I have succumbed to the gratitude challenge running rampant on Facebook– and have enjoyed recognising people and experiences and aspects of life that inspire me forward…but even as I was sharing these, I was thinking, what is it about social media that fails to satisfy? I love keeping up with old friends and former students; hearing about the amazing things they are doing in their lives, but there are times when I turn away from scrolling through posts and feel a bit of despair…an insightful friend nailed it. She said, ‘…looking at Facebook is like going through a high school yearbook– you don’t see any of the crap- everyone’s lives look shiny and exciting all the time but no one really lives like that…’. If you are in a moment of struggle, if your adolescent is giving you fits or your bills are overdue, if you are struggling in your relationships, if you feel like time is not on your side or you just have a good case of the blues, it is hard to turn those experiences into a breath-taking photo or a witticism.
And yet I know that some of my best moments connecting with friends have been sharing the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune (sorry Hamlet) and through the support or insights or simply shared experiences of others, climbing just a bit out of the black box my mind has made in combination with difficult circumstances.
Significant literature does this well. In a graduate seminar, the lecturer proposed that the universal theme of great literature is struggle. That is it. Simple. And we continue to read and relish the journey of the struggle of characters–not just, I suggest, because of instinctive Schadenfreude but because we feel a companion in the realm of struggle–where we all live.
A recent scientific study bears this out. Last October, Liz Bury wrote about the positive effects of reading a good book on our ability to understand and empathise with each other. She finds that “research shows works by writers such as Charles Dickens and Téa Obreht sharpen our ability to understand others’ emotions – more than thrillers or romance novels.”
Here is more from the article
Have you ever felt that reading a good book makes you better able to connect with your fellow human beings? If so, the results of a new scientific study back you up, but only if your reading material is literary fiction – pulp fiction or non-fiction will not do.
Psychologists David Comer Kidd and Emanuele Castano, at the New School for Social Research in New York, have proved that reading literary fiction enhances the ability to detect and understand other people’s emotions, a crucial skill in navigating complex social relationships.
The article goes onto to consider the difference between ‘writerly’ and ‘readerly’ literature– interesting premise that writerly (i.e., significant) literature ” lets you go into a new environment and you have to find your own way” while readerly (more for entertainment’s sake) literature dictates the experience of the reader. So I want to go back to Facebook and create a five days of Grumbling tradition…well, no, not really– but maybe it is worth celebrating those books that have helped me be a more generous human being– or at least a work in progress.
Comments are welcome and always free….
Hi Toby
I’ve explored the world throughout my life via books as much as through raw experience. My education at so many levels has been through my exploration of the literature of the world, enhancing my real life at inner levels.but usefully and practically too. I travelled extensively before actually travelling in reality and this journeying through books was real too. So many great books out there to nourish, relish.