Self-Knowledge (Essay Books)

Or we may feel lost in our career, but be unable to say more than that we wish to ‘do something creative’ or ‘help to make the world a better place’ – plans so vague that they leave us vulnerable to the more robust plans of others.

Feelings and desires that have not been examined tend not to leave us alone; they linger and spread their energy randomly to neighbouring issues.

Denigration We tell ourselves that we simply don’t care about something – love or politics, career success or intellectual life, that beautiful student or the house we can’t afford. And we are very emphatic about our lack of interest and disdain. We go to great lengths to make it clear to others and ourselves how absolutely unconcerned we are. Ther

Our overall nervousness declines when our anxieties are systematically laid out and examined.

How might we still be OK, even if it all fell apart? Entertaining the most extreme consequences can be the best way to finally neuter an otherwise nagging concern. One by one, we should confront the worst, and see that it is, for the most part, very survivable.

I am wise not because I know, but because I know I don’t know.

Entertaining the most extreme consequences can be the best way to finally neuter an otherwise nagging concern. One by one, we should confront the worst, and see that it is, for the most part, very survivable.

Philosophical Meditation, a practice with the premise that a decisive share of the trouble in our minds comes from thoughts and feelings that have not been untangled, examined and confronted with sufficient attention.

Most so-called ‘addictions’ are at heart symptoms of insistent difficult feelings that we haven’t found a way to address. Insomnia is revenge for thoughts we have refused to have in the day.