journal/

on-going mostly unedited stream of thoughts

the more I read

It is ironic how much I’ve evolved when it comes to goals, routines and habits. I remember so much of myself having an “artist temperament”, which loosely translates to “do anything I like at anytime”. If only they told me earlier that many of these artists had strict routines and practices.

I’ve written about some of my favorite habits, as well as the realization that I’ve to force myself to travel, all designed to overcome my lizard brain.

This year, I’ve set myself a goodreads reading challenge of 68 books, in an ambitious attempt to better my previous year’s goal of 50. Why? I know if I didn’t set myself a conscious goal, I’ll not prioritize reading among all the busyness in my life. I’m also trying to make up for all those years I’ve spent blindly living. Years I’ve hardly finished five books, much less 50. It also helps to realize that even if I tried really hard, there would still be a very finite number of books I can finish in my lifetime. Maybe not even 2000 books if I keep to a book a week for the rest of my life?

I’ve entered December with 22 books off my goal, so I did the next best thing. I picked books that were highly recommended but short. It was a great decision on hindsight, because I started reading books I might not have read otherwise.

Among them were “A room of one’s own”, “The awakening”, “Invisible cities”, “The lathe of heaven”, and “Too loud a solitude”. Books are like micro-worlds, like little travel experiences. The best ones not only bring you to another world, but they make your heart churn with their beautiful prose. They make you think, what sort of mind is capable of stringing words like they were never meant to exist otherwise?

The more I read, the more I yearn to read. For they remind me of all the other books I’m missing out on, the elasticity of the human mind, the worlds we could build, if only we give ourselves that time and space – to be, to create, to think. That books are evidence that we have a collective consciousness, that this consciousness will expand if everyone is free to share and access.

Imagine a world where we all hoard our knowledge, ideas and imagination?

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