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This Is the Secret to Real Wealth

Daily Stoic Emails

What is the point of reading?

“To me,” Fran Lebowitz tells Martin Scorsese in the new Pretend It’s a City docuseries, “[reading] is just a way of being immensely rich. This may be the reason I never cared about money. Because as soon as you can read, you are incredibly rich.”

It’s true. There are of course rich people who don’t read, but like Harry Truman’s famous quote, there are very few people who read who aren’t rich—be it in wisdom, imagination, or happiness. Although it’s also true that books are pretty much the single best investment you can make, which is why most people who are financially successful are readers. 

As Seneca said, to read is to annex all the ages of the past into your own. To study philosophy is to acquire the thing which plenty of kings and titans have never had: an understanding of what the good life is like. 

So why do we read? Because it’s fun. Because it’s part of philosophy. It gives us one of the best forms of relaxation. It lets us communicate with the greatest minds to ever live. It lets us be friends with them too. It gives us answers to our problems

Reading makes us rich. In more ways than one.

Reading isn’t something you can take for granted—you need to learn how to read effectively and in furtherance of your goals. That’s why you should sign up for Daily Stoic’s Read to Lead Challenge. It’s 13 daily challenges that will change the way you read books permanently. Sign up today.

P.S. This was originally sent on March 18, 2021. Sign up today for the Daily Stoic’s email and get our popular free 7-day course on Stoicism.