Mauapropisms

Reading is a very difficult task for me. I love to read now, but I consider myself a very slow reader, whose mind wanders a lot. I’ll read pages of text only to realize I my mind was focused on something else. Then I have to go back and reread and try and catch and redirect myself if my mind wanders too much.

Additionally, I tend to misread and interpret words incorrectly because of my dyslexia sometimes creating confusion over what I am reading. This is also something my children point out to me whenever I make one of these mistakes now that they’re old enough to read. As such, I have had to find tools and tricks to help me when it comes to reading and writing.

One of the things I have found useful in combating my dyslexia (and general issues with focus) is audiobooks. I am able to focus more when I’m listening to something, partially because it’s harder to be distracted by ambient sounds. The other method I have developed and used is also listening to music (almost as a white noise) to help me focus on what I am reading.

What Dyslexia has taught me about literacy is to focus on what is being said, not how it is being presented. This is also strengthened by the fact that I grew up with an immigrant parent and recognizing not every language uses the same syntax and structure as English. So minor mistakes or grammatical differences in what I am reading I tend to push past and focus on what the individual is trying to convey to me, rather than focusing on whether they said it “right” or not. I still wrestle with my own writing and how it will be interpreted because of these struggles and it has given me a lot of grace when dealing with other peoples writings and providing feedback. Because of this I am mindful to not impose my own interpretation of what someone is writing, but rather focus on what they are saying and how they are defining terms and what evidence they bring to bear to support said narrative.