Reading as a default state

Or: why I read as much as I do

This post is for Stephanie.

The most straightforward answer to why I read as much as I do is because I like it. For someone who has an endless capacity to get excited about people, ideas, pieces of art, professions, personalities — and who has done her fair share of career, hobby, and place-of-residence switching — reading offers the most efficient way to live a thousand lives, to be a thousand souls. And especially since I started reading poetry, I’ve come to appreciate that there are truly a million ways to put life into words — and that some people are simply better at it than the rest of us.

But apart from all that — and probably even more importantly — there’s another reason I read as much as I do, one that some of you may find more relatable: I often prefer reading to the alternative.

For me, not reading doesn’t open up space for other adventures of the heart and mind. Not reading opens the door for old habits to kick in and for my brain to default to a familiar script — one organized around effort, discipline, and delay — that goes something like this:

The most important thing in life is to work hard — at work and at home. To work hard at work means accounting for every moment of your day and making sure everything you touch bears the marks of effort and diligence. If something feels easy, you must not be working hard enough. When you’re home, you should work hard on making that home as clean and orderly as possible so you can enjoy being in it. You can’t enjoy it unless you’ve done all the things. Do the things so that you can finally sit down and relax with, let’s say, a book. But you can’t enjoy the book unless everything is done — at work and at home.

I used to think this logic was primarily the result of my Eastern European upbringing — that after years of living under various degrees of state surveillance and oppression, people coped by building facades of impeccability. As I get older, I also recognize that there’s nothing especially Eastern European about this kind of dogged perfectionism. People under all sorts of circumstances respond to their particular lack of control by becoming especially controlling.

So, to bring things back to reading: I don’t read as much as I do because it fills my free time with something pleasant (which, of course, it does). I read because it redirects my attention away from a way of being that I am actively trying to avoid — a way of being defined by tightness, self-surveillance, and the constant sense that life must be endured before it can be enjoyed.

Reading allows me to enter a state of suspension — one where I can be with people, settings, and circumstances that are messy, confusing, liberating, oppressive, out of control. I don’t know how else to explain it except to say that when I make time to read, my capacity to deal with my own life — and my own bullshit — expands. My natural tendency to be tightly wound loosens its grip.

This might sound like another way of describing escapism, but to me it feels closer to practice. Not in a literal sense, but abstractly — the way the point of yoga isn’t to twist yourself into a pretzel. Reading, similarly, feels like a way to practice settling, focusing, expanding, and staying with whatever the moment has to offer. Even when the reading itself isn’t especially fun.

Accessing that space came more easily in my twenties and early thirties (pre-kid). But it was becoming a parent — stopping reading, focusing on getting ahead professionally, and keeping house — that made me realize how much I needed reading to stay grounded and to avoid feeling stuck. Ironically, it was going through what I now call my sad girl years that clarified this even further: reading isn’t optional for me. It’s central to my mental health and my sense of self-worth. I know some people feel that way about exercise. I wish I were one of those people

I’ve shared this analogy before, but picking up a book throughout the day feels a bit like a Roomba returning to its docking station. I float around doing the things I need to do — important things, necessary things — but whenever I can, I plug back in. That’s how I maintain my default state. The dustier the house, the more reading time I require to get myself ready to go again. And I mean that both literally and metaphorically.

• I try to read a little every morning, even if it’s just a couple of pages. I always want to be reading, but some days are completely nuts, and I hate spending the whole day in anticipation — will I or won’t I? If I get even a few pages in early, I feel steadier and more like myself.

• When I’m driving, especially my standard twenty-minute commute, I listen to audiobooks. Staying focused on audio was an acquired skill for me, but I’m so glad I practiced it because some days this is the only way I can return to that state. If a narrator feels too slow or too animated, try 1.2 or 1.5 speed. Someone who understands brains better than I do can explain why this helps — especially if you’re a little neuro-spicy.

• Always, always bring a book. I usually bring a physical one and read a few pages during my lunch break. I cannot overstate how much better a sad desk lunch feels once you add a book. Also: a visible book is an excellent conversation starter.

On my way to work. It’s a tote life.

• Audiobooks have made household chores borderline enjoyable, with one caveat: I don’t recommend multitasking unless the task is genuinely brainless. Emptying the dishwasher, folding laundry, weeding the yard — great. Actual cooking, for me at least, not so much.

• In our family, we’re all readers — but it took a while to get there. Now we end each day with what we call Family Reading Club. When my kid was little, we read to her every night. These days, we pile into her room and read our own books for twenty to thirty minutes before bedtime. It’s the sweetest ritual.

We also love a good library run followed by enjoying our loot at a coffee shop, and cozy weekend reading piles with tea and blankets. I finished Anna Karenina in one of those piles, reading the last pages while my kid read across from me on the couch — one of my happiest hours of 2025.

• On weekends, when I don’t have to rush into the day, I make myself stay in bed reading with a cup of coffee. It’s my favorite time to read — not just because it’s relaxing, but because it’s my way of choosing expansion over obligation first thing on my day off. That choice still feels like a major victory.

I don’t know that I’ll ever be done negotiating the pull between discipline and aliveness — between doing what’s required and choosing what keeps me open. But I do know that when I treat reading as my default state — something that steadies me, expands me, and brings me back to myself — everything else in my life tends to soften around the edges. I become more patient, more curious, less constricted. And that, for me, feels like a good place to organize from.

🤓 Some questions for you:

• Do you organize your life around discipline — or around what brings you back to yourself?

• What does your default state look like when you feel most like you?

• Are there small, everyday ways you interrupt the idea that pleasure has to be earned?

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