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The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking, by Oliver Burkeman
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Self-help books don't seem to work. Few of the many advantages of modern life seem capable of lifting our collective mood. Wealth—even if you can get it—doesn't necessarily lead to happiness. Romance, family life, and work often bring as much stress as joy. We can't even agree on what "happiness" means. So are we engaged in a futile pursuit? Or are we just going about it the wrong way?
Looking both east and west, in bulletins from the past and from far afield, Oliver Burkeman introduces us to an unusual group of people who share a single, surprising way of thinking about life. Whether experimental psychologists, terrorism experts, Buddhists, hardheaded business consultants, Greek philosophers, or modern-day gurus, they argue that in our personal lives, and in society at large, it's our constant effort to be happy that is making us miserable. And that there is an alternative path to happiness and success that involves embracing failure, pessimism, insecurity, and uncertainty—the very things we spend our lives trying to avoid. Thought-provoking, counterintuitive, and ultimately uplifting, The Antidote is the intelligent person's guide to understanding the much-misunderstood idea of happiness.
- Sales Rank: #48399 in eBooks
- Published on: 2012-11-13
- Released on: 2012-11-13
- Format: Kindle eBook
Amazon.com Review
Amazon Best Books of the Month, November 2012: The you-can-do-it, life-is-one-big-smiley-face ethos of our contemporary culture has its value: Aggressive positivity helps many triumph over addiction, say, or build previously unimaginable businesses, even win elections and wars. But according to Oliver Burkeman, this relentless pursuit of happiness and success can also make us miserable. Exploring the dark side of the theories put forth by such icons as Norman Vincent Peale and Eckhart Tolle by looking to both ancient philosophy and current business theory, Burkeman--a feature writer for British newspaper The Guardian--offers up the counterintuitive idea that only by embracing and examining failure and loss and unhappiness will we become free of it. So in your next yoga class, try this: breathe deep, think unhappy thoughts--and feel your soul relax. --Sara Nelson
Review
“Burkeman's tour of the ‘negative path' to happiness makes for a deeply insightful and entertaining book. This insecure, anxious and sometimes unhappy reader found it quite helpful.” ―Hector Tobar, The Los Angeles Times
“Some of the most truthful and useful words on [happiness] to be published in recent years . . . A marvellous synthesis of good sense, which would make a bracing detox for the self-help junkie.” ―Julian Baggini, The Guardian
“The Antidote is a gem. Countering a self-help tradition in which ‘positive thinking' too often takes the place of actual thinking, Oliver Burkeman returns our attention to several of philosophy's deeper traditions and does so with a light hand and a wry sense of humor. You'll come away from this book enriched--and, yes, even a little happier.” ―Daniel H. Pink, author of Drive and A Whole New Mind
“Quietly subversive, beautifully written, persuasive, and profound, Oliver Burkeman's book will make you think--and smile.” ―Alex Bellos, author of Here's Looking at Euclid
“Addictive, wise, and very funny.” ―Tim Harford, author of The Undercover Economist
“What unites [Burkeman's] travels, and seems to drive the various characters he meets, from modern-day Stoics to business consultants, is disillusionment with a patently false idea that something as complex as the goal of human happiness can be found by looking in a book . . . It's a simple idea, but an exhilarating and satisfying one.” ―Alexander Larman, The Observer
“This is an excellent book; Burkeman makes us see that our current approach, in which we want happiness but search for certainty--often in the shape of material goods--is counterproductive.” ―William Leith, The Telegraph
“Fascinating . . . After years spent consulting specialists--from psychologists to philosophers and even Buddhists--Burkeman realised they all agreed on one thing: . . . in order to be truly happy, we might actually need to be willing to experience more negative emotions--or, at least, to learn to stop running so hard from them.” ―Mandy Francis, The Daily Mail
“Splendid . . . Readable and engaging.” ―British Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, The Times (London)
Review
“The Antidote is a gem. Countering a self-help tradition in which ‘positive thinking’ too often takes the place of actual thinking, Oliver Burkeman returns our attention to several of philosophy’s deeper traditions and does so with a light hand and a wry sense of humor. You'll come away from this book enriched—and, yes, even a little happier.” —Daniel H. Pink, author of Drive and A Whole New Mind
“Addictive, wise and very funny. Burkeman never takes himself too seriously, but the rest of us should.” —Tim Harford, author of The Undercover Economist and Adapt
“Quietly subversive, beautifully written, persuasive and profound, Oliver Burkeman’s book will make you think—and smile.” —Alex Bellos, author Here’s Looking at Euclid
Most helpful customer reviews
52 of 55 people found the following review helpful.
Not a justification of pessimism, just the opposite
By MichaelInVenice
For those who walk around with a scowl on their face all day and hope to find in this book the secret to being happy while being angry, depressed or forlorn, this books will probably not the mark, because there is no mark to hit.
