About Me & Books

In my lifetime I’ve had a hard time with books, at first but there was this one book!

I explore the reasons why, if for the only reason that I enjoy them so much now, and benefit daily from the habit of reading.

One possible one is anxiety,

I thought of it as just a part of me, as in it was something to yield to, rather than something to overcome. But when you yield to anxiety, it swallows you up, and pushes you down. When I saw the movie A Beautiful Mind, with Russel Crow, from the book of the same title about the mathematician, John Forbes Nash, Jr. He is more of an example of schizophrenia, but I see my anxiety as thoughts which I do not own, and treat as separate from my true self. The Bible talks about holding our thoughts captive. I still have the anxious thoughts, but do not obey them, for want of a better way of expressing it. Anxiety manifested itself in how I viewed books, in that I feared that if I read a book, I’d lose my own mind, and become brain washed by the author of that book, and most importantly I would somehow lose God. It at last sounds ridiculous to me now, but as is always the case, an unchallenged thought is a like a dream where it all makes sense, until you wake up. Waking up from a dream, is parallel to confronting an anxiety, and instead believing and obeying the TRUTH. It’s the difference between walking according to my own understanding, and walking by faith. But that’s another topic altogether.

But so far I’ve only partially described my difficulty with reading. In High School I was to have read Crime and Punishment. I got part way through it, and got completely messed up, psychologically. I felt the guilt of the main character. Maybe it’s because I’m such an empathetic person, maybe because Dostoevsky is such a good writer! But I had to put it down to put myself out of my misery. I tried again many years later, same thing happened again, and maybe a couple times more, then finally about 10 years ago maybe, I made up my mind that I would do it! And I did do it! I found that the best way to describe my experience with that book as being crucified, and resurrected! Put to death and healed again! It’s utterly awe inspiring book.

From that book it was like I had a new suit of armour with which I could take on every book, and I eagerly read every book I choose. But the armour in all actuality is the armour of God…

Because it wasn’t all bad, not reading books for most of my life. For the one book I DID read was the bible, and as a consequence I know my bible better than most people I know. And again, that’s not to brag, its actually a frustration because I love to discuss the bible, and people I talk with get distracted by my knowledge of it, and/or intimidated by it. That part cannot be helped. But the benefit of knowing the bible so well is that as I read about the world through the eyes of authors both secular and Christian, I am able to better discern the truth, and appreciate the points of view expressed. Most of all it is the Holy Spirit that preserves me, and keeps me close. God is true to his promise expressed in John 14:26.

But that is merely scratching the surface of what reading will do for you! I also find that it connects me with others, because I am better able to understand others, because I’m not afraid of listening to them tell me their point of view. The beliefs and world view of people are for the most part a passive experience, in that they haven’t really sat down and thought it all the way through. They think that they are independent thinkers, but really, they have been influenced in one way or another by films, magazines, TV shows, news media, and the books they’ve read. Stephen Covey talks about this in his book, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Habit 5 is Seek first to understand, before seeking to be understood. Instead of a finding a world far from God, I find a world working out their version of the meaning of life. Every single one of us has to make up our minds about the one fact… we are all going to die. Life comes to an end one day for all of us. And along the way, our youth gives way to old age, our one time abilities fade away, and we are no longer quite so able. Trouble comes, and threatens our peaceful, blissful dancing around in the garden… and life becomes serious.

But now I’m rambling…

One more thing before you read on here… the way I’ve chosen what to read has been no way in particular. At first it was to read the books I was suppose to have read in school. Then it was to read the books recommended by others, and then as I discussed books with people they would tell me of their books, and I’d read a book they’d recommend. Andrew, John and I had a book club, and it ended up that Andrew would tell us which book we’d be reading, and I’d take part. It was a challenge. So, it stretched me, and I read outside of my comfort zone, and enlarged my point of view.

I hope to add my thoughts on each book at some point, for now all’s I can do is list them!

The Cost of Discipleship – Bonhoeffer

I’m not sure anymore if I actually made it to the end of this book, but nonetheless it’s been so long that it’s time to do it again, in order to claim having read it! The quote that keeps me going back to it is here.