How to lead 4000 lives

Even when life is limited, literature expands horizons

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is to use literature to expand your horizons, especially
if you are in a phase of life where your

(00:25):
opportunities for bigger adventures are limited. Books can be a
portal to other experiences and can make life feel fuller
no matter what else is going on. Today's tip comes
from Shigahiro Oishi. He's a psychology professor at the University
of Chicago who studies well being, and he's the author

(00:47):
of the book Life in Three Dimensions, How curiosity, exploration,
and experience make a fuller, better Life. Recently, on the
Happiness Lab podcast, she described a bookseller who said that
he had read four thousand books, so he had led
four thousand lives. I love that when we step inside

(01:11):
a book, or for that matter, watch a really good
movie or a play, we can be transported to another
person's experiences, thoughts, and feelings for a while. We live
where they live. What happens to them happens to us.
We step inside their experiences and share their emotions. Whatever

(01:33):
the specifics of your daily life, you can add what
ois she calls psychological richness by reading. As he puts it,
this lets you broaden your life by proxy. Your life
is not only as big as the experiences you yourself have.
Your life expands to encompass the experiences you read about two.

(01:56):
I find this a comforting thought, particularly as I ponder
how much to the world and how many experiences most
of us will never have. I will never be a
professional ballerina or opera singer or basketball player. But I
can read the memoirs of people who have had these
careers and see what their lives are like. Perhaps I'll

(02:17):
live abroad someday, but I lived in say, Paris for
a year. That means I probably wouldn't be living in
Tuscany for a year as well, or Norway for a year,
or near Yellowstone National Park for a year. But I
can read novels set in these places, or read the
biographies of people who have had those experiences. I know

(02:39):
for sure I will never live among the aristocracy in
nineteenth century Russia, but I can read Tolstoy and see
what that life is like. Even the longest books tend
not to take more than a few hours to read. Okay,
War in Peace might be more like thirty hours, but
even that would be doable in an hour a day

(02:59):
over a month. The six hours it takes to read
a novel set in Paris is less time than it
would even take to fly to Paris from the east
coast of the US, to say nothing of the cost. Now,
of course, I want people to travel to lots of places,
but during many phases of life that might be less possible.

(03:20):
Money might be tight. Maybe you have lots of little kids,
Maybe you are caring for a family member with complex
medical needs. Sometimes these situations can even prevent you from
meeting lots of different people with different points of view
and experiences. But that doesn't mean life has to be
completely limited. After all, four thousand books can give you

(03:42):
a glimpse at four thousand lives. That's a lot of adventure,
even if other sorts of adventures aren't possible. In the meantime,
this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making
the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast.

(04:09):
If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach
me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast
is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia,
please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you

(04:31):
listen to your favorite shows.