As you may have seen from Sunday, I am using the book “All are Free to Write” by Sheila Allee to help me to feel inspired and to write. The first prompt was about intentions for the next year and giving permission to do things. I made a list of 5 different things I want to give myself permission to do this year. I know I am technically starting this book in the month of February, but I think I can still work towards utilizing it appropriately.
The second INTENTION on my list is:
Reading what I want to read.
Reading is supposed to be for entertainment and sometimes for education. It should be enjoyable and you should be able to read whatever the heck you want to read. This is my philosophy now, but I have struggled with this greatly. There are a lot of reasons for that struggle, but one of the primary ones is my brain told that I should read “important works” that “have meaning” and “social stakes”. This was my mentality for numerous years. I recognize now that we should read what the heck we want to read.
Where does my idea of reading come from? The past. My father pushed reading on me, in a positive way for many years. He told me that I should read anything and everything. He would try to purchase books like “The Prince” by Machiavelli for me to read. I loved to read “Fear Street” by R.L. Stine and at one point was a huge “The Babysitters Club” by Anne M. Martin fan. There were times that he definitely purchased for me those books, mainly the “Fear Street” books. He refused to purchase the other. We won’t go into those reasons in here because it isn’t necessary for this particular post. There is a memory attached to one of those books though that I may share someday. His messaged always continued to be “read anything and everything”. It wasn’t until I got to be a bit older that I recognized and realized that he was often trying to push books that he enjoyed onto me or that had some meaning for him. He wasn’t interested in what I wanted to read for enjoyment. I get that we all want to share our love of books with other people when we have this passion, but there is a moment where it crosses a line. I realize that there were moments that it crossed a line into “Don’t enjoy what you are enjoying, instead enjoy what I tell you to enjoy.” This should have never been the message conveyed to a child, it should be “read for enjoyment.” Please, the person reading this, if you struggle with reading I want you to hear this, if you want to read a trashy romance novel PLEASE READ IT. If your thing is high brow literary fiction, PLEASE READ IT. Read whatever the heck you want and devour it if you love it. Reading should be personal. It should be fun. It should not sting or feel forced. There are books that may take longer than others, but that is not what I mean. When you feel like you have to read a book, outside of academia, you should stop and ask why you are reading that book. I am learning that about the books that I gravitate towards now.
I had thought that I had gotten over these issues with reading, but when I went home due to a family member’s passing I distinctly remember sharing that I was doing a book blog with my father. I remember the feeling of disdain he gave me when he looked at my book blog. It wasn’t the type of books he would read is how he made me feel. I stopped book blogging after that. I felt defeated. This killed my love of reading for a second time, the first being after childhood. I couldn’t find a spark for reading any more. Anytime I set down to read, I would think I was not reading something that was worthwhile or that I would be judged for reading. I gave up on the act of reading entirely. I loved reading before. I loved books like “The Joy Luck Club”, “The Handmaid’s Tale”, “The Alchemist”, and “The Color Purple” to name a few.
I want to be my own reader. Reading things that I want to enjoy. This is important to me because I love books. I always have and one day I would love to publish a book. I would love to see a by line that is my own. I can thank my dad for this as well because he always helped me to recognize that I could write. Words do not have to be perfect. You do not have to know every single rule to be a writer, a writer is someone that simply writes. I feel like I got part of that message from him. So not everything is negative, but definitely he defeated my reading habits. I own so many books now. I have books from so many genres that I want to read, that I picked. I can’t read them usually. I get in my own head, so I want to create a goal of reading a certain number of pages a night. I have started this at 20 pages a night. There are times I do not meet it, but I am not critical of myself instead when I get to it I make sure to read twenty pages and praise myself for having read more than I read last year. I keep a positive attitude. It is a struggle though. I am still draw to books sometimes that I have no desire to read because of these voices that tell me that I should be reading this or that.
My favorite genre is MURDER MYSTERY. I want to read THRILLERS. I want to sit and be swept away in these types of books. I do enjoy books with social commentary as well. These take longer for me to read, but I love them. I enjoy a very distinct group of comic books. I find myself drawn to obscure titles more than the mainstream “Batman” types. This next year, I want to become intune with myself as a reader. I want to find what books I want to read and not feel like I am obligated to make someone else happy in what I read. I know that if I just listen to myself and ask myself why I want to read a particular book, I can figure out the difference between a book that is being signaled to me from an outside voice or when it is truly a book that I want to read. This will become easier with time, but for now I struggle and want to work on this. I want to make an intention to read books that I want to read and move towards returning to being a reader. My own type of reader. Not yours.
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