Reading as a Spiritual Exercise by Grace Ji-Sun Kim

Today is “National Read a Book Day”. I hope you are having a wonderful day and will get a chance to read a book before the day is over….

I have been writing for Spirituality and Health Magazine for a few years now. I wanted to share with you an article I wrote for their May/June 2022 issue called “Reading as a Spiritual Exercise”.

Reading isn’t just about gaining new knowledge or relaxing. It can be a spiritual practice in its own right.

I didn’t grow up reading.

I grew up so poor that buying books would have been a luxury. Except for the two beds that my sister and I slept on, everything in our tiny apartment was donated, secondhand, or retrieved from the dumpster. That is how we lived. There were no books when I was growing up.

One day, my dad found a picture book at his work and brought it home. That was the only book I had as a child and I read it repeatedly. As the child of immigrants from Korea, I couldn’t even read English at that time. I made up the story from the pictures and pretended that I was reading the words. I can still clearly visualize the story and the pictures, as I read it thousands of times.

Growing up with no books around me, becoming an author of more than 20 books and the host of a podcast with extraordinary authors is something that I never envisioned for my life when I was a young child.

I immigrated to Canada when I was five years old. I didn’t speak a word of English. I started kindergarten and I slowly began to learn the English language. I only read books that were required reading in my classes during elementary school. Since my parents didn’t understand the logistics of borrowing books from a public library, we never went to one.

Later in my teenage years, I began to read more books. I borrowed books from the school library. Books were still a luxury item and something that our family could not afford, since we were struggling to put food on the table.

However, as I entered college, I discovered the value of books. My approach to books changed. They became tools to enter different worlds—imaginary and real, to follow the lives of others, or to be entertained by mysteries or love stories. As I began to read more and more, I began to see reading as a spiritual exercise.

*** For the rest of the article, please click here.

I will be speaking at the Writing for your Life online Conference, “How to Write Dangerously”. Please join me and many other speakers. Register here.

Writing is to offer hope into the world.

Two of my books Keeping Hope Alive & Invisible try to offer hope. I hope you get a chance to read them.

Also, please join me as I speak on Invisible at the First United Methodist Church, Elmhurst, IL on October 9th at 3:30 p.m.

This event is free and open to the public.

Also, if you are interested in podcasting…please join me at Theology Beer Camp. Use “madang’ discount code for 50.00 off registration.