As children, we are taught that reading is an important aspect of being human. Reading gives us a form of art that looks into the author's hopes, dreams, fantasies, and some of their deepest darkest secrets in such a form that we can find ourselves relating to the characters or stories. Author's are able to manipulate their ideas and stories to create two hundred page long novels that contain secrets, knowledge, and experiences that many of us have never experienced ourselves, but feel as though we experience it through the story. The love, the hurt, the adventure, all wrap us up differently and present a unique experience for every single reader.

Over winter break I pushed myself to read more. I used to read books all the time, holding the flashlight under my blankets after mom and dad said it was bed time. I would read series upon series of books, finding my refuge at the local library. Since it was close the Christmas, I could not go to the library to pick up a new novel so I searched through my own, limited library. It contains a lot of the novels I read in elementary school, simple chapter books about brave pets/animals all with happy endings. As I searched for the most sophisticated book I had left at home since I went to college, I came across Twilight. When I picked up Twilight, all the raw emotions I felt when I first read it flooded back to me. This book series was one of the most impactful (emotionally) series I had read growing up as a kid. I chose to reread this book, and I was wrapped back into the love story of Forks, Washington. In less than 72 hours I turned through over 200 pages to finish the novel.

After reading Twilight for the first time since I started dating my boyfriend, I spent some time reflecting on the story itself and how the story affected me while in high school. The raw emotions I had when I first read Twilight, heartache, loneliness, desperation, were just as real and raw when I read it for a second time. As I followed Bella's search for answers, and then her journey to keep the boy she knew she shouldn't have, her emotions became mine. This was such a powerful part of the novel for me, and it reflected into parts of my life.

Through high school, I searched for the "Edward Cullen" character that I thought I deserved. A boy that was mature beyond his years, who looked perfect, cultured, demanding, selfish, and had an undying love for me. When you're a fifteen year old girl who has been swooned by a book character, you wouldn't think she is so crazy to believe that we all have a man out there that will love us in such a way. Now I realize that there is no high school boy that could ever fit that description, let alone a man that fits that description. How could I be so naive to believe that an Edward Cullen existed past the crisp white pages of the paperback novel?

The reality is, books are powerful. I never realized how my emotions could be affected by someone else's thoughts. The dark depression that would blanket the town of Forks would blanket my thoughts no matter what was going on in my life. The need for someone to fill a "hole" in my life pushed me to look for a guy that would be able to do that. This lead to poor judgment on my part, and I started to settle for friends and guys that I knew were not good enough for me. I do not "blame" Twilight for my life choices, I just want to reiterate that at that young age I did not realize how powerful these books really were.

To what extent are books influencing our lives? I never realized the small impact the Twilight series had on my ideas of love until many years later, but what other books have influenced my thinking of the world or situations around me? And let's stay away from books, but think about movies, or plays, or music? These arts are more powerful than we realize, and these artists are changing our lives without us even knowing.

So next time you are engulfed in a new book series, album, or play take a step back and really evaluate the lessons and values each hold. Are the values and lessons something you agree with, or does it present new ideas that could change your current ideas? Expand your intellectual capacity and reflect on these types of art and how they affect you in the now. Do not let it affect you in a negative way because that is not the goal of the artists, but let it inspire change and conversation. If I opened a discussion about the dating relationship between Edward and Bella, I might have been open to seeing and understanding the signs of an abusive and unhealthy relationship. I would have learned that being so obsessed with another person was unhealthy and that there needs to be a good balance of who we are and who we are with our significant other. This separation of persons was a huge struggle for me in high school, creating a very dependent person. Even with my current boyfriend, it took time for me to learn who I was as an independent woman, and then learning the woman I was with my boyfriend. They are not much different, but the change from dependent to independent was one of my greatest accomplishments as I headed into my twenties, and if I had an open conversation about these topics during the big surge of the Twilight series I might have been better off.

Value the arts, as they are some of the biggest influencers of how we view the world. Their ideas and stories create a fire within all of us in one way or another, a powerful tool that many will not accomplish within their lifetime.