In An Intricate Web of Words

The past two years have been somewhat like a temporal anomaly. Everyone was locked within their homes and forced to repeat a similar day over and over again. Friendships and relationships broke. Livelihoods were lost, and spirits of people were diminished. Overall it was a period of despair. With no place to go to and no one to confide in, all of us were lonely. At such a time, like reviving an old friendship, an old habit of mine rekindled. Reading books became the sole highlight of my days in lockdown. I found a different world within the crispy pages.

The labyrinth of sentences made by the authors transported me to different timelines. Sometimes I am fighting alongside WW1 soldiers in Russia or at other times I am revolting with the freedom fighters in India. With the lack of people, I made connections with paper characters. I went to different places, experienced exquisite adventures and learned various things with them. The stories became a place of comfort. I escaped in them when our world was crumbling.

Consuming stories by reading is not similar to other media. When we watch a movie or a show, there is no blank for us to fill in. We see and accept the creator’s vision. There is no space for us to make the story our own. On the other hand, books give us a free space to imagine the story ourselves. We have our own visions of the characters, of the story and at the end it becomes something of our own, something very close to our hearts. That is why reading is a very personal and subjective hobby. It affects the reader at a deeper level.

Other than providing me comfort and escapism, the stories helped me grow as a person and learn about the ways of the world. It gave me perspectives of people about whom I knew very little and helped me understand them. Unintentionally, I was so absorbed with my life and my problems that I never realized that I was not the main character in everyone’s story. Reading about different people all around the world showed me the vastness of the wild world and bit by bit made me compassionate towards others. They showed me the everyday struggles of some people, how people struggle just to survive everyday and live a life where they are not discriminated. They taught me about people’s grief. They taught me to let go of some things and hold on to the ones that matter. Even though the stories are fictitious, the characters are non-existent, their problems are inconsequential, we connect with them. We connect with them so much that we smile when they are happy and we cry when they are sad. They make mistakes, we learn. They make friendships, we feel. They triumph, we are proud. The characters develop, we grow along with them. Words really do have the power to shape us, mould us and create an individual full of unique thoughts and ideas. Reading is not only a hobby that brings us joy at the end of the day but it also really helps us exercise our brains. Different studies show how reading affects our brain.

1. In a microwave age, we want our lives to be fast-paced. Everything happens in a flash. We want nuggets of information as opposed to a meeting, ted talks as opposed to a lecture. While these things are efficient it decreases our attention span. We consider waiting for a few seconds for a web page to load to be long because our focus is very low. Reading over a long period enhances attention span to sit and focus on one task without getting distracted. Finishing a book from start to finish enables us to focus on a task and give our all towards finishing it.

2. Reading engages and exercises the left temporal cortex that is associated with language, facts and memory. As a result it helps us remember the things we learned. It also helps our vocabulary and makes us able to communicate in an articulate manner.

3. As per research, readers have heightened connectivity senses. They can associate different things and find a common point. Reading helps to meld different things together and find a connection between them. This is a common skill; however it gets enhanced when the mind is engaged through reading.

4. It can lower risks of dementia, enhance emotional regulation and increase verbal recall. This is why reading can reduce stress and anxiety.

5. It diversifies our minds and helps us experience the world through people's perspectives with different personalities and people of various cultures. In turn it increases empathy and help people come out of the bubble consisting of their own problems. It broadens our perspectives and helps us see how different people lead their lives.

It is really fascinating to see how a hobby that brings so much happiness and entertainment can also have such effects in the brain. Reading is a safe place, a comfortable place for so many people. Experiencing love, loss, anger, adolescence, maturity through the web of words written by the authors brings a different kind of peace and comfort to readers. Although people lost many things in this lockdown, I got a beautiful gift- my love for reading. The lyrical prose, inspiring words, captivating stories saved these two years for me. While the whole world was stuck in their homes, I went around the world with my books.