Follow along with the transcript below for episode: Get Your Summer Reading Prescription With Emely Rumble
[INTRODUCTION]
[00:00:01] PF: Thank you for joining us for Episode 526 of Live Happy Now. It’s summertime, so it’s a great time to break out the books. But this year, let’s try a new approach to those summer beach reads. I’m your host, Paula Felps, and this week, I’m talking with Emily Rumble, a distinguished, licensed clinical social worker and bibliopsychotherapist who wrote the book, Bibliotherapy in The Bronx.
Emily specializes in integrating the creative arts in the psychotherapy and mental wellbeing, and she’s here to explain the healing power of literature and tell us how we can use those summer reads to boost our mental health. Let’s have a listen.
[INTERVIEW]
[0:00:40.8] PF: Emily, thank you for joining me on Live Happy Now.
[0:00:42.9] ER: Thank you, Paula, for having me. I’m so excited to talk with you today.
[0:00:46.8] PF: This is going to be a fun conversation, and as I was saying to you, I get to say something I very rarely get to say these days is this is something we’ve never talked about on the show. So, it’s something very new for our listeners. I’m really excited, we’re talking about bibliotherapy. So, to begin with, can you explain what bibliotherapy is?
[0:01:06.7] ER: It’s the million-dollar question everybody wants to know. Bibliotherapy –
[0:01:10.7] PF: Everyone’s on ChatGPT right now, right? They’re like, “What?”
[0:01:13.2] ER: Right, exactly, exactly. Bibliotherapy is the intentional use of reading, of reading literature, and whatever genre or format that means, for emotional insight, reflection, and healing. It’s not just sort of prescribing a book and calling it a day, it’s really about using stories, poems, narratives as mirrors and windows into our own life experience. So, when a character reflects our pain and our hopes, our fears, it’s super validating, and it’s liberating.
And in my clinical work, as a therapist who specializes in literature-based approaches, I help clients name their emotions using literature. I prescribe and integrate literature into our therapy sessions, in a way that helps clients to understand relational patterns, to imagine the ways of being in the world. Literature really gives us language when we don’t have the words ourselves.
[0:02:08.5] PF: And that’s so interesting, because when I think of using books for healing and emotional wellbeing, I’m thinking of self-help books.
[0:02:17.1] ER: Yeah.
[0:02:18.4] PF: And that is not what we’re talking about, yeah.
[0:02:20.4] ER: Yeah, it could be. It could be, but I try to challenge my clients, like, let’s branch out a little bit. You know, I think, it’s common for mental health professionals to use self-help, but I also find that self-help as a genre that can also be very limiting, because the scope of a self-help book is really based on the person who wrote its lens, and experience. What I find about fiction is that there’s so many diverse entry points to healing because a fictional story really takes us there and it brings our guard down.
We don’t feel like we’re evaluating ourselves; we feel like we’re just going on a literary adventure, and so what happens when we emotionally connect to fiction, and we allow our heart space to rise to the surface. So, there’s something special about engaging with fiction and bibliotherapy.
[0:03:06.4] PF: And probably, the way we go into it is a little bit different because when I pick up a book about, like, any kind of self-help book, any kind of healing book, I have more of a scholarly, “I’m going to learn about this” attitude just going into it, and sometimes it can be pretty dense getting through some of the science of it, which is important. But it’s like, it can take some extra work for your brain. So, how does the way we approach fiction differ?
[0:03:35.4] ER: Yeah, that’s a great question. I love what you say, too, about the way we approach the literature because sometimes we do read to learn, and we want to fill in some gaps in our understanding, but when we’re engaging with fiction, it really allows us to explore our emotional terrain, in a way that feels less vulnerable, in a way that feels more safe. I think exploring grief, anger, joy, shame at our own pace is really supported by the use of reading fiction.
You know, for some clients, it’s easier to talk about a character’s choices than our own, and so from there, we can work backward. You know, as a mental health professional, I’ve noticed also how memoirs in particular show us that we’re not alone. Any kind of story, whether that’s fiction or non-fiction, that helps us to connect with the character’s journey emotionally, holds up near to us.
