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The Second Mountain

The Quest for a Moral Life

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About this listen

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Secnd Mountain, written by David Brooks, read by Arthur Morey.

Are you on your first or second mountain?
Is life about you - or others?
About success - or something deeper?

The world tells us that we should pursue our self-interest: career wins, high status, nice things. These are the goals of our first mountain. But at some point in our lives we might find that we're not interested in what other people tell us to want. We want the things that are truly worth wanting.

This is the second mountain.

What does it mean to look beyond yourself and find a moral cause? To forget about independence and discover dependence - to be utterly enmeshed in a web of warm relationships? What does it mean to value intimacy, devotion, responsibility and commitment above individual freedom? In The Second Mountain David Brooks explores the meaning and possibilities that scaling a second mountain offer us, and the four commitments that most commonly move us there: family, vocation, philosophy and community. Inspiring, personal and full of joy, this book will help you discover why you were really put on this earth.

 Personal Development Personal Success Philosophy Society Sociology Inspiring Morality

Critic reviews

Potentially life-changing lessons can be found in this relevant and thought-provoking book.
Brooks's best book yet ... Powerful ... His stirring new book is a self-help guide to escaping the prison of self. (Oliver Burkeman)
Enormously comforting and galvanising ... a better way to live
Across more than 300 pages of heartfelt prose, Brooks reworks [the meaning of life] into a neat story . . . Brooks' willingness to be "a little vulnerable" results in a refreshing honest confession . . . There's no top-of-the-mountain moment . . . just a friendly, gentle nudging toward the conclusion that real joy lies in moral commitment.
The book overall, candid about the reality of stress and failure in the author's life, has earned the right to put forward with equal candour the experience of finding, or being found by, faith. (Rowan Williams)
All stars
Most relevant
This book is pure gold.

It talks about how “self” and the pursuit of happiness no longer works, and shows an alternative where the society at large, and the reader in particular, could follow.

Really great book, worth the read.

This book is a jewel

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Good book all in all but unfortunately a bit to scattered and long and therefore difficult to finish. It should be possible to say what he's trying to say in a shorter way.

Interesting ideas but could be more efficiently described

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The book speaks to my soul. It has put everything I've been feeling into words. A truly wonderful read worthy of reading.

Beautiful book

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A lot of brilliant, thought provoking ideas in the book. It does seem to resonate quite well with my experience of the ego based lifestyle of seeking pleasure, money and reputation feeling empty and meaningless, while giving and caring for a few close relationships feeling extremely meaningful.

The book has a couple of chapters that are really insistent on faith and religion and spirituality, that can be a very off-putting for readers who weren’t looking for this - seeing these chapters almost made me abandon the book. The rest of the book is great though.

A very powerful message

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this audiobook is fascinating, the author goes into great detail with each of the four areas of one's life - vocation, marriage, faith/religion and community. while the religious element had the least appeal to me, it was interesting to hear the author's journey into becoming a religious person. I would have liked to hear more on community and less on religion.
I found the audiobook excellent but quite long.

fascinating view on life

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