About this quote

Reading can move you so completely that you start to carry other people's thoughts for a while. That sudden overlap tells you how much your mind borrows, practices, and tries on different responses. Pay attention when a character's feeling lingers in your day; decide whether it fits you or if you picked it up unconsciously. Try pausing after a chapter and asking which parts are borrowed and which are truly yours.

When to use it

• In my literature seminar, after discussing the protagonist I kept answering questions as if I were her—so I told the class I felt like the character for an hour.
• In therapy I said I had been acting like the memoirist all week and we spent the session sorting out which habits came from the book.
• On the late train home I realized I was smiling at people the way the narrator did, so I laughed and said the book had turned me into someone else for the ride.
• After reading a parenting chapter, I snapped at my kid the same way the father did and then admitted to my partner, 'That chapter made me act like him.'