The Number Game: On Quiet Pages and Quieter Expectations

By Afrah Fatima

All things considered, 2025 wasn’t the best year for me in terms of the number of books I read. And, in order to come to terms with this (un)fortunate event, here goes something! 

We’ve been conditioned all our lives to think that more equals better. Part of me still thinks this to be true, and unlearning it can be difficult. An emphasis on quantity is after all the foundation of consumerist society. We've been told that a person is more important the more he accomplishes. But why is the person who struggles to get by not as worthy of praise? We don’t see these people as deserving of success because we’ve internalized this concept that somehow those who do more are better. What I mean is that we tend to treat both financial gain and sheer productivity as proof of worth. We assume those who earn more or do more are somehow better, and that’s exactly the mindset I’m trying to question.

This mindset has grown to be pervasive in our society only within the last couple of centuries, beginning with the Industrial Revolution prioritizing profit over individuals. We started seeing humans as capital, as investments to further the message of those one percenters who benefit in the end from this dehumanization. I’m not trying to argue that the Industrial Revolution or modern day society is inherently bad. In fact, I think that we’ve come a long way since preindustrial times and that there have been advancements made for the better of humanity. But all the same, the industrial revolution brought about a greater set of discontents for the common man. That probably is a topic for another time.

My issue is with rewarding the blind consumption of anything, say, books. Reading not for the sake of pleasure or knowledge but for the sake of getting your numbers up. I’m guilty of this. And in late November, when the year was nearing to an end, I had a feeling of worthlessness because I didn’t complete my reading goal. And while the reading goal was for my own satisfaction, I couldn’t help feeling like a disgrace to my English major for not having read enough books. And this is where I falter. Deep down I know, despite having read less, that what I did read mattered more because each book made me question things, made me aware of new perspectives, and ultimately helped me become a better human being, book by book,  page by page, sentence by sentence.

While goals and plans are important as motivators, failing to achieve quantitative goals doesn’t make one less better off in any way. The capitalist system has made us think that by failing such goals we lose value and become less important to society, but if that was the case then I probably wouldn’t be writing this. For, if failure really stripped me of my self worth, then this reflection wouldn’t exist. We’re taught that unmet goals reduce our worth and that value is something earned through crossing off tasks on a list. But if it were true, then why am I here, turning this "failure" into something human? The very act of admitting and writing this, while persevering through my supposed failure, is proof that my life and everyone’s life has inherent value that cannot be diminished by sheer unfulfillment of goals. 

So, long story short, consume not because that is expected of you. Consume to reflect, to experience, and to create something that is entirely yours!