“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
The words of Henry David Thoreau seem even more poignant while staring at a column of tail-lights that stretch for miles down an endless highway. The commute is a formidable daily experience for nearly everyone of working age. When Google informed me that I had spent over sixty hours in the car last month, that is over two days for every thirty, I knew I had to make better use of my time.
Most of us can’t change the necessity of driving from place to place, particularly when it involves work, but finding a way to transform those moments of desperation into fruitful experiences is possible. Last year I began an intentional effort to listen to audiobooks during my commute, and it has changed my perspective about car rides – I now enjoy going to and from work.
Audiobooks gives us another key to experiencing new worlds.
Instead of the familiar scenes of landfills, industrial complexes, and urban sprawl, through audiobooks I experienced the imaginative worlds of talented story-tellers. I stepped into Neil Gaiman’s London Below, explored the Forest Savage with young King Arthur, and traveled through the Alps in the 18th Century. Exchanging stoplights for the canals of Venice is like transmuting rubbish into gold.
Audiobooks provide extra reading time for discovering the great truths within literature.
For those who find this sentiment to be too much of the escapist bent, there is a more practical reason to listen to audiobooks. Charlie Jones said, “You are the same today as you’ll be in five years except for the people you meet and the books you read.” The benefits of non-fiction audiobooks are obvious, provided action follows learning.
There are benefits to myth and story as well. Good stories offer truths that resonate deep within by allowing the reader (or listener) to experience unique situations that may not be accessible in our lives. Empathy and wisdom inevitably follow the continuous consumption of worthy literature. Moreover, truth can be more easily received when it is wrapped comfortably in a story.
Truth sometimes can be better understood when exemplified in story and sometimes stories are better understood when someone else tells them.
Audiobooks let us hear sentences as the author intended.
I am a novice reader. This became even more apparent when I started listening to audiobooks. Reading silently to myself I missed out on many of the important pauses and enunciation that occur within a book, most notably when it came to dialogue. Audiobooks are read by professional readers who offer their own interpretation to the characters and dialogue. This often enriches the story. Books read by the author, like Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, offer an opportunistic glance into the mind of the author which adds even more value to the experience.
One of our most precious assets is our time. Audiobooks help transform the dreary repetitive tasks of life into fruitful experiences.
On a side note, audiobook don’t have to be expensive. Below are some free or cheap ways to listen to audiobooks.
- Librivox is a free source of audiobooks in the public domain read by volunteers. The quality varies from book to book, but the variety is extensive.
- The local library is a great resource for audiobooks. Most local libraries offer at least one digital audiobook service and keep a decent stock of physical copies. My library in Anchorage, Alaska provides free access to Overdrive and Hoopla.
- Audible is a paid service offered by Amazon, basically for $15 a month you can download one book per month.
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