Review: The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life by David Brooks

3 stars for The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life by David Brooks.

I am not much of a reader of self-help books. It is only in recent few years that I start reading this genre. I may not have read that many self-help books but I know it when I come across one that is like a spark to my heart, a light bulb clicking on and illuminating the truth; the truths of life, something I already know all along and then seeing them put in words, elevate it to a different level. What I want to say is, I don't have this feeling with this book. It is difficult to enjoy reading The Second Mountain, least of all like it.

Having read the inspiring introduction, I thought I will be equally blown away by the rest of the book. But I am sorely disappointed. I don't usually enjoy reading a book's introduction but I always read it. Ironically, this book's introduction is one of the best I have ever read. Among the topics covered, the author talks about happiness and joy and the difference between them. He shares the reason behind the birth of this book. It reveals the author's vulnerability and perhaps because of it, feels most personal and relatable. Whereas, the rest of his book feels more like a collection of quotes where he takes the curriculum of other people's knowledge and passes it along. The only impressive thing out of it is that it goes to know how widely read the author is.

Having said the above, don't get me wrong. I do not mean to say this self-help book is no good. It is just the way the content is being delivered to the reader that does not sit so well with me. I do not doubt the sincerity of the author, but I also cannot remember much of what I have read and learned from him at the end of his book. There are simply information overload from his quotes and stories of others which come across as directionless at times. The wisdom presented is generalised at best. Still, I believe there are others who will benefit - much more than me - from this book. Ultimately, this is a book about finding meaning and purpose in life through relationships and commitments (after worldly success has failed to fulfill).

If you are like me, someone who does not like that a book is excessively filled with writings put together with stories and parables and quotes from other people, you can consider simply reading the introduction and the conclusion chapter on The Relationalist Manifesto. It provides a good summary of the case against hyper-individualism of the current moment, and for relationalism, which the author believes, is a better way to live.


Publisher: Random House
Publication date: 16 Apr 2019

*** Favourite Quote 1 ***

A commitment is making a promise to something without expecting a reward. A commitment is falling in love with something and then building a structure of behavior around it for those moments when love falters.

*** Favourite Quote 2 ***

Happiness involves a victory for the self, an expansion of self. Happiness comes as we move toward our goals, when things go our way. Happiness often has to do with some success, some new ability, or some heightned sensual pleasure. Joy tends to involve some transcendence of self. Joy often involves self-forgetting.

Happiness is what we aim for on the first mountain. Joy is a by-product of living on the second mountain.

*** Favourite Quote 3 ***

We can help create happiness, but we are seized by joy. We are pleased by happiness, but we are transformed by joy. When we experience joy, we often feel we have glimpsed into a deeper and truer layer of reality.

*** Favourite Quote 4 ***

Happiness tends to be individual; we measure it by asking,"Are you happy?" Joy tends to be self-transcending. Happiness is something you pursue; joy is something that rises up unexpectedly and sweeps over you. Happiness comes from accomplishments; joy comes from offering gifts. Happiness fades; we get used to the things that used to make us happy. Joy doesn't fade.

To live with joy is to live with wonder, gratitude, and hope. People who are on the second mountain have been transformed. They are deeply committed. The outpouring of love has become a steady force.

*** Favourite Quote 5 ***

Seasons of pain expose the falseness and vanity of most of our ambitions and illuminate the larger reality of living and dying, caring and being cared for. Pain helps us see the true size of our egotistical desires. Before they seemed gigantic and dominated the whole screen. After seasons of suffering, we see that the desires of the ego are very small desires, and certainly not the ones we should organize our lives around.

*** Favourite Quote 6 ***

The valley is where we shed the old self so the new self can emerge. There are no shortcuts. There’s just the same eternal three-step process that the poets have described from time eternal: from suffering to wisdom to service. Dying to the old self, cleansing in the emptiness, resurrecting in the new. From the agony of the valley, to the purgation in the desert, to the insight on the mountaintop.

*** Favourite Quote 7 ***

Character is not something you build sitting in a room thinking about the difference between right and wrong and about your own willpower. Character emerges from our commitments. If you want to inculcate character in someone else, teach them how to form commitments — temporary ones in childhood, provisional ones in youth, permanent ones in adulthood. Commitments are the school for moral formation.

When your life is defined by fervent commitments, you are on the second mountain.

~ The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life
David Brooks

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In The Second Mountain, David Brooks explores the four commitments that define a life of meaning and purpose: to a spouse and family, to a vocation, to a philosophy or faith, and to a community. Our personal fulfillment depends on how well we choose and execute these commitments. In The Second Mountain, Brooks looks at a range of people who have lived joyous, committed lives, and who have embraced the necessity of dependence. He gathers their wisdom on how to choose a partner, how to pick a vocation, how to live out a philosophy, and how we can begin to integrate our commitments into one overriding purpose.

In short, this book is meant to help us all lead more meaningful lives. But it’s also a provocative social commentary. We live in a society, Brooks argues, that celebrates freedom, that tells us to be true to ourselves, at the expense of surrendering to a cause, rooting ourselves in a neighborhood, binding ourselves to others by social solidarity and love. We have taken individualism to the extreme—and in the process we have torn the social fabric in a thousand different ways. The path to repair is through making deeper commitments. In The Second Mountain, Brooks shows what can happen when we put commitment-making at the center of our lives.

*Blurb from Goodreads*

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