1. To Develop Your Verbal Abilities
Although it doesn’t always make you a better
communicator, those who read tend to have a more
varied range of words to express how they feel and
to get their point across. This increases exponentially
with the more volumes you consume, giving you a
higher level of vocabulary to use in everyday life.
Why read
2. Improves Your Focus and
Concentration
Unlike blog posts and news articles, sitting down
with a book takes long periods of focus and
concentration, which at first is hard to do. Being
fully engaged in a book involves closing off the
outside world and immersing yourself into the text,
which over time will strengthen your attention span.
Why to
3. Readers Enjoy The Arts and
Improve The World
A study done by the NEA explains that people who
read for pleasure are many times more likely than
those who do not to visit museums and attend
concerts, and almost three times as likely to
perform volunteer and charity work. Readers are
active participants in the world around them, and
that engagement is critical to individual and social
well-being.
4. It Improves Your Imagination
You are only limited by what you can imagine, and
the worlds described in books, as well as other
peoples views and opinions, will help you expand
your understanding of what is possible. By reading a
written description of an event or a place, your
mind is responsible for creating that image in your
head, instead of having the image placed in front
of you when you watch television. Why read
5. Reading Makes You Smarter
Books offer an outstanding wealth of learning and
at a much cheaper price than taking a course.
Reading gives you a chance to consume huge amount
of research in a relatively short amount of time.
Anne E. Cunningham and Keith E. Stanovich’s “What
Reading Does for the Mind ” also noted that heavy
readers tend to display greater knowledge of how
things work and who or what people were. Books at
home have been strongly linked to academic
acheivement. If you are looking for a list of great
books to read, check out 10 Easy To Read Books That
Make You Smarter .
6. It Makes You Interesting And
Attractive
This goes hand in hand with reading to become
smarter. Having a library of information that you
have picked up from non-fiction reading will come
in handy in any academic or scholarly conversation.
You will be able to hold your own and add to the
conversation instead of having to make your excuses
and leave. You will be able to engage a wider
variety of people in conversation and in turn
improve your knowledge and conversation skills. Why
to read
7. It Reduces Stress
A study by consultancy firm Mindlab International
at the University of Sussex showed that reading
reduces stress. Subjects only needed to read,
silently, for six minutes to slow down the heart rate
and ease tension in the muscles. In fact it got
subjects to stress levels lower than before they
started. For more information, check out the
Telegraph article here. Why read
8. It Improves
Your Memory
In their book Proust
and the Squid: The
Story and Science of
the Reading Brain,
Maryanne Wolf
explains that
“Typically, when you
read, you have more
time to think.
Reading gives you a
unique pause button
for comprehension
and insight. By and
large, with oral language—when you watch a film or
listen to a tape—you don’t press pause.” The
benefits of this increased activity keeps your
memory sharp and your learning capacity nimble.
Why read
9. To Discover
and Create
Yourself
In his book How to
Read and Why ,
Harold Bloom says
that we should read
slowly, with love,
openness, and with
our inner ear cocked.
He explains we should
read to increase our
wit and imagination,
our sense of
intimacy–in short, our entire consciousness–and also
to heal our pain. “Until you become yourself, what
benefit can you be to others.” With the endless
amount of perspectives and lives we can read about,
books can give us an opportunity to have experiences
that we haven’t had the opportunity to, and still
allow us to learn the life skills they entail. Books are
a fast rack to creating yourself. Why read
10. For Entertainment
All the benefits of reading mentioned so far are a
bonus result of the most important benefit of
reading; Its entertainment value. If it were not for
the entertainment value, reading would be a chore
but it needn’t be. Reading is not only fun, but it has
all the added benefits that we have discussed so
far. Much more enthralling than watching a movie or
a TV show (although they have their many benefits
as well), a good book can keep us amused while
developing our life skills.