How I Started Reading Again (For Pleasure)
By Soumaya Bahi
Picture this: It's 11 PM, you're in bed, and your thumb is doing that thing again. You know the one—the endless scroll through TikTok, Instagram, whatever feeds your digital addiction. Sound familiar?
Early 2025, I had a moment of clarity that stopped me mid-scroll. I started questioning how I was spending my spare time—those precious moments before bed or during my commute when I actually had space to breathe.
Like everyone, I was caught in the scroll trap. I particularly loved TikTok, constantly sending videos to my sister (seriously, the creativity blows my mind). But here's the thing: after 15 minutes would pass, I'd start feeling like a robot—like my hands were scrolling on automatic mode while my brain slowly turned to mush.
My bedtime ritual had become depressingly predictable: Plan A was scrolling (obviously), Plan B was watching videos of people riding massive waves or crushing ultra trails to feel momentarily inspired, and Plan C was reading… maybe.
Here's the irony: I've always loved reading. But somewhere along the way, it had transformed from pleasure into punishment.
I would buy all the "right" books— Atomic Habits, Thinking Fast and Slow, you know the drill. This year, Nexus sat on my nightstand like a judgmental friend, silently waiting for me to finally crack it open. I had loved the author's previous works (Sapiens and Homo Deus were brilliant), but this one? It felt like homework. Still, I kept it there just in case inspiration struck at midnight.
But Plans A and B left me empty. After long workdays, I desperately needed something that actually made me feel good—something light and engaging. I craved that amazing feeling of getting lost in a story, like when I read 40 Rules of Love during my post-surgery recovery when I had literally nothing else to do.
The problem? I had no clue what to read next.
Here’s the truth: my brain had been rewired by bite-sized content. Fighting it wasn’t working. Why fight it? I mentally told Nexus, "See you later," and decided to pick up something... light for once.
Enter The Housemaid—literally everywhere I looked, people were raving about it. I grabbed it and... wow. I finished it in one sitting. Not like checking off a to-do list item, but with the same easy pleasure as binging Netflix. Game changer.
Suddenly I thought: okay, this worked. I just replaced mindless scrolling with an addictive page-turner. But now what?
I started exploring reading apps. Every reading app promised to be the one. Instead, they bombarded me with overwhelming questions: "Set your yearly reading goal! 40 books? 50???" Um, what? Then came the statistics dashboards and progress charts. I just wanted book recommendations, not a performance review of my literary life.
Then something great happened. Right before my Brazil trip, a friend grabbed my arm with real excitement: "Soumaya, you have to read this book. It's set in Brazil. You're going to absolutely love it."
That excitement was contagious. I ordered The Seven Sisters immediately.
And then... it happened again.
That amazing feeling of getting completely lost in a story. It felt so easy. Fun. I couldn't wait to turn the next page. My phone? That endless scroll? Suddenly it didn't matter.
But something even cooler happened when I actually got to Brazil. Reading that book during the trip made me notice more. I'd walk through the streets and think, "Oh, this is like that scene from the book," or spot details in the architecture of the Corcovado, the way people interacted, the little cultural moments that suddenly had meaning because of what I'd read. I felt more connected to the place, more aware. It was like the book had given me a secret lens to see Brazil through.
Then came another recommendation: Born A Crime. Funny. Easy. Emotional. I was hooked.
And that’s when it clicked—the impact of these stories went beyond entertainment. They made me see differently, feel more, learn without trying. And they reminded me of something powerful: books spark the best kind of conversations with friends. Because when you find the right book, it doesn’t just stay on the page—it stays with you.
That feeling—the pure joy of getting lost in a story, and the calm it brings in our noisy digital world—is what inspired me to build Swelv.
I wanted to bottle that magic: reading that feels effortless and rewarding, powered by a community of friends who light up when they share a story they love. Real recommendations that actually fit you, not random lists. Real connections built around the simplest love language: “Hey, I think you’d really love this book.”
Think of it as Strava for reading—but made for everyone, not just bookworms. For anyone who’s tired of mindless scrolling and craves something that actually feels good.
And honestly? In 2025, we need that more than ever.