Why I love to read…

I have recently started reading and appreciating more artsy stuff.. I came across this website – Berlin artparasites and they have some beautiful poetry and prose combined with interesting art work. I don’t have any background or education in liberal arts and barely have any knowledge about art, but I love reading these and hope to write something as beautiful someday..

For almost two decades, I have loved to read.. I read a variety of things – books (mostly fiction), blogs, opinion pieces, and anything else I can lay me eyes on. What draws me to reading is how words can provoke intense emotions in people across barriers of time, distance, and culture. When I read a good book, I find myself thinking about the people in the book for many days, about their stories, their hopes and emotions, their happiness and pain, what happened later in their life, and so on. Similarly, I find myself empathizing with a poet’s emotions when I read poetry. I have learnt a lot in these past years by reading blogs and opinions pieces about biases and prejudices, privilege, gender, etc. These have helped me broaden my perspective and question things that I grew up believing in.

Many times, I share things I can strongly relate to with close friends or my sisters. Other times, I come across articles that are more broad and interesting and question the current status quo or encourage us to think differently, and I share them either on Facebook or with the larger Whatsapp groups – my friends from school or college, cousins, etc. Sometimes, sharing these leads to interesting discussions with people.. The most mentally stimulating conversations I have on feminism are with my friend D who is a kickass fellow feminist! We share articles and news pieces from pop culture with each other and discuss and dissect them, and we both learn a lot from these discussions..

Before the clock strikes 12 (yes I’m secretly trying to post everyday in February because I could not do the January blogathon), I’ll end this post by saying that I love reading and can’t imagine a life without reading. If I had to pick my favorite reason why I love to read, I think it would be because reading has taught me to think beyond my own world and experiences and empathize with other people’s struggles and pain. So assuming that you love to read (given that you read blogs), why do you read or what’s your favorite part about reading?