Whole 05: Think Outside of Your Four Walls + Tips for How to Read More Books Transcript
This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Laura Wifler: It's so funny because I think every person—as you become a Christian or at some point in your Christian walk, we'll say—you start to realize that all great stories mimic the big story that God is writing in the world—the metanarrative of Scripture. There was this time more recently that I was in the car with my kids, and it was funny because we were talking about good and evil—we were talking about superheroes—and my son was putting it all together like, "Mom, why is every story like this, where there's a villain and there's a good guy?" It was this perfect moment to be like, "Because, my dear son . . . " and to get to explain to him.
It was funny because I could literally see my kids' eyes get big and just be like, "Whoa. Yes." When you see that connection—it is a really fun thing to see it light up on someone's face.
Emily Jensen: It just makes me love God so much that he creates stories and shares his Word with us in stories. I don't know. I think most of us love a good story. It's just so amazing to me that he's the originator of that. He is the architect of that—the author of that. Even throughout Scripture—to see in the Old Testament—just how much the way that Israel's history was recounted—mankind's history was recounted—was often in narrative. It was told in ways—it's riveting and interesting, and there's foreshadowing, and things connect back to something that happened earlier. There's character development, and there's plot twists, and there's things that you didn't see coming. It's like we could have been given—God's Word could have literally been a book of just bullet-pointed commands.
Laura: Not only ten commandments but thousands of them.
Emily: Or “I am God, and this is what I'm like. I'm like this, I'm like this, I'm like this, I'm like this. These are the things that I command. It's this and this and this.” Instead, he gives it to us in this amazing story. It's intricately told. I'm sure this is obvious, but it is the best-written document ever. These pieces that were written at different points in history—I think that's the other thing that just blows my mind. What do they call it? Hyperlink? Have you ever heard that term before, where it's like, "Hey, there's this part you're reading in Daniel, and it actually links to this thing that's in Deuteronomy, and it also links to this thing that's in Revelation"? No human mind could come up with that.
Even the best novels or the best story series where you're like, "Oh, I remember the author mentioning that in the very first book, and I always wondered what happened. Now in the very last book, they're explaining that little detail." God was the first one to do that. That's part of what's amazing about his Word.
Laura: I love that. I think too—even just the example that Christ shows of teaching so much through story and parable. Like you were saying, it's not just this like—Jesus coming in and being like, "I am only giving you the bullet points of who I am." But instead, he's like, "Okay, I want to teach these people compassion." He knows that because of the way he created us, we learn better through story. It's more memorable. Typically, we can take it with us a little better.
Emily: Tugs your heartstrings.
Laura: Oh, 100. Yes. There are so many great applications for it. He's teaching us compassion through the story of the Good Samaritan, or he's teaching us about rebellion and grace, so he tells the story of the Prodigal Son. I love that about Christ; we see that example in Scripture and even can model that as one of the reasons why stories are a good thing in our lives. I think that there's something about stories that really leads to spiritual formation. There's a depth to bringing story in as we're thinking about the truths of God that gets it under your skin a little bit more than if we're just reading from a dry textbook.
I think what happens in early motherhood often is that we forget about this. Just like we were talking about in “Awe” last week, we forget that there's this whole world out there that's so much bigger than the four walls of our home and being up at night, exhausted with the baby—all those kinds of things. I think that that's something that—the point of this show is that we want to talk through how to be caught back up into that bigger story. Especially as we think about how our time, our energy, goes—I know that a lot of times as moms, we think, "I need to only apply that towards something that is growing me—that I'm learning in a very practical, hands-on way."
Something I think you and I found as we progressed through motherhood was a return back to fiction, even, and those big hero stories and finding that it was actually something that we were growing spiritually in ways that we couldn't have predicted previously.
