Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. This has always been one of my favorite linkups and I knew I had to include it in my weekly posting schedule.

This week’s topic is reasons we love reading. I thought about a few different ways to approach this topic and decided to just go deep and personal and tell it like it is, rather than glossing things over or going for light and fun answers, like I usually do.

Books give me somewhere to belong

My entire life, I’ve always felt like I was on the outskirts of everything. I’ve always been the extra person invited along for the ride, usually at the last minute. The slightly different girl who was often sitting alone in the corner, or trying to cling to the one person she knew at any gathering. I’ve always felt that there was an otherness about me in every group setting, even to this day. Even with, or especially with, my family. But in a book, I lose that sense of not belonging and I am swept up into the story. I belong in the worlds I read about, no matter what that world involves.

There are people like me in books

Because I have that sense of otherness when around people in real life, it is so comforting to find people that I identify with and people who are like me in so many ways on the page. I sometimes feel like I was born into the wrong life. But finding myself in the characters I read helps me to know that there are others out there somewhere who are like me, and maybe places where I belong.

In books, I am still young

I often feel that I am not equipped to be an adult. I mean, I’m about to turn 50 and I still cannot take care of myself on a regular basis. I feel like I fail at adulthood in general. But in books that’s ok. I can read children’s books and I’m a kid again, YA and I am young and just starting out with the world laid before me. In books, and when reading, I haven’t made all of the mistakes that I’ve made in real life, and the opportunities are endless.

There are friends to be found between the pages

I don’t have many friends IRL, and I don’t have any local friends, so my friends are the characters on the pages. Or the readers I’ve connected with online.

I find hope for change in books

While not every book has a happy ending, most do. And a lot of times characters have redemption arcs. While I understand that most of what I read is fiction (I do read nonfiction as well), happy endings tend to give me hope for the future. And redemption arcs allow me to believe that people, including myself, can change for the better. And I choose to keep that hope when I leave the fictional world and carry it into real life with me.

I don’t feel alone when reading

Because I’m surrounded by characters and other lovers of books. Even if no one else is around IRL, I have people surrounding me in the story.

There is no judgement from books

Books don’t think that I’m weird or judge my interests or act like there’s something wrong with me because I prefer not to be social and never married. Books always welcome me in and invite me to stay.

There is no pressure from books

Books don’t expect anything from me. I don’t need to do anything for them or act a certain way or even agree with them. And if they sit on my shelves for years, they still have the same story to tell me as they would have if I’d read them right away.

I can be myself when reading

The story doesn’t care if I’m Bi, or depressed, or anxious. It doesn’t care that I love cats and the color pink and cuddling with stuffed animals at 50. Books let me be myself and feel however I’m feeling in that moment.

Reading brings me peace

When the world is confusing and I’m afraid of what is to come, reading gives me a place to escape to. When I feel alone and misunderstood, reading give me a place to belong and feel comforted. No matter where I’m at emotionally, mentally, even physically; reading has always brought me peace.

Disclaimer: All book covers link to Goodreads, all titles link to Amazon Smile. I am not an affiliate of either site and have not been compensated for this post in any way.