For the last several years, I have participated in a cycling fundraiser to raise money to fight children’s cancer. I’ve learned an important lesson along the way: Preparing ahead of time makes a huge difference. Preparation for the cycle challenge involves exactly what you’d expect: cycling daily to improve my cardio vascular health. In recent years, I have tried to take on what is called a zone training strategy. I train at different heart rate intensities to improve different aspects of my heart and lung health. In the long term, those improvements will pay dividends as I age. Everybody sort of knows that exercise improves our health and quality of life. Of equal (or greater) value for quality of life and long term health is daily reading, both for leisure and personal enrichment.
Regular reading brings with it a host of helpful benefits both physical and mental in nature. One of the most desirable is very similar to my cycling training. Whereas cardio improves heart/lung health, reading improves and helps to maintain vital brain functions, like memory. Studies have found that avid readers experience less decline in memory as they age than their non-reading counterparts. This is likely related to a recent finding that elderly persons who read or engage in other non-passive forms of entertainment are 2.5 times less likely to develop Alzheimer’s than their passive entertainment counterparts. The idea is that the brain requires regular exercise to keep it healthy and sharp over the long term.
In addition to the cognitive benefits, regular reading brings with it physical benefits. The idea that reading may improve your physical health may seem counterintuitive, but research suggests that stress reduction and improved sleep quality are among the benefits that come with picking up a good book. A 2009 Sussex University found that reading can reduce stress as much as 68%. Their research concluded that it didn’t matter what you were reading, but rather that the material was engrossing enough to draw you in and offer escape. Further, it has been thoroughly documented that reading a print book (rather than a tablet, phone, or e-reader) at bedtime resulted in more and higher quality sleep. This is because of the relaxing effects of reading as well as the elimination of blue light exposure which disrupts the body’s production of sleep hormones.
For parents: studies have found that the children of avid readers tend to also be avid readers. This is a huge deal given the well documented impact of reading to children and children reading to overall intelligence. Simply put: if you read to your kids and/or if they read avidly themselves it impacts brain development and contributes to a higher IQ.
Charles Spurgeon, one of the greatest preachers/authors of the last 200 years offers my final, and I believe most compelling argument for the value of reading. He once said: “Give yourself unto reading. The man who never reads will never be read; he who never quotes will never be quoted. He who will not use the thoughts of other men’s brains, proves that he has no brains of his own. You need to read.” The idea is simple. Reading expands your thoughts/knowledge by incorporating those of others. You multiply your own ability to think, reason, and understand by filling your head with the brilliance of others.