Emily: It definitely feels like, in those survival-mode years, it's like, "Who has time for something like a fiction book? Who has time to get immersed in a really great series of films even?" Or maybe it's an audio podcast series that goes through someone's life or someone's experience or tells a story about a scam that happened or something that's so interesting that really engages your mind. Certainly, there is a fine balance here because we can hold up entertainment as too high of a value, almost to the point where we're using it as a way to distract ourselves or numb out or escape from some of the hard things that are in front of us.
But there's also a way to engage good stories and listen to even people's real-life experiences that are told through stories that really can keep us alert to what the world is actually like—what we want to be like as mothers, what we want to be like as women, the story we're hoping that God tells in and through our lives. I think sometimes we're very willing to read a story to our kids because we're like, "Stories are what our kids need," but stories are also what shape our hearts. Of course, one great way we're getting that is through Scripture and the stories God tells there, but there's also a lot of other stories that we can learn from that can shape us.
Laura: For today's show, we're talking a little bit broadly with the term “story” because I think a lot of times when we think of story, we think of a literal book—a literal story—but we're saying here, "Hey, there's some TV and media that's edifying in this way.” There’s, like you said, a podcast series—even songs have stories in them. There are a lot of different ways I think to be caught up in story. There's an element of making sure that it's high-quality literature and that we're actually engaging our minds in this and it's not just—we all know the junk food of stories. We're not talking about those today. We're talking about the meat and potatoes of stories.
We want to walk through, though, a couple of reasons why great stories shape us as believers and why they're important to the life of a mom. The first thing is that it challenges our assumptions. I have found this time and time again, especially through reading books that maybe even perhaps I wouldn't have normally picked up. I'm in a book club. I'm definitely reading widely and hearing about books that I might not have normally heard about.
I remember I read a fiction book about a woman who was in an abusive relationship. Honestly, that helped me so much to understand and be less judgmental or condemning of why women stay in those types of relationships. It's something that has impacted me powerfully to have a lot more compassion because I had all these thoughts of, "This is what I would do, and this is how it would happen, and I would never tolerate that." And you realize very quick how wrong you are.
Emily: Yes. I think about that a lot with villains. I am always really intrigued with stories that dive into the making of a villain or why someone became the way that they are. Sometimes, that can be a prequel that goes back and explores the origin story, or sometimes, it's something they do within the story. I think it's so easy to read something and be like, "Okay, that's the good guy, and that's the bad guy," and it's like capital B bad, and you just characterize them as that. Then, when you hear their backstory and you hear maybe some of the incredible hurt that they experienced or the horrible things that were done to them, you realize that they were shaped into their villainous ways.
It doesn't make it right, but there is something about that that grows your compassion, and it grows your understanding of how grief can shape people for good or for ill or how abuse can shape people or how loss can shape people or challenges and trials. It does help you grow in compassion or your assumption of, "Hey, this is black and white, and this person is good, and this person is not good." To go—"Every person who is a villain, whether it's in the story or it's in your real life, has their own story of hurt."
Laura: Another thing is that it grows our social skills and our emotional intelligence. Again, you guys know I always like to pull in the science, but literally, there have been studies done on this, where people have read different types of literature and those that have read literary fiction become more sensitive to the emotional states of others as compared to reading popular fiction. That's not to say we can't gain anything from popular fiction. Emily and I would actually push and say, "I think there still can be things that can be learned from that." In general, there's an element of— some of that higher-quality media that we can engage in—people are showing a higher level of emotional intelligence, of social perception, of empathy.
I think that this is really where we gain an ability to say, "Hey, the way you view the world is different than the way I view the world. That's because of our life experience. That's because of the things that we've been taught, how we've been raised, the things we've endured." As we read those things and expand our own worldview, we are more easily able to engage in their worldview and then also believe the best. That they are coming in the only way that they know how to a relationship and that we can trust that they are doing their best in the relationship that we have with them.
I think that it just shows you a bigger view of humans’ life experience. It challenges you to start to think on your own and to apply your mind and not just assume we're all stereotypes of one another.