Offering us proof that, like, “Hey, I’m not the only one, I’m not crazy, other people have lived this, other people have survived this.” Literature really lowers our defenses and sparks self-awareness, naturally, when you’re emotionally connected to a text, and you can’t stop reading, like, you’re naturally kind of pairing it with reflection and self-interrogation, and it leads to the same emotional breakthroughs that happen in traditional talk therapy.
[0:04:53.9] PF: So, what really struck me as you were talking about that, I know there’s like, for children, that’s how they approach topics like grief. I’m thinking in particular about a book I saw recently, where it was helping children get through the loss of a loved one, and it was – tells a story of someone losing their dad, and so that’s a great way, we use it as children. When did we kind of lose that aspect of it and say, “Well, no, now, you got to read this science-y book to get through your…”
[0:05:23.1] ER: Right, right, and I think the schooling system does that to us. It becomes about adventure and imagination, and more about metrics and performance, and that takes the fun out of reading. So, I think, what’s beautiful about children’s literature, and the way that children read, is that it’s super adventuresome. It’s really based upon imagination, and children’s books in general, right?
Like, they’re colorful, the illustrations are carefully and intentionally curated, or the themes in the book, I think about books like The Giving Tree. I use a lot of children’s books with adults. So, like, The Giving Tree’s illustrations are very simple, but we get the point. In the beginning, the tree is lush and beautiful, and by the end, baby, that tree is a stump, you know? She’s tired, she’s worn out.
She’s done, giving everything away, which makes us think about our boundaries and how much we give in order to receive love. So, I think there’s something really beautiful about the way that children’s literature engages the heart space, and it’s super nourishing, and meets us where we’re at in the moment, and I love using children’s literature with adults because I find that, like you said, right? Society doesn’t privilege us in that way.
We don’t live in a society that’s actively supporting our mental health or asking us to slow down and reflect. We live in a very fast-paced, capitalistic, production-driven society, and so what happens when you connect with the text versus like, “Oh, let me, you know, go on this adventure.” Even if the themes are heavy, like, to your point, children’s books about grief, but we can more easily like access those feelings when it’s through a book.
[0:06:53.3] PF: Absolutely. So, I’m interested in knowing how you discovered this.
[0:06:57.7] ER: Yeah, so, I actually – I’ve always been a lifelong reader, I had a really traumatic childhood, in a lot of ways. My grandmother raised me, she passed when I was 14, I went into the foster care system, and emancipated myself when I was 16, l put myself through college, and I was lucky enough to have so many people along the way who just, like, reinforced my strengths, and offered me opportunities.
My junior year at my whole little college, I was an English major, I ended up getting a scholarship to study abroad. So, I ended up at the University of York at York, England, and that’s where I realized that bibliotherapy is not only just a term about books to heal, but it’s actually a practice that people are using in their daily lives. There are scholars and counselors, and mental health professionals who specialize in this modality.
That’s also where I was introduced to bibliotherapists who are British, like Ella Berthoud, Susan Elderkin, authors of The Novel Cure and The Story Cure, and so in Europe and England, like, bibliotherapy is really embedded into the culture. Today, there’s actually a poetry therapy pharmacy in London, where you can walk in and if you're depressed, if you’re sad, if you’re going through a breakup, they will prescribe you a poem, which is so cool.
[0:08:08.0] PF: Really?
[0:08:09.6] ER: Yeah, yeah, and so that’s foundational to my development because that’s what brought into my awareness that this is actually a modality that one could specialize in and niche down in. So, when I decided to go to grad school to become a therapist, I went to Smith College School for Social Work, and I just pursued my training. This was a modality that was like front of mind.
And so, a lot of the interventions that I would use with clients would include poetry, literature, asking what they’re reading or what’s the last thing that they read that truly impacted them, or gave them some insight, and that’s really like, the origin story of how I got into this work.
[0:08:42.8] PF: That is super-super interesting, and so can you give us an example of how you’ve seen it change someone’s life?
