This might be a slightly unusual 'suggest me a book' post, I hope it's allowed.
I feel like I 'rotted' my brain. Due to mental struggles I was in pure escapism mode for years, only watching random series, had no intellectual input at all.
Now I've finally come out of it, but I feel like an empty shell of myself.
I want to start reading again. Obviously in my head I'm like "now I must read everything all at once quickly to make up for all these lost years". But I don't want to fall into another trap of 'once I…. then I can start living…'.
I would rather start reading and slowly, gradually become more educated, more eloquent, more interesting to talk to (firstly, interesting to myself). I had so much curiosity as a child, and as a teen/late teen I enjoyed going into deep interesting discussions with people. I want to get back to myself. It's not like I want to become someone I'm not. I just want to feel like my old self again.
Some things I'd love to read about:
I love learning about nature
I love finding interesting stories from around the world. I love learning about how other cultures live, special things they do that I don't.
I also love philosophy, I love thinking about human nature, consciousness.
I am also curious about science
I don't care too much about history and politics in a sense of facts/events. If it's something about the bigger picture, or ideas, or ways of the world – I can find it interesting.
I also don't want to read about psychology too much, I feel like that's all I used to read about even during my escapism phase.
The way I imagine it – I'd love to first read something that would bring me back on track in general, give me some general knowledge, and then it could be like a gift that keeps on giving – I could branch out from that general condensed information and go into more details of topics/ideas that catch my eye more.
So my question is – what books should I start with to bring back my curiosity about life and rebuild my mental muscles?
by NumasVanegasTijerina