Emily: Even just missionary stories, where you're hearing what they experienced in another culture and maybe some of the persecution. You get a better understanding of what it might be like to live through that. Like we've been talking about, it grows your compassion and your perspective.
Laura: Another one—I think this is one of my favorites—but it increases our love or our hate towards various virtues. We especially see this in the very big-time hero stories. You might not notice this as much in some of the stories that have less grand arcs, you might say. But when you get some of these drastic good versus evil type of books or movies or different things, we grow beyond—especially, you can see this in your children—we grow beyond this element of “I logically know that lying is bad and that serving other people is good.”
Instead, it gives you pictures, and it comes—undergirds like the logic of it all where now you understand, "Oh, okay, I love courage. I don't just know it's going to be courage. I love when someone's courageous. I love being courageous."
Emily: This is what loyalty looks like. This is what courage looks like. This is what being a good friend looks like.
Laura: I hate—I do not like when people are cruel or evil or greedy. It brings emotion to what we logically know is right or wrong. That is, I think, just a really cool piece.
Emily: You must think it's cool because you wrote your own children's virtue book.
Laura: No, I do think it's cool.
Emily: I think, and we're going to be talking more about a book that you have coming out that you wrote for kids, and it's called A World Wonder. It releases March 5, 2024. It's all about the story of a little girl named Cora who grows up to be a woman who learns the true meaning of life. It's meant to show some of those virtues. Definitely catch that episode.
I think what's sad to me in our culture today is that some of these “what is good and what is evil” are getting distorted. We see virtues also getting distorted, where it's like—there aren't sometimes good pictures of what godly character traits look like in stories today.
I'm really grateful that you're embarking on that and that we have Christians stepping back into that. Because one of the saddest things to me is when you pick up a book—I do this a fair amount where I'm scanning through books at the library to tell my kids whether they can check them out.
Laura: Yes, or not.
Emily: You realize that evil is being glorified. Something that God says is wrong is being held up as, at the very least murky or gray, or maybe even that it's being seen as good. We can even see virtues distorted. What is it, Laura, you've seen as you've looked through virtue books that really provides good springboards for conversation with children on this?
Laura: I think you're right that the world has changed how we're doing virtue books and/or I feel like they're just full of nothing. A lot of today's modern-day books—maybe they don't have a message at all. There's a place I think to laugh. There's a place to just have something that's lightheartedly read. A lot of things are empty or they're, like you said, glorifying things that don't honor God. I think virtue books that show through story the things that God loves—it helps our children see really the way the world is supposed to be and the way it is in God's good design—what the best of us can be.
I think that that really tucks away little nuggets of Christian values in ways that I think the child doesn't even always realize what's happening—doesn't even maybe even realize the impact that that's made. But someday down the road, they can draw on that and say, "Okay, I understand that," or "This reminds me of this book that I read at one time." Or maybe they don't remember that, but they remember learning to love the virtue of being generous or something like that. That starts to inform their decisions, their actions, their values, and it shapes them in a way that I feel like you can't entirely ever lose.
Emily: Let's shift gears a little bit and get practical because, even if maybe a mom is agreeing with us right now and being like, "That would be so great to have more stories in my life," I still think this can feel practically challenging. I know I'm over eleven years into motherhood, and I still can feel like if I pick up that fiction book right now and I read two pages, my eyes are going to close.
Laura: Oh, me too. All the time.
Emily: Sometimes even, I will feel like my brain is so jam-packed with stuff that I just don't even want to listen to another audiobook, or I just don't want to add another thing. Yet I find it to be rewarding when I do and when I pursue this. Let's talk through some practical ways to do this or some tips of how to cultivate a love of good stories in your life and bring them in in a way that's going to impact you as a woman who's following God.