[0:08:49.0] ER: Yeah, absolutely. So, in my book, Bibliotherapy in the Bronx, I actually have a few case studies of the way that I integrate literature into my therapy sessions, and how it’s helped people to access their emotions or to process to name their emotions. One example is actually one of my favorite case studies in the book. The Case of Maite, a Dominican elder who came to me after a traumatic brain injury.
She saw that I had on my bookshelf, The House on Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros, and as we were talking, just in regular talk therapy, she saw the book and she had mentioned, “Oh my goodness, I love that book.” And so I was like, “Oh, I love it too.” So, we just started talking about it. Eventually, this led to me reading the book with her in the session, and then she asked me if I could read it in Spanish. I had both versions in my office.
So, we ended up reading a passage from The House on Mango Street, and immediately, she recalled the name of her father, which is a big deal because when she came to me, she was having trouble accessing memories. She couldn’t even remember her daughter’s names. She was –
[0:09:48.4] PF: Oh my gosh.
[0:09:49.3] ER: Yeah, she was really struggling, she was actually referred to me by her eldest daughter, and so as we were reading the book, she says, “Pedrito,” and I say, “Wait, who is Pedrito?” And she was like, “Oh, that was my father’s name.” And you know, she just starts crying because she’s like, “I can’t believe, like reading the book, it just helped me remember that.” And I was like, “Yeah, that’s such a beautiful recollection through literature, right?”
Like, reading the book, and those emotions came up while reading, that she remembers because she loves this book so much, helped her recall the name of her father after a traumatic brain injury. I mean, if that’s not bibliotherapy, what is? So, we were both crying at that point, because I just thought that that was so – such a testament to the power of language, and you know, she didn’t recall that memory when I read the passage in English.
But she recalled it when I read it in Spanish. Something about it, at least, did an emotion that brought that memory to the surface. So, that’s just one example, but there’s many in the book as well.
[0:10:43.1] PF: Yeah, there are, and that is a beautiful example, and can you explain to us from this scientific standpoint, what is going on in our brains that’s allowing us to respond that way by reading these books and listening to these books?
[0:10:54.4] ER: Absolutely. Yeah, there’s a whole science behind it. You know, when we talk about cognitivism, social cognitivism, these are theories that really look at the way that what we think impacts how we feel, how we feel impacts how we behave, and so a lot of times, you know, we built up these defenses that really structure the psyche in a way that defends us from not having to think or feel painful, thoughts and emotions.
But what happens when we connect the story is that we actually are more open to letting those encounters happen from a curious place, not a judgmental place, and so there’s a lot of science behind the cognitive process that we go through, and attaching to fictional stories and characters, and how that helps our defenses to come down so that an emotional response can happen, and then similarly, with social cognitivism.
It’s not just what we think and how that impacts us, because we don’t always have to go through experiences ourselves to be impacted by them. Social cognitivism and the work of psychologist like Al Bandura, have taught us that sometimes, it’s looking at what somebody else is going through, that opens our perspective, that shifts our world view, that helps us to develop empathy and understand that, “Wow, like, other people are living a completely different experience than I am, and maybe it never occurred to me.”
But by engaging with other people’s stories, now, we kind of brought in our schema as well. So, there’s so much there in the science, and my book will definitely explore that as well. So, if you’re someone who is interested in the science behind bibliotherapy, it’s all in the book.
[0:12:30.6] PF: It is, and you know, right now, it’s a time people are talking about the summer beach reads and all the light summer reading, and this was a great time to talk about it. You’re creating summer reading prescriptions, and I love that. Listen, first of all, talk about how you go about creating a prescription, and can someone do it on their own? Can they create their own prescription, or how do we do these?
[0:12:54.8] ER: Absolutely. So, it’s really about asking yourself, like, “What emotions or questions am I currently sitting with, you know, in my life?” So, certainly, you know, if you’re going through a breakup, if you’re going through a new move, or if you're someone who struggles with anxiety, right? You're going to be drawn to certain themes, but I think the first thing is to ask yourself, like, “What am I dealing with emotionally?”
