You Should Read Every Day: 5 Top Reasons Why

This post was most recently updated on October 23rd, 2023

[A collaboration post – all thoughts are my own.]

Do you like to read every day? The most important reason to read nonfiction every day is for regular maintenance and updates for your brain.

Life is busy; between work, family, school, and blogging, we barely find the time to spend time alone, watching Netflix, having a self-care evening, let alone reading a book. When was the last time you read a book? If your daily reading habits are centered around the latest Instagram posts, latest tweets, and Facebook updates, you are one of many people who do not make a habit of reading on a regular basis.

We live in a digital world. Push notifications are constantly alerting us to social media messages, new emails, news headlines, app updates, etc. While it’s nice to be up-to-date, these constant distractions aren’t very beneficial for our brains. In other words, where can you find calm? The answer is very simple: read every day.

“Books are the perfect entertainment: no commercials, no batteries, hours of enjoyment for each dollar spent. What I wonder is why everybody doesn’t carry a book around for those inevitable dead spots in life.” — Stephen King

I like to think that our whole body is like a computer. Imagine your body is a piece of hardware, and your brain is the software to operate your body. Well, I’m not a biologist, but even if the brain is a remarkably powerful organ, the software it runs among neurons is quite buggy.

Our brain bugs come from many different sources; they can be from traumatic experiences (I can’t swim because I almost drowned when I was twelve, it’s traumatic), limiting beliefs, lack of awareness, and so on.

Now, by reading, talking to people, reflecting, and observing different situations, you can update your software to be less … buggy. It’s simply like this:

Updating your brains = download + process + apply

After updating your brains, you will have the ability to make your brains (software) more capable and more accurate with fewer bugs. Meaning, that you become more intelligent when you regularly update and maintain your software.

And among all the ways of “downloading” knowledge to update the “software” that your brain runs, reading is one of the best, free, and most popular ones.

The simple, mindful action of reading can make you less stressed, more empathetic, and not to mention, smarter. However, finding the right time to focus on reading can be hard. I like to read on break and before sleeping.

Reasons why you should read every day

Reading helps us open new perspectives and angles. It enables us to improve our communication abilities and understand the world, and ourselves much better. That’s why most successful people, no matter the industry; read a lot.

Here are some reasons why you should read every day, which will get you to start reading.

Read every day helps your creativity

I know that some people don’t like to watch movie adaptations. My friends said because when you anticipate some interesting scene from the books, and they do not make it to the movie, you feel disappointed. People like to imagine things and expect the best when the production team chooses the actor/actress and the scenes.

You know, when you watch a movie or a TV series, you have visual material in front of you. But when you read, especially fiction books, you have to imagine things. And your imagination is … unlimited.

You can imagine a situation in many different ways and with dozens of different mental pictures. You can play it over and over again in your mind by adding things and taking them away. This is a big stimulation for your brain’s neurons.

When you read every day, you’re making your own mental movie; or even many different versions of Harry Potter and Twilight. If I need more ideas for my blogging or any subject in my life, the first thing I do is to read as much as possible on the topic. When I read a lot of ideas and knowledge, new ideas start to pop up. So, whenever you feel stuck with ideas at any time, start reading and reading a lot.

Read every day helps with knowledge

Everything you read is filled with new information and you never know when it might come in handy. You may find yourself in a difficult situation, and you might lose everything else – your jobs, money, even your health – but knowledge can never be taken from you.

If you are afraid to make mistakes when translating foreign information for your project or study, don’t hesitate to ask for professional service. Knowledge is very valuable and you don’t want to get false information, let alone spread it to the world. Day Translations will help you to transfer the knowledge into your native or target language. Don’t worry about privacy, the world’s leading business trusts them and they’re always ready to chat with you 24/7; in whatever way is easiest for you.

The more accurate knowledge you have by reading every day, the better equipped you are to handle any challenge you’ll ever face in life.

Read every day helps with vocabulary expansion

“A book can talk to your mind. A book can go around the world with you. A book can make you a smarter individual.” — Dr. T. P. Chia

Someone from my previous job asked me how I can speak English because she wants her children to learn it too. I told her that I read a lot: study books, illustration books, a dictionary with a lot of funny pictures, global news, and more English novels. The more you read, the more words you gain exposure to. The more I read English books, they will inevitably make their way into my everyday vocabulary.

Reading books is vital for learning second languages, as non-native English speakers gain exposure to words used in context, which will help their own speaking and writing fluency. I used to be very bad with grammar, so reading the formula really helped me a lot. Knowing that you can speak another language with self-confidence can be an enormous boost to your self-esteem too.

Read every day improves focus and concentration

As a blogger, attention is drawn in a million different directions at once as we multi-task through every day.

In a single 10-minute span, the average person (including myself) will divide their time between working on a task, keeping an eye on Twitter/Instagram, monitoring their smartphone, checking email, and interacting with others. This type of behavior causes stress levels to rise, lowers our productivity, and doesn’t know which one to prioritize.

When you read a book, all of your attention is focused on the story and you can immerse yourself in every fine detail you’re absorbing. You don’t even realize how time flies so fast when you’re focused.

Try reading for 15 minutes before work and you will be surprised at how much more focused you are once you get to work.

Read every day is a free entertainment

Reading is entertaining, and it’s FREE!

Though many of us like to buy books so we can dog-ear pages for future reference, they can be quite pricey. Sure, buying books is an option, however, it may become expensive should you find reading to be something that you enjoy.

For low-budget entertainment, you can visit your local library and enjoy your time with countless books available there for free. If your area doesn’t have a library and you can’t get to one easily, there are also numerous apps that are available for free on your smart devices. I like to read on Wattpad, and though now they also have paid stories, there are still thousands of them who are free to read.

There’s a reading genre for every literate person in the world, and whether your tastes lie in classical literature, poetry, fashion magazines, biographies, religious texts, young adult books, self-help guides, or romance novels, there’s something out there to capture your curiosity and imagination.

Most kids around me don’t really like reading, because they’re too focused on their smartphones – even my cousins who are already in high school. So, I’m trying to convince you to read more here. But reading is not enough. Thinking about it is not enough. Only reflecting is also not enough. You have to change your behavior in the end. Download, process, apply. But reading is where you most often start.

“A house without books is like a room without windows.” — Horace Mann

Regular reading means regular brain maintenance. Research has shown that reading improves your memory and greatly decreases the chance of cognitive diseases like Alzheimer’s. It also helps slow down your cognitive decline with age. Reading is the workout for your brain. You have to take care of your body and your mind.

Do you read every day? What kind of genres do you enjoy? Let me know your stories below.