“I’ve always thought that a good book should be either the entry point inward, to learn about yourself, or a door outward, to open you up to new worlds.” ― Taylor Jenkins Reid
As the dog days of summer wind down, you might try to squeeze in one last trip to the beach or indulge in a quiet lazy weekend. Many of us enjoy the guilty pleasure of reading lighter fare during our vacations. Why is that a good thing? Aside from pure escape, reading contributes to both mental and physical well-being. Additional benefits include brain stimulation, stress reduction, greater empathy and entertainment. If this isn’t enough to convince you, reading also:
- Helps expand your knowledge. In fact, every time you learn something new, you can draw on the facts, ideas or even vocabulary to apply to aspects of your life.
- Builds analytical thinking. As you engage with complex plots and characters, you expand your critical thinking skills.
- Improves memory. Reading requires you to remember connections among characters, plots and details, which can train your brain to recall information.
If you love to get lost in legal thrillers or procedures, in the back of your mind, notice how lawyers plan their strategies, prepare their witnesses, influence the juries and win their cases. Or if your appetite leans more to historical fiction, notice both what is similar to life today and what is remarkably different. Maybe you secretly indulge in the occasional romance novel. Notice how characters communicate and relate to each other. How do they get entangled and recover from sticky situations? What emotional intelligence is at play as the characters find their way into each other’s hearts?
We encourage you to read whatever appeals to you—and use the content to make connections to current business challenges. How might you apply character behaviors to gain insights to problems you face in your office? Decades ago, a dear friend and female vice-president of a Fortune 500 company admitted, “I no longer read business books. I’ve read hundreds of them, but the truth is, I love fiction, and I have very limited free time. Fiction helps me wind down after a stressful day—and I’ve discovered that I learn more about how to interact with my colleagues, motivate my team and navigate organizational politics through fiction.”
When helping our clients be more creative and innovative, we believe in reading to help promote the use of “forced connections.” By noting qualities of one thing, you can force connections to a problem you’re experiencing and gain lateral insights. Download our FREE handout to learn more about how to use this engaging technique alone or with your team.
For now, move that book you’ve been dying to read to the top of the stack. Discover connections you can make to better your world!