Laura: I want to start by saying, overall, there's nothing wrong with—let's call it “a check-out” book or movie. As long as you've wisely chosen something that's not against the things of God, go watch that design show where they make over that room. Have a great time. When we're talking about the great stories that Emily and I are trying to encourage everyone to turn towards, I do think there's a development in taste, and there's a development in like, "Hey if you've been eating junk food for a long time, you're going to have to cleanse your palate a little bit to get used to something that's maybe a little bit more heavy or going to bring a little bit more of a strong arm towards that literary elevation."
Or even the movies that we watch that are a little bit higher level. Just know that if you're feeling like, "Oh, this feels clunky"—but curation is a huge part of it. It's the whole know-thyself type of thing where everyone has different tolerances for raw stories or hard stories.
I know that recently I engaged in a book—or I read about one hundred pages and then I quit—on this book that is a Pulitzer Prize-winner book. It was very well written, very well done. It was part of my book club, but I knew because I was starting to not sleep, and I was starting to think about it.
I was like, "This is not worth it. I get the gist of what this book is about. I do think it's important to learn about this subject matter because it was about a very hard subject matter, but like I don't think this is the right way for me." Know yourself. Some people will be able to tolerate a little more than other people, and it is good to be uncomfortable. We don't want to be people that say, "Oh, I never want to feel uncomfortable or engage in something that's different," because that's how we learn. That's how we grow. But there is something that—I think we have to be very wise that we don't want to just expose ourselves to a new style of life because everybody else is, or everyone says that book is so great or that movie is so great. If that is too hard for you, honor that—that is your spirit or your conscience probably ticking off and saying, "Not for us. Not for us." Read reviews, take recommendations. Do your research and go informed. Don't go in blind to a book, especially one that you know is maybe going to have some hard topics.
Emily: Probably know the “why” right behind your reading it. I think sometimes it makes a difference to go, "I'm not just reading this to be entertained or just reading this to talk with my friends, but I'm reading this because I want to understand someone else's perspective or because I want to think critically and try to understand a character's perspective or the message in light of what's true." There is that critical thinking component that really enriches a fiction experience and takes it to another level beyond just the enjoyment of it.
Let's dig into books more specifically. How do we as moms read more books? Laura, what's your first tip? [Laughter]
Laura: My favorite tip for moms who get tired during books—because this is the main thing that we hear. This main thing I tend to hear from people is, "I always fall asleep reading books." It's actually that—and this may not work for everyone, so please just don't get mad—but here's what I do: I start reading my book around 7:30 or 8:00 whenever all my kids are down for bed or at least somewhat near bed. Then I might take a ten-minute nap when I get real tired. I put my book on my chest.
Emily: That does make me mad. No, I'm just kidding. [Laughter]
Laura: I put my book on my chest. I just close those tired eyes. I take a quick nap. Sometimes it's longer than I meant to, but then I can indeed wake back up and read, but if I am fighting sleep and my eyes are going down and down and down, it is the worst experience to read a book in that feeling. Maybe it means we have to find different times to read our books, but I have learned to just give it a quick power nap and then resume reading, and we're good. Or sometimes it means—go watch a TV show, perk back up, and then read and say, "Okay, it's only going to be twenty minutes instead of two hours of reading."
Emily: That is a superpower you have—power naps.
Laura: I think other moms have it too. 50-50, probably.
Emily: There are other moms. I think the other thing that helps for me is having books in different formats. I have personally found audiobooks to be an incredibly helpful way for me to consume things because I like to be busy with my hands and be up moving around. I am one who gets tired reading at night, but during the day, I do have that space for listening to something when I'm folding laundry. It's probably how you're listening to a podcast right now. You're on a walk or you're driving in your car or whatnot. That's a great time to engage in a story, maybe in addition to some of the podcasts that you love.
Another thing that's also helped me is just learning how the local library works or the different systems that are associated with that. I think sometimes—even though we all probably went through that as a kid, where they walk you around; they show you where everything is and how to find things. I needed a little bit of a refresh as an adult to not be intimidated by the library—to learn how to navigate it and how to reserve books ahead of time. How to get on waitlists for things or even how to use the app. We have an app that our local library is a member of that you can listen to audiobooks for free or get Kindle books for free or whatnot.
