This past year, I've found myself returning again and again to lines of poetry by Emily Dickinson. Like many people, I've needed the curing effects of reading more than ever. As scientists and psychologists will tell you, books are good for the brain and their benefits are particularly vital now.

Books expand our world, providing an escape and offering novelty, surprise and excitement. They broaden our view and help us connect with others. Books can also distract us and help reduce our mental chatter.When we hit the “flow state" of reading where we're fully lost in a book, our brain's mode network calms down. It's a network of brain that is active and gets absorbed in thinking and worrying endlessly when we are not doing anything else.

There is so much noise in the world right now and the very act of reading is kind of meditation. You disconnect from the chaos around you.You reconnect with yourself when you are reading. And there's no more noise.

In 2020, the NPD Group recorded the best year of book sales since 2004. Yet even as people are buying more books,many are reporting they're having a harder time getting through them. It's difficult for your brain to focus on a book when it's constantly scanning for threats to keep you alive.Our fight-or-flight response has been consistently activated.

Sometimes I picture my brain as a cartoon brain with little arms and legs, fighting with a book I am holding and screaming: “Can't you see I'm busy!” Anxiety causes our brain to produce a flood of stress,which consumes our energy and makes it harder to concentrate.

Then one day in December sitting on my couch, I remembered how much I like to read"The House of Mirth" every few years around the holidays. The memory inspired me to pick up the familiar book, opened it up and started reading.I just kept going.The comfort and distraction and brain-opening experience gave me peace.So return to something familiar.

You can either travel or read, but either your body or soul must be on the way. The popular saying has inspired many people to read or go sightseeing. Traveling just like reading, is a refreshing journey from the busy world. Books, brain food, can keep you company on your travel.

On the Road, 1957, by Jack Kerouac

The book is a globally popular spiritual guide book about youth. The main character in the book drives across the US continent with several young people and finally reaches Mexico. After the exhausting and exciting trip, the characters in the book begin to realize the meaning of life. The book can be a good partner with you to explore the United States.

Life is Elsewhere, 1975, by Milan Kundera

Jean-Jacques Rousseau once said, “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” The book tells a young artist’s romantic but miserable life, about how he reads, dreams, and has a relationship. Experience the artist’s passionate life in the book during a trip to Central Europe. The book invites you to deeply reflect on your current life.

The Stories of Sahara, 1967, by Sanmao

The book narrates the author’s simple but adventurous life in the Sahara Desert, which seems a desolate and dull place. The fancy natural scenery and life there, along with the author’s romantic and intensive emotion, will inspire you to explore the mysterious land. Reading the book is like participating in a dialogue with the author, who is sincere and humorous.

Lotus, 2006 by Annbaby

This novel set in Tibet, tells three people’s stories, each with their unique characteristics. It shows modern people’s emotions and inner life, their confusion about love and exploration of Buddhism. The book is a good partner to bring you to the sacred land Tibet.

I have spent the past two decades in the classroom teaching literature, and what I deeply believe is that literature makes us more empathetic (同感的). The empathy we feel for characters can help us better connect with others.

While reading books，we compare the main characters’ actions to what we would do in a similar situation. The mind-reading we do when thinking through a character gives us practice taking on another person’s point of view. How do books manage to transport us into another person’s body? Taking a look at the brain— many regions that are actively involved with and work well together when we read— gives us a clue.

One of my favorite authors is Jane Austen. In one of my favorite studies» my literature students were given a Jane Austen novel to read inside a FMRI Machine (核磁共振机), which shows brain activities by testing changes in blood flow. Natalie Phillips, the literary scholar who worked on the study, supposed that the students, while reading, would experience a great increase in blood to the areas of the brain responsible for processing language. To her surprise, the students experienced a dramatic blood flowing increase to the areas that are responsible for their communication skills as well.

My students are those most in need of the increased brain connectivity that literature can lead to. When you read a passage about running through a forest, you would expect the area responsible for language processing to light up. It does— but the area, which is in charge of the body’s movements, lights up in the same way it would if you were actually running.

The students in my class are struggling over whether or not to choose to be an English major to be successful. If by “success” they mean the highest average starting salary perhaps I should lead them somewhere else from the English building. But if “success” means helping to create a more harmonious world, pull up a chair.