On a typical school day in the 6th grade, after finishing my homework, I would curl up on a sofa and read. I could get lost in a story for hours, often oblivious to the fact that time was still ticking by. When someone asks me what my favorite book is, I give the same, cookie-cutter answer each time: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (which I finished in June 2018). I recorded the books I read in a book log, giving them ratings, tracking their genres and trying to explore new ones (though, my favorite genre will always be historical fiction).
I learned a lot from books; in fact, books taught me almost everything I knew at that time – from the events and consequences of World War II to how the government worked to how cancer metastasized… and much more.
2018 was the year I read a hundred books, meaning I was finishing one to two books a week. I miss the simplicity of those moments. I wasn’t thinking about how to maximize my productivity; I just found joy in finishing a book and walking away with more knowledge than when I started. As much as I want to, I don’t know if it’s possible for me to read a hundred books in a year again. Each time I sit down with a book, I ask myself: I can be doing something better with my time, right?
Growing up, and asking: what if I could do life differently?
This is a flawed question, as I know so much more now in 2025 compared to what I knew back then. Yet, it doesn’t stop me from wondering: if I did things differently before, could I be more successful now?
Back in my middle school years, I aspired to be a journalist. Pursuing writing professionally was my dream. I didn’t give much thought to my major in college or to the college admissions process. All I knew was that I relished the feeling of accomplishment that accompanied reading a book or writing a story, and I wanted that to be a central part of my life.
However, I did enjoy science, specifically biology. I dedicated a lot of my efforts to homework and studying (probably not in the most efficient way in retrospect), and earned good grades. Of course, I stressed too much about my grades, but I guess that’s one aspect that stayed the same as I grew up.
Then, in eighth grade and going into high school, I decided to be… practical. I decided that medicine could be a good fit for me because of its people-centered component (similar to why I enjoyed storytelling). Later on, that evolved into a passion for research and biomedical engineering. If I knew this would eventually be my path, then maybe I would have made progress sooner. Instead of having my nose buried in a historical fiction book, maybe I would have learned to code or immersed myself in science experiments.
But, I didn’t know what I know now.
In the end, I believe everything works out the way it’s meant to. My childhood hope of becoming a journalist influenced my hobby in content creation, as well as my long-term goal to combine people-centered design with engineering and research.
Yet, when I think about 6th grade, I feel a dull ache. I miss how simple life was; I miss how I was content with what I was doing.
Is it possible to live simply?
Now, as an engineering college student, I’ve been trying to be as productive as possible. My calendar is full, and I time block everything. These days, my mind is always planning: how to be productive, how to do more, while neglecting that “more” is infinite. This is not so much of an issue now, but in high school and during the college admissions process, I would think about the past, regret tugging at the edges of my mind over not having done enough.
Getting lost in a novel feels counterproductive, especially when I could be writing or completing organic chemistry work – in other words, preparing for the next challenge that lay ahead. Perhaps the last time I truly relished the present moment was in the 6th grade.
While professional growth is crucial, it’s also equally important to slow down. For me, this involves reading, which fills my mind with new ideas and broadens my view of the world. When we slow down, we learn to appreciate and be patient (one of numerous traits reading helped inculcate). We learn to see profoundness in the simplicities of life.
After all, before we learn to speed up, we first have to learn how to slow down.