And then choosing books that speak to those themes, and after reading, you know, journal about what stood out to you. Was there a moment of recognition? Did something feel activating while reading or comforting? Because bibliotherapy is not just about like feeling better. I get asked this a lot by social workers that I train. It’s like, “Well, when people read, aren’t they escaping reality? Isn’t literary escapism like, counterproductive?”
And I’m like, “No, because bibliotherapy and engaging with text is more about becoming a thoughtful reader with a willingness to reflect as you read.” And so, it’s really about feeling more deeply, and asking yourself, “What mirror is this book holding up to me, and what does this say about, like, my own conflict resolution style, or communication style, wants, needs, rage, envy, right?” Especially, the shadow emotions, because I feel like that’s where we really need a safe place to be able to express ourselves.
We’re so afraid of other people’s judgment, even our own, that we deny or repress those emotions that make us feel like, “Oh, I’m a bad person if I feel hatred,” or, “I’m a bad…” It’s like, no, you're a human being with a spectrum of emotions. So, in what way does a reading practice help you to actually understand yourself, understand your inner world through story? That’s what it’s all about.
[BREAK]
[0:14:28.9] PF: We’ll be right back with more of Live Happy Now. And now, let’s hear more from Emily Rumble.
[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]
[0:14:43.2] PF: So then, do you just make a list of saying, “All right, these are the books that I’m going to get through this summer,” like, how do we do that? Because here’s the thing, when I was a kid, I was like a big reader.
[0:14:51.8] ER: Yeah.
[0:14:51.9] PF: And I always did that summer reading program, and like every year, I would be very proud of being the kid that read the most books, which made me a total nerd, but –
[0:15:01.2] ER: I love it.
[0:15:01.5] PF: The library gave me like, I don't know, they gave me like a certificate or something. So, that was reward enough.
[0:15:06.6] ER: Yeah.
[0:15:07.0] PF: So, how do we do that? How do we create this summer reading list that we know is going to really speak to us, and we’ll come out of the summer, having really gained something emotionally?
[0:15:16.1] ER: Yeah. Well, first of all, I think it’s knowing who you are as a reader. Like, if you’re a reader who likes to read to learn, that’s cool. Find a subject you want to learn about and go to the library, or go to one of the amazing book influencers’ pages, and see what books they’ve highlighted, and learned a little bit more about, you know, what’s out there, around those themes, but in terms of like, curating your summer list, I wouldn’t put too much pressure on it.
I feel like summer is a season of rest, of play, of good vibes and good energy. You know, definitely, we have those, like you and I, who are avid readers, and we always have like, “If there’s an award, baby, I want it.” If the library has a –
[0:15:47.7] PF: I’m there, I’m there for it.
[0:15:49.8] ER: I’m there, I’m there. If the library or school has a summer reading program, sign me up, right? But we don’t want us to be performative, we want us to be fun. We want us to be more about reading choice, and less about pressure. So, I would say start with like one book that you’ve been wanting to read. If you don’t have one that comes to mind right away, ask yourself, “What’s something I want to learn about this summer, or what’s something that I’ve been wanting to read?”
Like, maybe there’s a new author that you’ve heard through the grapevine that’s really had a great debut, and you want to check it out, go borrow that book from the library. Definitely also support and follow folks in the social media space, in the blog space, who do this work every day, because there are people who literally dedicate so much time to making book lists, and curating different, diverse collections.
So, just remain open, and start to peruse, and see what you’re interested in, and what lands with you, and as a general rule, this is actually Ella Berthoud’s rule, I agree with this, in the first 50 pages if you don’t feel connected, put the book down, and pick up something else, right?
[0:16:51.6] PF: Oh, I love it.
[0:16:52.2] ER: Don’t force yourself, yeah, like don’t force yourself to keep reading if it’s not resonating with you. Find something that does and read that.
[0:16:59.4] PF: And how would this work in a book club setting? How could we use this? You know, so oftentimes, you might have a book club, and you get together, and you talk about the different characters in it, and the effect of it. How could you almost use this as a group therapy if you’re approaching it this way?
[0:17:12.2] ER: Oh, absolutely, yeah. Well, first of all, I have a book club. It’s free, you all could join, Readers Who Run with the Wolves on Fable and Storygraph.
