I was a just a young girl when I first discovered the wonder of reading.
“These words were, to me, as the notes of bells, the sounds of musical instruments, the noise of wind, sea and rain, the rattle of milk carts, the clopping of hooves on cobbles, the fingering of branches on a window-pane, might be to someone, deaf from birth, who has miraculously found his hearing,” says Dylan Thomas in Poetic Manifesto.
I find myself in the words on a page.
Reading, for me, is a relaxing beginning and end to my day. It is my gift to myself and to my children. It is my betterment. I bookend my day with it, to fill a mind with words and to empty a mind of troubles so I can naturally find my way into the flow of creativity.
I’ve been asked by many friends who watch my bookshelf how I have so much time to read.
And maybe it boils down to philosophy.
I believe that to be a better writer, we must first be readers. To be better painters, we must first be readers. To be better dancers or singers or songwriters or artists we must first be readers.
Reading takes us to places we’ve never been, and it brings us face to face with people and personalities we may or may not ever meet, and it broadens a mind and strengthens a soul and buries beauty in a heart.
So maybe it’s not a question of how much time but what we choose to do with our time.
I don’t have the time. I just make the time.
I wake up early and read for an hour before I have to get boys up for school. I read on my lunch break, between jotting notes and writing. I read standing in line to pick up my two oldest from school and in the grocery checkout line, too. I read in the bathroom and under the covers for the half hour I get between putting my boys to bed and going to bed myself. I listen to audio books while I’m getting ready for work and in the car on the way to work and while I’m folding the eight loads of laundry I have to do every week.
I read to all my boys, individually, while they’re taking a bath. I read from a chapter book for 10 minutes every evening. We all read silently for 10 more minutes before bed.
Reading is a part of our lives, and I think this is the only way we’ll find time to do it.
Sometimes reading seems impossible because we don’t have the chunks of time that finishing a chapter would require. One of the greatest gifts I gave myself when I became a parent was permission to put a book down, even if I hadn’t finished a chapter.
Sometimes I have five minutes to read and can finish a page or two. Sometimes I have 15 minutes and can read half a chapter. Sometimes I have an hour left over to myself and can read whole chapters at a time (very rare).
I don’t have the uninterrupted hours to read like I did as a child, or even before I became a mother, and my boys make life busy and a job makes it busier and the home responsibilities make it even busier, but I know I am doing myself no favors when I cut reading time from my day.
Reading makes me a better writer. It makes me a better journalist and editor. It makes me a better mother and wife and sister and daughter and friend.
Reading cracks open a world and rearranges it into something brand new. We owe it to ourselves to never stop reading.
What about you? Do you have a reading practice? Where do you squeeze in the moments for reading?
What is your story about becoming a writer or a creator? How did you know that’s what you wanted to be?
Welcome to The Ink Well Creative Community.
The Ink Well Community is evolving. While this used to be a place where I posted a prompt for writers to share their creative works, I have been receiving several inquiries about my process, how I create and read and manage a household with half a dozen little ones. So I thought we could turn this into a community of people who share about the creative process in all its many facets, from where we find our inspiration to when we find time to create (especially if we work other jobs). I’ll be sharing struggles about my creative life and logistical information about my particular creative process and what I’m learning about creativity, among many other things. I hope you’ll weigh in with your own struggles and observations and lessons. Let’s start a conversation. Let’s encourage one another. Let’s live the creative life together.
And if you have your own questions about creativity or process or inspiration, feel free to visit my contact page and send me a note.