Laura: It's like a national thing. It's like Hoopla.
Emily: Hoopla. I didn't know if that was—
Laura: And Libby. I think it's a national thing. If it's not, sorry, but I'm pretty sure everybody has it.
Emily: Get Hoopla—but that takes time to research and set up.
Laura: To download it, log in, all that stuff, it does, but take the initiative for sure. I think a big one we often hear is, "I don't have time." Totally get it. I think we all are short on time, but the other thing that you can do is be really honest about how you spend your time. How much TV do you actually watch? Again, some TV, we think, and movies can fall into a category of actually helping you learn virtues and do some of the things that we talked about in this podcast. How much time do you spend on your phone throughout the day?
When anyone says, "I don't have time," everybody always likes to point back to phone use, and we're going to do it too. Then also—I think that you can break it down a little bit. I think if you read one chapter a day and you're trying to read—if it's a fiction book, that's going to be a lot more chapters—usually thirty to sixty chapters or something—but you would actually read a book in a month or two in just one chapter a day. A nonfiction book—those are what? Twelve chapters? You can cook through nonfiction, but we're talking about fiction for today. Break it down.
I think sometimes we look at that big old honker of a book and we think, "Oh, that is just too hard." Or we look at the twelve hours of audio. But if you just start plugging away at it, you actually get through quite a bit.
Emily: I think to that end, don't be afraid to put something down if you're not enjoying it and you're slogging through it.
Laura: Yes. Do not read books that you don't like.
Emily: Unless there's a really specific purpose.
Laura: There are too many good books in the world.
Emily: Just don't, because I have gotten really bogged down in reading before, where I've determined like—
Laura: You felt like you should read something.
Emily: —"I need to finish this book before I move on." It's like, "That's the beauty of the library. Just take it back."
Laura: You don't have to read all those old classics. If you're like, "Hey, that ain't for me. It's so boring but I feel like I should, to be an elite educated person." No, that's weird. Don't do that.
What else? Oh, I think learning how to discover new books. A lot of times, people will go back to just saying, "I don't know what to read." That's legitimate. Emily and I are both voracious readers, which means we read a ton—which means you do need a long list. One, there's Instagrammers or Bookstagrammers. There's Book Talk, which to me is a little bit—
Emily: I love Bookstagram. I think—
Laura: Bookstagram is more high-quality than Book Talk.
Emily: I don't follow that many, so I probably have a very small—
Laura: Find some good ones.
Emily: But it is so helpful.
Laura: Finding somebody whose tastes you trust; have a friend. Most people have a friend who's a heavy reader. Get close to them and ask them, "What should I read next?" I think there's a podcast literally called, What Should I Read Next? You can go find some of those types of resources, but that's like learning your library— learning the landscape of books and discovering how you can keep a list. I keep a list on my iPhone. If somebody mentions this is a good book, I'll write it down. Or on Amazon and Goodreads—there's “more books like this.”
That's another way to be able to say, "Oh, okay, I liked that book. Now I can read this book." It's hit or miss and that's where we go back to—don't feel like you have to finish a book. Just put it down.
Emily: I love, too, the challenge of taking a book one level deeper, or doing some extra behind-the-scenes content. Then getting to enjoy it again as you go listen to an interview with the author or maybe it is historical fiction and then you're like, "Oh, I'm super interested in that period of history, and now I actually want to go read a more dry book on that topic because I want to understand this thing that I was reading a little bit more.
Or, again, that critical thinking about the story is—can you go find something to read or listen to where you see other people reflect on the characters and the stories so that you're thinking more deeply about it? I think that's one of my favorite ways to enjoy a good book twice—dig in a little bit deeper and find that way that you can think critically about it too.
Laura: Hopefully this inspires you to go out and find a great podcast series or a great book or a great movie or TV show and to get caught up in a great story.