[0:17:19.9] PF: And we’ll definitely, we’ll drop a link on the landing page so they could just click right through.
[0:17:24.0] ER: Absolutely. Yeah, it’s free, we read one book a month, and there’s no pressure if you’re not into the book of the month, read with us next month, or you know, whenever the next book is there, you are interested in, but I think reading together is better. That’s my personal opinion, I read all the time, so I am a big solo reader, but I love reading in book club because I think what brings the Bibliotherapy to life is connection with others, and being able to have rich discussions around the text.
And so, what better place to do that than a book club, and my book club is all online. So, we have the platforms that we use on Fable and Storygraph, people share comments, people share questions, or book quotes. A lot of times, we’ll share book recommendations based off of what we’re reading, like, “Oh, if you guys really love this, you should read that.” Like, for example, I’m a huge fan of The Great Gatsby, and today is the pub day for a book that is a retelling called The Great Man by Kyra Davis Lurie.
I didn’t know about The Great Man coming out today; it was actually in my book club that somebody was like, “For folks who love The Great Gatsby, if you’re looking for a black history retelling, this is a great book.” So, I went and preordered that right away. So, I think just being in community with other people, you learn about new book titles, what other people are reading, what other people have read that’s really helped them through hard times.
And so, I’m a big fan, and a big proponent and supporter of joining book clubs, and again, that was pressure because I had some friends who are a part of like 17 book clubs, and I love that for them because you don’t have to read every book every month. You’re just, you’re being a part of different communities and you are connecting with folks, and if the book resonates with you that month, read it, and if it doesn’t, you don’t have to.
But you are still in community, and I think that’s always like the goal is to be in community with other readers, and reading together is just better.
[0:19:08.8] PF: I love that because we do talk about here on the show how important community is, and we’re losing that more and more, and that also brings up for me, we’re in some very divided times right now. It’s very uncertain, it’s frightening, depending on where you live, there is varying degrees of fear, anger, concern. So, how could we use bibliotherapy both to work through some of the emotions that we’re experiencing and also to maybe bring ourselves together with others?
[0:19:37.5] ER: Yeah, I think a lot of it is that we’re not a culture that is very self-reflective, especially here in America, I think we’ve lost the art of conversation, we’ve lost the art of like healthy conflict. Like, I can love you, you say you love me, we’re not always going to agree on everything, and that’s okay. It’s not either/or, in other words, like being in a relationship to someone doesn’t mean that you’re always going to agree, or that you’re coming at things from the same point of view.
We all have different life experiences, we all have different intersectional identities, and let’s be honest, we’re all impacted by the sociopolitical context that we’re living in, in different ways. So, I think one thing about engaging with literature, and having which discussions that are honest and vulnerable allows to see that, to honor that. In my experience as a therapist and just as a reader, you know, there are things that I learn every day.
Just being somebody who is open to learning, and being corrected, and understanding that not everybody is living my experience. I have one experience, but in this world, there are many different experiences, and so one person’s experience doesn’t take away from my own, but also like, I have to open to connecting with others, and hearing about their experiences, and learning, you know, about those histories.
And so, I think one beautiful thing that literature does is to connect us, not just to ourselves, where we can better understand our own inherited traumas and limitations and needs and frustrations, but also to help us to become curious about that of others, and I think that that’s really important, and it is a really important starting place because many of us are not self-reflecting. We’re sort of just reacting and responding, but we’re not really connecting that way.
So, being able to slow down, to have the dialogue with self, allows us to engage in a healthy dialogue with others in a way that’s not combative and hateful, but genuinely curious.
[0:21:30.4] PF: That’s important. I like that too, because just books in general make you slow down. It’s like, you got to slow your roll to sit down, and spend time with that page.
[0:21:39.0] ER: Yeah.
[0:21:39.8] PF: And so –
[0:21:40.6] ER: Why do I think that? Is that true? Where did I get that belief from? A lot of us have inherited beliefs, right? And prejudices that we don’t even really know we have, because we have it slowed down enough to like, consider that. Like, when did I start thinking that from, or is that just something that in my family culture or my home life was like passed on to me? So, that slowing down is so important to self-reflection.
