Review
The Antidote is aptly titled: the book is both a cure for what ails most guides to happiness and an anti-self-help title of sorts. Author Oliver Burkeman offers compelling introductions to seven philosophies that capitalize on the reality of the negative – versus the popular and permeating positive – to promote happiness. While realists and melancholies will feel quite welcome in
The Antidote's pages, all readers who have ever been suspicious of the glib advice to "think positive", or flummoxed by society's obsession with goals and success, are likely to find Burkeman's exploration of these philosophical and spiritual habits of mind fascinating stuff.
Burkeman first introduces the idea of a negative road to happiness via Stoicism, or as he puts it, "the art of confronting the worst-case scenario." His tour then moves to a layman-friendly...
Beyond the Book
The Antidote introduces readers to numerous intriguing thinkers, past and present. Here is a short sampling with brief introductions:
Daniel Wegner – professor of psychology at Harvard and director of the Mental Control Laboratory at the University. Wegner's studies concentrate on what he calls "the precisely counterintuitive error," our propensity to do exactly the thing we're trying to avoid. A New York Times opinion piece by Wegner explores the Web's effect on human memory. He is also the author of the book,
The Illusion of Conscious Will.
