Why are we reading for?

Beware for another random thoughts.

As I was packing my stuffs to go back home to Jakarta for a shortwhile during summer, I packed several of my finished books to put in Dubai. Did so so that when I need to move back later on, at least I've got rid of several unused stuffs.

And then I started to think.. all these books I've read, but none of them really stuck to me. I cannot remember a memorable lines, I mean I can tell you how it made me feel reading the books, but I can barely retell you the story or the content. I read The Cultural Map. But what I can tell you about it?? Other than people came from different background and stories and how I became more 'aware' on how we say direct and indirect things, I think..

Wait.

So I have become more consciously aware of how people communicate! And how even with direct communication, people have different way to share feedback! Wow, I actually got something.

Sure I think there are still a lot of interesting part at the end of that book that I think is interesting, but somehow that didn't stick to me. Either I didn't really relate to it or just because I read it in a hurry to finish the book during the flight haha.

OK. So now, I think I can craft what reading means to me.

Reading means you are opening yourself to the possibility of having a game-changer mindset, eye-opener, an emotion, or simply just joy from passing through the time. It doesn't mean everything you read will stick to you, but when it does then it fucking does.

Books that stick to me, even though I cannot remember the exact plot are like Laskar Pelangi and Negeri 5 Menara. I think The Naked Traveler is also that kind of book! I know I want to travel and see the world after I read those amazing books. They're definitely the kind of book that I would want to re-read.

There are eye-opener books that are very enjoyable to me, like Freakonomics, Factfulness, Indonesia Etc, Sapiens Graphic Novels. There are books that make you feel empowered, like Educated and Becoming. There are also books that give me emotions, mostly fiction books like Harry Potter.

I do not need to memorize all the words in the book to say that I've read the books. But I need to make sure that I digest the words from the sentences and chapters that are meaningful to me. And not every book will make you feel something, and that's okay.

FYI, I wanted to ask this blog's title to ChatGPT. But then I remember this quote: we use AI not so that they can write and make arts. We use AI so that we can write and make arts because they are doing the menial jobs like washing the dishes and cleaning. Well, not the exact word-by-word quote but that's close! Let me also share with you the image below if I found it haha.

Found it!