Reading is an essential cornerstone of creativity and not just reading junk blogs and the “news”. When I talk about reading I talk about reading stuff of substance whether it be self-improvement, nonfiction, fiction, or manuals on how to build something; if it adds value to your life in a positive way you should be reading it. For the last couple weeks I have slowly been giving into distractions, sometimes it’s hard to see it while it’s happening, but as I moved further and further away from reading every night I started to notice that my writing in the morning was starting to lack in substance. While I feel like I’ve written some good things in the last couple weeks I’ve truly wrote more shit than I have gems and I think this has a strong correlation to me reading at night, or rather the lack there of, for the last couple weeks.
Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. ~ Joseph Addison
Many of the creatives I follow online and truly admire all say that reading is in the top 5 things they do for creative stimulation alongside a solid amount of good sleep and exercise. Just because I admire someone a lot and the work they do I don’t just jump right in and follow everything they say. I pick and choose what will work for me and even though I absolutely hated it as a kid I do in fact find great pleasure from reading (I also hated writing). However, being the skeptic that I am I was hesitant to completely buy into everyone saying that reading was one of the most important things someone can do for creativity. Then I started to read more, dive into subjects I am interested in, build upon ideas, and absorb myself in a different world. I now know from empirical evidence in my own life and creative works that reading is a major cornerstone for creativity and inspiration, one foundational piece that should not be neglected and should always be reinforced. On top of just reading I find that reading at night is one of the most valuable times to read, it brings ideas to the surface shortly before you go to bed and they just kind of sit there and ferment overnight while you are sleeping, when you wake up you now have fresh processed ideas. It’s like an espresso nap but for ideas and creativity.
You can make positive deposits in your own economy every day by reading and listening to powerful, positive, life-changing content and by associating with encouraging and hope-building people. ~ Zig Ziglar
More I dive into why reading is important, especially to writing and the creative process, the more I realize just how many successful people spend much of their time reading and absorbing material. Warren Buffett spends 80% of his day reading books, news, articles, etc. It sure as hell seems to be working for him. Guess where I found this insight? In a fucking book! I chose to better myself and get back on track with creative processes and immediately I was reward with golden nuggets of valuable insights and ideas.
I still believe that sitting down and reading a book is the best way to really learn something. ~ Eric Schmidt
Another gift of reading is that you get to hang out with some of the most intelligent people in the history of the world. Smart people write books, successful people write books, interesting people write books, people who know more than me write books, these are the people that I want to hang out with, these are the people I want to associate with but they may not be accessible to me in the traditional sense. I can’t call up Richard Branson and say “hey, let’s go grab some coffee and chat” I probably wouldn’t even make it to his secretary nor can I raise Ben Franklin from the dead and have a deep discussion about life and the world but I CAN go to a library, bookstore or amazon and buy their books. I can hang out with them, I can get insights into their minds. Books are open doors to the authors minds. When they write a book they are writing their most valuable lessons that they have learned and in the most accessible way possible. Books let us be surrounded by people who we admire and respect.
The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries. ~ Rene Descartes
Jim Rohn wrote “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” I don’t know about you but I want to be able to select these 5 people with precision and tact, reading can help with that. The quote can be taken in a literal way but it can also be taken in a “think outside of the box” way. The literal way would just be exactly what it says, you are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with throughout the day, if this is true, it can be a pretty fucking scary realization depending on our situation. I’d rather think a bit outside the box, take some people in my real life I spend the most time with and substitute them with some truly great people and rotate them in and out of my life. One week I could have Richard Branson, Teddy Roosevelt, and Einstein in rotation and the next week I could have Marcus Aurelius, Ryan Holiday, and Brene Brown. We can pick and choose the 5 people we want to be the average of and we don’t have to settle just for the people we interact with in our daily lives, we can choose historical figures or successful people, reading gives us that option.
To me, this is the singular privilege of reading literature: we are allowed to step into another’s life. ~ Nicole Krauss
Now with clarity and presence of mind I have realized just how influential and important reading can be. Especially for increasing intelligence, cognition, creativity, inspiration, and learning from some of the greatest people to have walked this Earth. I will once again put strong value on reading to help my creative flow now that I know that there is real substance supporting the action. Sometimes the most insignificant and unassuming books can have some of the most rewarding impacts that you can experience. The saying “don’t judge a book by its cover” is right, while we do this all the time sometimes the ones we had skipped by may have been the ones that matter the most. Reading illuminates the world in ways we can not imagine.