But if you're just one of those many people out there like myself who's trying to avoid being angry and upset, but who doesn't buy the "be happy and wonderful things will happen to you" mantra, this book will be interesting. I say "interesting" not "enlightening" because it is a surface treatment covering everything from ancient stoicism to Buddhism to modern-day Santa Muerte beliefs and as such can't possibly be deep enough to be enlightening. It does go deep enough to show the common theme running through many beliefs, that happiness is ultimately related to finding a way to be content and productive in the world as it is, without devoting too much of our energy to struggling against it. The book does not suggest that we not try to better ourselves or the world around us, but does make the point that it is the struggle against our condition that is likely to make us unhappy far more than the condition we're in to begin with.
I found this book to be an interesting departure point, suggesting several others that I suspect will be more enlightening, rather than merely interesting.
189 of 204 people found the following review helpful.
Debby Downer was on to something.
By Dustin G. Rhodes
I am a sucker. Feature a writer on National Public Radio, and the interview is mildly entertaining, I will buy the book. I will also probably read it -- the only question remaining: will I actually like it?
The Antidote, for sure, is personally fascinating. I abhor positive thinking, gravitating instead toward reality. But I didn't come by this easily. In my early 20's, I became obsessed with all manner of self help, positive thinking and new age spirituality. I devoured (embarrassing) self help books, feeling temporarily inspired by them while making feeble attempts to put the words into practice. Inevitably, I'd feel like a failure for not being able to be perfect -- or even slightly "better" than I was before; I'd feel consumed with anger and resentment, too, that my problems didn't magically go away; that life wasn't easier. It took me a LONG TIME to realize that my faux spirituality was primarily the cause of my dissatisfaction and pain.
My actual problems were far less annoying than the books I was reading to solve them.
I wish I'd read The Antidote 15 years ago.
The Antidote travels familiar -- to me, a junkie, at least -- terrain. If you've ever read a book on buddhism (through a pop culture lens), for instance, much of this won't be new: accept life as it is. But the context will; the author blends storytelling, cutting edge research, personal anecdote and wry humor into this compelling case for what he refers to as the negative path; the wisdom of the Stoics as a sane approach to life.
I am torn as to how many stars to offer; for whatever reason, I wasn't in love with the book as a whole. The author is certainly a talented writer, but I felt like the book went on and on. And on. This kind of thing, yes, is highly subjective, so take it with a grain of salt. To me, this book would have been a lot better had it been a lot shorter. I often feel this way about non-fiction books -- that there's a quota to fill. What's wrong with lean and mean?
(OK, OK: the book is not actually that long, so maybe it's my attention span).
It also bears mentioning that reading The Antidote is not actually the antidote for, really, anything: you actually have to live -- which means accepting that life is hard and messy and sometimes ugly and awful; it means not constantly trying to escape it.
But if you're obsessed with The Secret, then you need this book. The Secret will not-so-secretly let you down, again and again. The Antidote contains actual valuable advice: there are no shortcuts, magical thinking is useless and, my favorite: a little negativity will make us happier.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful.
He argues that our attempts to find happiness by thinking positively
By Christina B.
In The Antidote, Burkeman attempts to provide a counterpoint to the ubiquitous positive-thinking messages we hear, from The Secret to corporate goal setting. He argues that our attempts to find happiness by thinking positively, concentrating on success, eliminating doubt, and setting specific goals actually make us more unhappy. As some one whose response to "positive thinking" is typically eye-rolling, I was excited to read the book, hoping to find useful tidbits that would help me utilize my more cynical view of life to my advantage. And while there are a few points in the book I found interesting, I was also disappointed by the vague and philosophy-heavy descriptions of alternatives to positive thinking Burkeman presents, from Buddhist meditation to Stoicism.
The book isn't intended as a step-by-step "improve your life" guide like many of the positive-thinking tomes, which I appreciated. But I suppose the downside is that the book also doesn't provide much for people who want to use a more negative approach to grab a hold of. Some of its generalities, though, were interesting. For example, Burkeman argues that rather than set goals, people should take stock of what they have, and begin working from there. Or, the best way to avoid procrastination is not to try to "feel like" doing something--just do it regardless. And for all those irritations in life, Burkeman suggests that we view it not in terms of something being done to us (that kid over there is annoying me) but in terms of how we respond (I'm annoyed because I believe he is annoying). Some of the other ideas I was more familiar with from my psychologist husband, such as imagining worst-case scenarios or separating your sense of self from your feelings, and others from my work as an educator (e.g., the importance of having an incremental mindset about intelligence and ability rather than an innate).
There are certainly things that will stay with me: when I next hear about how Bob Smith became a millionaire because he was perseverant, I'll remember survivor bias--and note that we've ignored all those people who were perseverant and failed. But, as a whole, the book was too focused on philosophy and on quoting various philosophers and not focused enough on practical matters for it to be much use to me.
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