[0:22:03.2] PF: So, what about the people who are like, “Well, this sounds great, but I’m not that big on reading.” Audiobooks, can we use audiobooks the same way, or is that a different experience?
[0:22:13.0] ER: No, audiobooks are reading, period. It’s not even a discussion at this point, and I really hate when people diminish other readers who love audiobooks. Audiobooks are reading, period.
[0:22:23.2] PF: Okay, good. So, they can jump on there, and make their own audiobook summer playlist there, and get going.
[0:22:28.7] ER: Yes.
[0:22:29.4] PF: So, is there a particular book that has been most meaningful in your personal journey or that is your kind of go-to when you’re working with clients?
[0:22:39.6] ER: There’s so many. I mean, for me, and my personal journey, and it’s also a goal to is I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. I read that book in third grade, and it changed –
[0:22:50.6] PF: Third grade, really amazing.
[0:22:51.5] ER: Yeah, and shout out to schools who still have libraries because I would have never found that book had I not had a school library, but I think Maya Angelou had always struck me as a presence and a force. So, reading her story and learning about the childhood trauma that she endured blew me away because I had no idea, and as a young girl, I was like, you know, I saw her as being this like regal amazing woman who I looked up to.
And so, reading her story just opened my eyes to like, what it took for her to become the her that I was in love with as a young girl. So, I love Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, but similarly, the work of a lot of black women writers, for me, being an African-American-Puerto Rican childhood, and grow up with my biological dad, like Toni Morrison was a guide for me. The Bluest Eye was my first encounter with literature that truly showed me the pain of black girlhood.
I read it as a teenager, and then again as a therapist. I read a lot with clients because Toni Morrison does not flinch in telling the truth about beauty, shame, racialized trauma. I think Morrison’s work, you know, Maya Angelou taught me that literature holds parts of ourselves that we’re taught to hide or be ashamed of, be embarrassed of, and so in doing so, these books, and these black women writers have offered me freedom and liberation in so many ways.
So, that’s just the start. We’re currently reading in my book club Of My Own Making by Daria Burke, who is a phenomenal – I think she’s a marketing exec, but she tells her story that no one would ever know, she actually grew up in deep poverty in Detroit. Both her parents were addicts, her grandmother died a traumatic death, and her grandmother was her rock and anchor, and similarly, like her book is just so beautiful.
So honest, so heartfelt, so painful, but we’re reading it now this month in Readers Who Run with the Wolves book club, and people are just floored because they’re like, “What? This is Daria’s story?” You know, you see Daria, she’s like this gorgeous black woman who is so successful, her career has been – it’s a guide for any black woman who wants to become an executive at that level.
And so, reading her story, people are just shocked because they’re like, “Wow, I would never would have guessed this.” But that’s just the thing, right? It’s like, when we tell our stories, and we shine light on the things that have actually impacted us, that have helped us to become who we are that we’ve had to like, excavate and alchemize to become great, it encourages other people, and inspires other people to know like, you could do it too.
You know, if I could heal from this, you can definitely do it too, and you’re not alone, and like, it’s survivable. It may not mean that life will ever be the same, but it’s survivable, and you can craft something beautiful for your life, despite whatever touched you.
[0:25:33.4] PF: Well, what struck me as you were talking about that, first of all, I wish everyone could see how you lit up when you’re talking about it, just like you glow, and it strikes me for people who say, “Well, that’s not my story, that’s not me. I'm a white, older female,” or you know, whatever their situation. How does it help to read something that isn’t your experience? That isn’t going to like, it’s a completely outside of what you have known your entire life? How is that helpful?
[0:25:59.2] ER: Yeah. It’s so helpful, and so necessary because it’s a human story, right? It’s centers the humanity of everybody no matter what walk of life you come from, and it humbles you enough to realize that you don’t have to be a black person, a queer person, you don’t have to necessarily have one part of your identity be marginalized to empathize, and to understand that other people are having a different experience.
