you learn about different writing styles and techniques without even knowing it. A lot of what you pick up, you tend to include when engaged in conversation or writing assignment.
5. Boosts Sleep
Creating a bedtime routine is essential as it can help set the perfect health cycle. By adding reading to your bedtime routine you can easily sweep away all the baggage you carry to your bed and ease your body and mind towards a stress-free situation. This way when you put your book down you feel cool, calm and collected, making it the ideal mental and physical state to enjoy a restful night.
6. General Knowledge
There is no doubt that books are filled with endless interesting facts. It does not matter if you are reading fiction or non-fiction, you will learn a great deal from every single book you read. This is because every single book is a source of endless information that adds to your current knowledge. Not only do you boost your general knowledge but your conversation skills get enhanced as well. Each book also bestows knowledge that can boosts your confidence and offers you the power you need to stand on your own and feel capable of debating or talking in any social situation.
7. Motivation
You might not see it at first, but reading gives us great motivation! Simply reading a writer’s experience can give you a deep dosage of empathetic experience, sometimes encouraging you out of your comfort zone and propelling you too take on a life of adventure. Moreover, there are endless positive and self-help books that can help you achieve anything you set your mind towards.
8. Reduces Stress
Many books have the power to transport you to another world, cutting you away from your current setting, placing you right in the middle of all that the book has to offer. So you not only read and learn about certain things but experience them as well. All the while you get much needed escapism – away from any stress and pressure you might be under. Reading truly can be the greatest escape which does not require you to move an inch from where you are sitting right now.
9. Teaches Empathy
Books are filled with stories from the past, present, and future. Offering you a peek inside the life of others, it lifts the curtain and peeks into another world. When you are reading any book you are the narrator. This means that you experience every single feeling the writer feels when writing the book, ensuring you have an empathic mindset. Empathy is the ability to understand and share others’ feelings. Reading can help build empathy, and this is something that allows you to connect better with others in everyday life.
10. Offers Positivity
Reading helps you see positive examples from others. This idea is a form of teaching by example and lets you gain positive new traits which you can rub off on others around you. So why spread around negative traits, when you can easily offer positivity? Make sure others can also enjoy the endless benefits of reading as you do.
These are just some of the many reasons why you should pick up a book or a paper every day. Just five minutes of your life can ensure a remarkable impact on your life in the years to come. Regular reading donates some of the best things life has to offer, without having to make a great change in your current lifestyle.
