Books and Me...

Reading and books is essentially what I am and what my life is about. Everything else is secondary. What makes up my thoughts, where I find solace, what my dreams are made of are all in the books I have read.

But now I don’t read as much as I used to. The reason is not that I am busy or don’t have time or have better things to do. Its way more fundamental than that. Every book I read becomes in some way a part of me. I think about it. It forces me to reflect. It’s almost like a living organism that morphs my thoughts such that they take a new shape and structure. All this most of the time causes a lot of dissonance and angst. After all I am not living the life I would ideally live; it’s not even close to what best I can be.

So the pile of unread books is growing in my shelf day after day. These days I am terrified of picking up a new book. I who was as impulsive as one can be, not afraid of change, not afraid of doing what I want to do has turned into this terrified, cornered individual finding safe haven in old and experienced much like my reading.

Is this what they call growing up…

Books and Me...

I feel I am finally beginning to understand books and writing…the written word has always spoken to me more than the said word…I was a voracious reader once…now I am just a reader…but there’s a huge difference…I was overly critical…I would only read the works I considered genius…of writers who “I thought” understood more than everyone else…of authors whose words filled my head with boundarylessness…and so I restricted myself…but now I am more appreciative of the way someone writes…even a simple thought and idea if written poignantly can give rise to a thousand new ideas…I think I am “hopefully” beginning to appreciate that now…