If anything, I think it actually connects you more to yourself because then, you begin to have the conversation of like, “Wow, in what areas am I privileged, right? In what areas am I oppressed?” Also, just because you’re a white person, doesn’t mean you’re not oppressed, right? There are other intersections that exist, and so what if you grew up white and poor? What if you grew up white and you were in foster kid, and you were abandoned as a child, right?
So, I think that there’s something really humanizing about engaging with diverse stories that helps us to honor our story even more.
[0:26:55.9] PF: And, does it help us? You mentioned empathy, does it help us build empathy? Because that is something that we are lacking today. It’s diminishing, there’s studies that show, like, we are losing our empathy. Can that help us rebuild some of it?
[0:27:10.3] ER: I think it’s a starting point. You know, I think it’s a starting point because if we don’t care, then we never grow. So, actually, being curious about the experience of other people as a starting point for the development of empathy. I think, unfortunately, our society is super individualistic and reinforces that in us, that it’s every person for themself, and you got to figure it out, and the pull yourself up by the bootstrap mentality is very American.
But it’s not only harmful to our society, it’s harmful to you as an individual because the reality of it is, is that you need people, whether – I don’t care how much wealth you have, I don’t care, right? Like, we have a loneliness crisis right now, some of the loneliest people are billionaires, right?
[0:27:55.3] PF: Right.
[0:27:55.6] ER: So, it’s really a shift in your world view, in your self-perception, to understand that we are interconnected, and if you would rather be someone who, you know, lacks empathy, then that’s really sad, and I’m sorry for you because there’s so much more richness in life when you connect with other people, and you learn about other people’s experiences. You know, like, I know that that’s how I want to live my life.
I want to continue to grow and to evolve, and to connect with different people from different life paths, and garner some empathy and knowledge about, you know, what other people lived through because it makes my life richer, and my purpose stronger, and so I would hope that most people want to develop more empathy and understand the importance of that towards your happiness, towards your sense of purpose in life.
Towards just making meaning out of this life journey, because we’re all going to die at some point. That’s the thing about life, right? It ends, and so what do you want to make of your life? And you can’t make much without empathy.
[0:28:57.4] PF: True, very true. Well, you were doing some incredible work. We’re going to tell our listeners how they can find your book, how they can find your book club, how they can follow you on social media, but what is it, as I let you go, what is it that you hope people truly discover about bibliotherapy and what happens to them once they discover it?
[0:29:16.1] ER: Great question. Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me, and such a rich conversation. I just want people to discover the importance of your story, that your story matters, and that is important for you to know that, and for you to honor whatever experiences that you’ve had that maybe you’ve been taught to keep invisible, or were not supposed to tell that story or you know, share your truth because it’s going to help somebody else along the way.
And know that, like, we want to know your story, your story matters, and I just hope that in connecting with my work, and connecting with other people’s work, that people can continue to find hope and connection through literature.
[0:29:57.2] PF: I love it. Emily, thank you so much for sitting down with me. This was a wonderful conversation. I really look forward to sharing it with our listeners, and we will talk another time.
[0:30:06.1] ER: Thank you, Paula.
[END OF INTERVIEW]
[0:30:11.0] PF: That was Emily Rumble, talking about how the books we read this summer can help transform our mental health. If you’d like to learn more about Emily, join her book club, follow her on social media, check out her new book, Bibliotherapy in the Bronx, or get her summer reading prescription, created exclusively for Live Happy Now listeners, just visit us at LiveHappy.com and click on this podcast episode.
That is all we have time for today. We’ll meet you back here again next week for an all-new episode, and until then, this is Paula Felps, reminding you to make every day a happy one.
[END]
In this episode, you'll learn:
What bibliotherapy is — and why it works.
How engaging with fiction can help us heal.
How to start your own bibliotherapy practice.
Visit Emely’s website.
Join Emely’s book club, Readers Who Run With the Wolves.
Discover her book, Bibliotherapy in the Bronx.
Follow Emely on Social Media:
Facebook: @Literapy_NYC
Instagram: @Literapy_NYC
TikTok: @Literapy_NYC
Threads: @Literapy_NYC
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