Why Read Stories?

In reading great literature I become a thousand men and yet remain myself. Like the night sky in the Greek poem, I see with a myriad eyes, but it is still I who see. Here, as in worship, in love, in moral action, and in knowing, I transcend myself; and am never more myself than when I do.

- C.S. Lewis

Within the cosy respite of my tiny home, I am indulging in hours of reading. Often a continuous train of reading doesn't happen so easily as the distractions of the day or evening pull me to and fro. My faltering is that I let them take me, even though I'd rather let the words on the pages transport me into another world. To read stories is to live in another world without leaving your own. It's magical.  You get to curl up in the cosiest spot on the sofa, place a steaming cup of tea on the table in front of you, and enter the world of story.

Within pages you get to see the world (or other worlds) through the eyes of someone else. You get to know other's thoughts, feelings, and emotions. You get to experience it, and yet you aren't leaving your sofa or your own life. The book may come with you wherever you go, so you might be at your desk reading, on the bus reading, or on a plane traveling across an ocean. Wherever you may be, you get to lives within other's lives through the transportation of books.

But why read stories when there are so many other things to do?

Stories require the use of your imagination, even more so if the story relies on a lot of metaphor. Your mind is engaged while reading as it is constantly creating in your imagination what you are reading about (creating the scenes, scenarios, viewpoints, characters, etc), and you are enriching your life with the wisdom gleaned from the stories. You sit above the vantage point of the story as you learn lessons as the characters figure things out. 

Keeping your mind engaged and active is a very good thing, and there are many studies that measure the beneficial effects that reading has on our brains.

So, what are you waiting for? Go pick up a good book and read a story!