A Jumpstart to Life Experience can be gained through Reading →

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Many book lovers write about their lifelong love of books. I didn’t start my love affair with books until I finished college. I remember a family of one of my Uncles and what seemed to be an absolute devotion to readers when the cousins were growing up. The books I saw in the girl’s rooms during our visits over the years impressed me.

I recall seeing an interview conducted by Prince Harry with President Obama. He asked him many questions, some seeming insignificant. What kind of boxer briefs do you wear? Obama said that was off-limits. Good for him. Who cares? Questions about Royal Weddings were attractive to many. The comments on social media were good ones.

These men have had exciting lives, but they have some insight beyond their path of experience. Wouldn't it be interesting to know what books had been essential and of interest to either Obama or Prince Harry? What books influenced Gandhi, Lincoln, Putin, and maybe my father and their fathers?

The books with the most significant impact on our lives change and evolve, but so do we. Some books may always make our top list. Some new ones have come. So, this year, I had several new ones that will likely stick with me. "American Wolf by Nate Blakeslee and Nothing to Envy, Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick came to mind and impacted me, but many others did.

Recalling what books I read when I was young is challenging. Unfortunately, I only read books with deeper meanings and influence once I was almost out of high school.

One time in my early teens, I recall visiting my uncle’s family on a trip our family took. He had a large family, and the two girls that were the closest to me in age were sharp. Socially, probably ahead of me at the time and perhaps even a little brighter (I can't believe I said that). Walking down the hall in their home, I remember seeing many books in the girls’ rooms. So I asked them to show me what they were reading, and they were books with more profound meaning and influence than I was used to.

This wasn't my life a-ha moment for loving books, but it was an important one, and I did up my own game and added some better books to read.

When I was about 3 or 4, my parents would take turns reading to me at bedtime. They read kid books, probably from the Little Golden Books series. At about eight years old, I started reading funny books. Superman, Batman, Spiderman, Donald Duck, and Uncle Scrooge. At about ten years old, I began reading Boy's Life. At around 12, I started reading movie magazines. I read the TV guide, Reader's Digest, Popular Mechanics, and everything around the house.

After about the 9th grade, I became interested in well-known dystopian books such as 1984, Brave New World, and Animal Farm. By the time I started college, my interest in philosophy had led me to The Republic by Plato, Aristotle and The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli, to name a few.

After High School, I read Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie, and many self-help books.

When I finished college, I began reading many business books. Robert Ringer's book "Winning Through Intimidation" impacted me. I also started reading church books. I have read the scriptures over and over throughout my life.

I have read Ulysses by James Joyce several times to determine if I could understand it. I have read War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy and most of what Shakespeare wrote. Moby Dick is a book that I read several times and started out hating, but after the last reading, I saw it as a great book. Henry David Thoreau's Walden and Civil Disobedience are books I have read several times.

My love of these books led me to pick the authors that stood out. Edgar Allan Poe, Steinbeck, J.D. Salinger, Virginia Woolf, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Charles Dickens are all authors I like. Hemmingway and Mark Twain are authors I have read but don't care for. I have read great books, such as Faulkner, Nabokov, T.S. Elliot, C.S. Lewis, Toni Morrison, Walt Whitman, and Franz Kafka.

I love the authors but love the poets even more sometimes. Robert Frost is a favorite poet, and a new poet I like and want to hear more from is Amanda Gorman. Her inauguration day poem for President Biden, "The Hill We Climb," is amazing.

Ok, I have some fallback favorites. Stephen King always gets my attention. There are several dozen authors I should have included. (Apology to Maya Angelou, for example) There are lots of modern and exciting authors.

“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.”

~ George R.R. Martin.

Reading Changes Our View of Our Path Taken Throughout Our Life →

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I admire those that can quote favorite thoughts from favorite books, famous people, or scriptures. Even more so, I admire those that can remember most of what they have read. I find myself going back and rereading much of what I have already read, and when I do, it often feels like a whole new experience. Each reading brings something new to us.

Why would going back and re-reading bring new thoughts? This same question could be asked as to why you see things differently when you retell your life story. One answer to this question is a crucial point I used in my book: Why Life Stories Change: As you Look at your Own Life Story, You See Yourself Differently. When you re-read something or retell your life story, you see things through a lens that has added experiences to your view.

Abraham Lincoln said: “What I want to know is in books, and my best friend is the one who will get me a book I haven’t read.”

In Lincoln’s quote, he expresses his interest in finding something new to read, but he often uses the books he has already read to make his points. Throughout his life, he frequently quoted scriptures to make his point. Perhaps he felt people would be less likely to question conclusions drawn from scriptures.

Louis L ’Amour was a prolific writer of Western Novels, but his book “Education of a Wandering Man” was his autobiography. Throughout the book, he talks about his life, and we can see that he had a lifelong habit of reading everything he could, and that, indeed, was his education. He tied the events of his life to the things he was then reading, and they combined to form his memoir.

A story from L’Amour’s book told of his life as a young man jumping on a moving train and living in hobo camps, but as part of the story, he recalled books he read while traveling the rails between cities.

Shakespeare’s writings contained over 500 references to the Bible. We could ask ourselves why he chose to do that. Was it an effort to influence his follower’s feelings, and he needed the authority of the quote? Was that the real reason for Lincoln’s similar use of scripture quotes? In both cases, it may have been that both men were readers and that the things quoted were the things that defined the outlook of these men.

Harold Bloom wrote a book titled “How to Read & Why.” He addresses the meaning of this title in his prologue titled “Why Read.” His answer was clear enough. He said it was because “It Matters.” Understanding if it matters to us can be determined by comparing what we read to our lives.

In the scriptures, Luke 10-26, Jesus Christ asked a profound question: "And who is my neighbor?"

Jesus said unto him, What is written in the law? How readest thou? This was addressed to a man seeking direction in his life. “ The man was told to go and love the Lord and his neighbors, but the answer came from reading.