5 Ways Fiction Books can Help with Self-Awareness

Did you know that reading fiction books can help with self-awareness? YES! You heard that right. FICTION. Not non-fiction or self-help books. I’m talking about the world of fantasy full of dragons, magic, wizards and witches, fae’s, everything that reality can’t deliver. Too often do we think that in order to reach our highest self we have to read self-help books. But I’m here to tell you that you can still reach your highest self and have fun doing so! In this blog post, I discuss 5 ways reading fiction books can help with self-awareness!

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After several months of getting back into the grind of reading fantasy, not only did I find my joy once again in reading these novels but I also found myself laughing, crying, and cheering for the characters. Ultimately, I found myself and was more in tune and aware of my emotions and actions. Though reading non-fiction books can help you attain knowledge, many of them are written with structure and persuasion to teach you how you should live your life while fantasy books give you the autonomy to create the world and non-existent characters and bring them to life as you follow their journey.

Need more reasons to start reading fantasy books? Here are 5 ways fantasy books can help you reach self-awareness!

Ready to reach your HIGHEST Self? Check out my 2024 Digital/Printable EVERYTHING Planner and my 2024 Digital/Printable Self-Care Workbook curated to help you become your BEST authentic self so you can become the boss lady of your life and live the life YOU deserve-The Happy Life!

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Deep Reading

Deep reading is the practice of reading a novel slowly, immersive, and reflectively. Doing so allows you to put yourself in the fictional character’s POV to help you understand their emotions and dilemmas. This allows you to practice self-awareness as you learn how to reflect and analyze your own emotions, actions, and opinions. It also increases your capacity to be open-minded, show more empathy, and have compassion towards others on a daily basis. The opposite of this is superficial reading which is quick reading and is non-reflective. Examples of this include scrolling through social media, reading emails, and texts.

Values and Guidance

By empathizing with characters or situations, it teaches you where your internal principles and aspirations lie. Ultimately, helping you determine your values and using these values to guide you through life whenever making decisions for yourself and others.

Insight

As discussed above, many self-help books are structured to tell you what is right or wrong. However, unlike self-help books, fiction books are the complete opposite of this. Instead, it gives you the freedom to interpret the story translate the character’s actions and emotions, and reflect it on yourself. Doing this gives you the freedom to search for the moral of the story and allows you to shape the lesson into something meaningful to help you use, practice, and grow.

Ready to reach your HIGHEST Self? Check out my 2024 Digital/Printable EVERYTHING Planner and my 2024 Digital/Printable Self-Care Workbook curated to help you become your BEST authentic self so you can become the boss lady of your life and live the life YOU deserve-The Happy Life!

Imagination

Self-help books are written with the author’s knowledge, experience, and research. These novels may enlighten you and push you to do better but it fails to allow you to critically think about what you’re reading as:

Experience represents what we already understand
Research represents what we do to try to understand something

However, in fiction, given that the book is written in a way to allows readers to create the world in their head, it gives the readers a chance to make sense of what they don’t understand. It allows readers to critically think about what they’re reading, in other words, practice deep reading.

Synthesize

As discussed in the imagination section, self-help books are written based on the author's POV. Everything is provided for you, it’s black and white. On the other hand, fiction books fall within the gray realm, allowing you to create the world and characters and bring them to life while also finding the various lessons scattered throughout the book. It forces you to synthesize your own learning as you connect the dots throughout the plot enforcing you to practice self-awareness by becoming aware of what you’re reading, feeling, and how it pertains in your life.

Books have been used as a form of therapy for many years as they can help develop the qualities, traits, and characteristics that many individuals desire. Though many people believe that non-fiction books are the best to attain knowledge, research has shown that reading fiction novels provides many important benefits. Examples include:

Increased social acuity and a sharper ability to understand the motivations of others
Develops cognitive agility and acuity to develop in-demand emotional skills
Enhances the brain’s ability to keep an open mind while processing information. This is beneficial for effective decision-making.
Have a lower need for cognitive closure which is wanting to reach a quick conclusion in the midst of decision making

Reading fiction requires us to slow down, take in a vast amount of information, and change our mind as we read which ultimately allows us to practice this in the real world when talking to others, being aware of our actions, and how we present ourselves to the world. As George R.R. Martin states:

“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies… the man who never reads lives only one.”

I encourage you to start reading fantasy novels not only to practice self-awareness but to also have fun, and explore yourself, your creativity, and your imagination so that you can develop what is needed to become a self-aware individual!

Ready to reach your HIGHEST Self? Check out my 2024 Digital/Printable EVERYTHING Planner and my 2024 Digital/Printable Self-Care Workbook curated to help you become your BEST authentic self so you can become the boss lady of your life and live the life YOU deserve-The Happy Life!

5 Ways Fiction Books can Help with Self-Awareness

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