To Read or Not To Read: Books & Wellness

"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, who had ever been alive". ― James Baldwin

There is no better time than the present to commit to caring for yourself in the best way you possibly can. Actively practicing self-care in a way that feels right to you has many powerful benefits. Your version of self-care might look really different than what others do, and that’s okay! Here's some ways you can put caring for yourself into practice:

• Setting your health & well-being baseline/goal

• Recognizing burnout/stress

• Setting boundaries

• Knowing your preferred methods of self-care

• Continued self-care practices (not just self-soothing

• Finding community & resources for support - we're here to help!

• Through self-reflection and noticing what works for you

• i.e. connecting with friends,

• And my personal favourite - reading.

Reading is self-care, even if it can seem daunting at first. When you've got a million scientific articles and literature to read for your degree, picking up a novel might seem like overkill - but reading something that brings you joy can help alleviate stress, and ease anxiety. Research shows that by suspending reality, readers can escape into an altered state of consciousness, which alleviates tension in the muscles and heart. And, genre doesn’t really matter – the relaxing effect produced by reading works as long as you can lose yourself in the narrative. Taking steps to protect your physical and mental health is an important part of navigating this increasingly stressful world, and using reading as an outlet for self-care can bring you relaxation, joy, and excitement!

If you commute, this is the perfect opportunity to get reading in! Nothing helps you prioritize, like setting goals. Just as you do in your academic life, set reading goals to motivate yourself to read - I love a good reading challenge, here's Girlxox's Master List of Reading Challenges. Our very own Toronto Public Library also has their version of a reading challenge that invites you to read widely and discover new books, authors and genres. Read or listen to 12 books in 12 categories from January to December to complete the 2023 Reading Challenge - and you can even win some prizes! I also love leaving reviews on Goodreads after I've finished a book - Goodreads allows members to catalog the books they're currently reading, have read, and want to read. You can also create custom “bookshelves” to organize and track books, and follow your friends to see what books they're discussing!

Here are some of the Wellness Team's favourite books:

A God of Small Things by Arundathi Roy

Set in Kerala, India, in 1969, The God Of Small Things is the story of seven-year-old twins Rahel and Estha, born of a wealthy family and literally joined at the soul. This book shows that how small things in life can affect a person's life but there is always a ray of hope sent by the almighty himself. This book is narrated brilliantly from the third person point of view and also from Rahel's point of view. The book's beauty lies in its way of narration, a non-sequential way of narration with the words chosen enticingly. A simple story of the complicated Ipe family set in the backdrop of social discrimination, communism and caste system, this book is mainly based on the betrayal and always pops the question into the mind of the reader 'Can we trust anyone? Can we trust ourselves?'. With mesmerizing language that brings to mind such authors as Salman Rushdie, Gabriel García Márquez, and William Faulkner, The God Of Small Things ambitiously tackles such profound issues as family, race, and class, the dictates of history, and the laws of love. Rahel and Estha learn too soon that love and life can be lost in a millisecond.

The Blue Between Sky and Water by Susan Abulhawa

The novel centres on the sufferings of the Baraka family, forced to leave their idyllic village of Beit Daras in 1948 for a refugee camp near Gaza’s southern shores. After which, the family scatters. But this is not only a story about displacement. It takes in love, hatred, sex, survival, death, loss and belonging. It is full of celebratory dances, partying on the beach, mourning, fear, mysteries, dirty jokes and national heroism. It is evident that, as she puts it at a vital point in the novel: “The human heart is made of the words we put in it.”

Everything else, she writes, might vanish, but words, stories and dreams remain and each find their place in the coming generations. Characters struggle to keep their secrets, but Abulhawa releases them. These are secrets we need to know, secrets that will educate us about ourselves, and Gaza.

Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner

An excerpt from Michelle's New Yorker article: Ever since my mom died, I cry in H Mart. For those of you who don’t know, H Mart is a supermarket chain that specializes in Asian food. The “H” stands for han ah reum, a Korean phrase that roughly translates to “one arm full of groceries.” H Mart is where parachute kids go to get the exact brand of instant noodles that reminds them of home. It’s where Korean families buy rice cakes to make tteokguk, a beef soup that brings in the new year. It’s the only place where you can find a giant vat of peeled garlic, because it’s the only place that truly understands how much garlic you’ll need for the kind of food your people eat. H Mart is freedom from the single-aisle “ethnic” section in regular grocery stores. They don’t prop Goya beans next to bottles of sriracha here. Instead, you’ll likely find me crying by the banchan refrigerators, remembering the taste of my mom’s soy-sauce eggs and cold radish soup. Or in the freezer section, holding a stack of dumpling skins, thinking of all the hours that Mom and I spent at the kitchen table folding minced pork and chives into the thin dough. Sobbing near the dry goods, asking myself, “Am I even Korean anymore if there’s no one left in my life to call and ask which brand of seaweed we used to buy?”

Before the coffee gets cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

If you could go back, who would you want to meet? In a small back alley of Tokyo, there is a café that has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. Local legend says that this shop offers something else besides coffee—the chance to travel back in time. Over the course of one summer, four customers visit the café in the hopes of making that journey. But time travel isn’t so simple, and there are rules that must be followed. Most important, the trip can last only as long as it takes for the coffee to get cold. Heartwarming, wistful, mysterious and delightfully quirky, Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s internationally bestselling novel explores the age-old question: What would you change if you could travel back in time?

Where I get my books from:

• BMV Books: There's multiple locations of this independent bookstore brand around the city, but this one in the Annex remains a favourite. Get lured in by their signature stacks of cheap used reads at the front of the store and stay for its easy-to-walk-through aisles and huge selection of well-priced books.

• Monkey's Paw: As its name implies, this Bloorcourt bookstore is all about adventure-namely the one of discovering awesome old reads. Any book lover can spend an unreasonable mount of time perusing the shelves here, but the store's biggest draw is definitely the Biblio-Mat: a homemade machine that shoots out a random used book for the cost of a Iwoonie.

• Balfour Books: Located in Little Italy, this small shop has a quality of its own. Neither dusty nor discount-oriented, Balfour is a cozy yet classy store where you can find a surprising amount of used gems well below average retail pricing.

“[D]on't ever apologise to an author for buying something in paperback, or taking it out from a library (that's what they're there for. Use your library). Don't apologise to this author for buying books second hand, or getting them from bookcrossing or borrowing a friend's copy. What's important to me is that people read the books and enjoy them, and that, at some point in there, the book was bought by someone. And that people who like things, tell other people. The most important thing is that people read...” ― Neil Gaiman