There is a version of self care that looks impressive. The spa day. The retreat. The expensive supplement routine. And I am not here to knock any of that. I am all for it… and a little more of it!
But the form of self care that changed my life last year was an inexpensive gift at Barnes & Noble. It was a book. And it gave me back something I did not even realize I had lost: the daily permission to stop. Yes, reading became my quiet act of self care.
A quick note from me: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links, which means if you decide to make a purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. I only ever recommend books, tools, and products that I genuinely use, love, and feel add true value to my life and spirit. Thank you for supporting Living La Vida Bella!
My Journey with Reading
Let me be honest with you. I did not grow up as someone who loved books or considered myself an avid reader. I always admired others who read various genres by choice and for leisure. It didn’t matter how many episodes of Reading Rainbow I watched, I wasn’t reading much outside of school. Libraries were more for finding sources for a school report, not pleasure.
Growing up, I preferred watching TV and movies for entertainment. That was my mental break for the day once I completed my homework. As I entered high school, summer reading was required prior to the start of every school year. Some books were wonderful. Others? Let’s just say CliffsNotes got me through more than I’d like to admit. Because it was required, it felt forced, at times boring, and a lot like “work.”
In my twenties, my journey with reading changed. It became recreational. I gravitated toward self-help books for personal development, and then I picked up some fiction by choice here and there. I loved going to Barnes & Noble just for the browsing—the sheer possibility of it all. Yet life and career took over, as they tend to do. Reading became something I did occasionally, not consistently.
My focus became building my career. I was working. I was surviving. There was not a lot of room for sitting quietly with a story.
Twenty Years Later…Enter Stress and Anxiety
Fast forward to the summer of 2025. I was edging my way to twenty years in the beauty industry. To make this milestone extra special, I was deeply and dramatically in the throes of perimenopause.. Carrying stress and anxiety that had compounded over years of giving, producing, caretaking, and showing up for everyone else.
I was longing for a mental escape. Not a vacation, necessarily, just a door I could walk through and close behind me. Somewhere I could go where no one needed anything from me and nothing was due. I seriously wanted to check out.
So, during my staycation, I walked into Barnes & Noble with one single goal: find one book.
The Book That Started Everything
I walked around slowly. I let myself browse the way I used to, just taking in what was popular, what caught my eye, and what felt like it was calling to me. And then I saw it: a new release from Jojo Moyes called We All Live Here. After reading back cover description and knew immediately. I had enjoyed a couple of her books pre-pandemic; her writing is sharp and warm, and she has a sense of humor I love. I had a good feeling.
Once I brought the book home to read, I disappeared into it. That is the only way I can describe what happened. I disappeared, and it was the most relief I had felt in a very long time.
Once I finished, I did not want to stop. I opened my Goodreads app, explored all the popular book club recommendations. I checked out Reese Witherspoon’s book club and The New York Times bestseller list. To my surprise, I stumbled into a special space called BookTok on TikTok, and familiarized myself with an entire community of people who talked about books the way I now understood them: as an escape, as medicine, and as pure pleasure.
I wanted to give myself that vacation feeling every single day. Not just on staycation.
How Reading is Essential Self Care in Mid Life
Let’s look at what reading actually does to your body. According to a study featured on Medical News Today, reading benefits your health and well-being in several powerful ways:
- Reduces stress by 68% in just six minutes (based on a study by the University of Sussex in the UK).
- Slows down—and in some cases prevents—cognitive decline.
- Improves sleep by easing your mind and body into a calm state. (Note: My Oura Ring completely agrees and has registered my reading time as a nap on more than one occasion!)
- Enhances social skills. Fiction readers tend to have a greater ability to understand and empathize with others.
- Boosts intelligence and vocabulary.
Women in midlife can benefit from all of these, especially during the perimenopause and menopause phases. It offers a low-stakes way to escape the pressures of daily life. For me personally, I desperately needed to incorporate routines to calm my nervous system. This form of self care calmed me quietly and consistently.
Reading became Personal
Reading is my daily mental vacation. I reserve the last couple of hours of my evening for my book, ideally, right before bed. Sometimes, when the plot thickens or twists, my reading session goes a little longer. On weekends, I love to read in the sitting room in the afternoon. I have even started bringing my Kindle to production shoots for the moments when there is a wait. I do not let those spare minutes go to waste anymore.
Simply put… Reading brings me joy. It is a hug to my soul. It’s a moment of autonomy in a life that often asks a lot of me.
Reading gave me words for emotions I had been feeling but could not name. It has given me thrills, heartbreak, and laughter that I felt in my whole body. It has even made me fall completely in love with “book boyfriends” (and if you know, you know!).
I felt deeply seen through characters I didn’t expect to have anything in common with. Reading fills my cup in a way I did not know I was missing.
What Reading Actually Gave Me
Reading gave me permission. That is the simplest way I can say it. Reading gave me daily permission to stop. To rest from the stress of the day. To disconnect from the responsibilities, the anxieties, and the worries that follow us everywhere.
We all deserve that. Not as a luxury, but as a right.
Reading became my quiet act of self care because I finally decided I was worth the pause.
You are too.
I’d love to hear about your personal journey with reading. Did any of my story resonate with you? Are you an avid reader or want to get back to reading like me? Leave me your response in the comments or reach out to me directly via my contact page.
I can’t believe I read 17 books that last half of 2025. Here are all the books I read last year. Discover more of my book recommendations in the LLVB Bookshop:
