Take a photo of a barcode or cover
tmcg's review
4.0
I just finished reading “Fearless at Work: Timeless Teachings for Awakening Confidence, Resilience, and Creativity in the Face of Life’s Demands” by Michael Carroll and wanted to share some thoughts on this book as I have read his previous book “Awake at Work” and have to say I do value the very ‘work’ that the author is doing in focusing on this element of the human condition and how Buddhism intersects with out jobs out in the world rather than the familiar subject matter of most books relating to work done on the cushion or in the meditation halls.
Since many of us spend so much time in our jobs, interacting with so many people and defining ourselves so fully through our 9-5, our workplaces can provide much of the meat for our practice and can demonstrate some of the best of the Buddha’s teachings all before we make it to the lunchroom after fantasizing over being the first to get our mitts on the veggie nuggets, only to be beat out by that miserable Brian in accounting who lacks social skills, speaks way to loud and stole the Penske file right out from under our nose.
This book centers itself around the subject matter of confidence, fearlessness, groundlessness and relates 37 lojong slogans to our work life in order to show how we can escape from habitual tendencies via both examination of these slogans as well as the practice of mindfulness-awareness meditation.
Being able to related directly to our experience has great benefit to our professional lives and Carroll mentions several times in this book that wakefulness helps us to snap our of restlessness and confusion that can obscure the reality of situations we find ourselves in. While it’s sometimes fun to engage in the juiciness of drama in the workplace, it can have serious results upon both our careers as well as our mental health and spiritual growth.
“Fearless at Work” digs deep into the emotional side of our professional life and through the lojong slogans helps to bring us a bit more out of our cocoons into a more skillful manner of working with others in society. False expectations, hopes, lack of confidence, ego posturing, lying, arrogance and all of the various toxic emotions that rear their heads take us further away from our ‘human-ness’ and only cause more pain and suffering. Carrol’s book gives solid examples of many who get caught up in the trap and through his work, he’s able to coach them to viewing situations in a different manner, rather than through their own lenses.
Much emphasis is placed on mindfulness-awareness and as such, much of the book discusses the benefits of a regular practice as a means to become more wakeful, aware, able to be in the present moment and overall to help us let go of the mental chatter that binds us.
Overall, I quite enjoyed this book, however I personally would have appreciated a few more ‘case studies’ in how those how employ mindfulness-awareness in their lives see the benefits of this practice. So much of Carroll’s book relates to this practice and I would have enjoyed a few more ‘real-world’ examples of these benefits in the wild. There is also a large part of the book which drifts from ‘working life’ towards more of life in general and while this is good since there really is little to distinguish between the two, it would help to have a refined look at the sphere of work rather than the examination being of one’s life overall. It could be said that one’s home environment can influence one’s behaviour at work, but I felt that some of these kinds of recommendations stretched a bit further from the title and primary subject of the book as being ‘Fearless at Work’.
There are about 6 paragraphs of the book on the vajra view of aggression that are alone worth the cover price as they are truly that good. Truly. In addition to this, the Appendix that covers how mindfulness-awareness cultivates social intelligence is in my opinion, is where my interest was truly piqued. The author gets into an analysis of how Daniel Goleman’s book “Social Intelligence: The Revolutionary New Science of Human Relationships” and reasons how mindfulness-awareness practice supports all seven of Goleman’s postulated skills for the cultivation of healthy human relationships.
All in all, if you are a fan of Micheal Carroll’s work (as I am), geek out on sociology, human interaction or are looking for help in cultivating fearlessness and confidence in your working life, I would encourage you to check out this book.
Since many of us spend so much time in our jobs, interacting with so many people and defining ourselves so fully through our 9-5, our workplaces can provide much of the meat for our practice and can demonstrate some of the best of the Buddha’s teachings all before we make it to the lunchroom after fantasizing over being the first to get our mitts on the veggie nuggets, only to be beat out by that miserable Brian in accounting who lacks social skills, speaks way to loud and stole the Penske file right out from under our nose.
This book centers itself around the subject matter of confidence, fearlessness, groundlessness and relates 37 lojong slogans to our work life in order to show how we can escape from habitual tendencies via both examination of these slogans as well as the practice of mindfulness-awareness meditation.
Being able to related directly to our experience has great benefit to our professional lives and Carroll mentions several times in this book that wakefulness helps us to snap our of restlessness and confusion that can obscure the reality of situations we find ourselves in. While it’s sometimes fun to engage in the juiciness of drama in the workplace, it can have serious results upon both our careers as well as our mental health and spiritual growth.
“Fearless at Work” digs deep into the emotional side of our professional life and through the lojong slogans helps to bring us a bit more out of our cocoons into a more skillful manner of working with others in society. False expectations, hopes, lack of confidence, ego posturing, lying, arrogance and all of the various toxic emotions that rear their heads take us further away from our ‘human-ness’ and only cause more pain and suffering. Carrol’s book gives solid examples of many who get caught up in the trap and through his work, he’s able to coach them to viewing situations in a different manner, rather than through their own lenses.
Much emphasis is placed on mindfulness-awareness and as such, much of the book discusses the benefits of a regular practice as a means to become more wakeful, aware, able to be in the present moment and overall to help us let go of the mental chatter that binds us.
Overall, I quite enjoyed this book, however I personally would have appreciated a few more ‘case studies’ in how those how employ mindfulness-awareness in their lives see the benefits of this practice. So much of Carroll’s book relates to this practice and I would have enjoyed a few more ‘real-world’ examples of these benefits in the wild. There is also a large part of the book which drifts from ‘working life’ towards more of life in general and while this is good since there really is little to distinguish between the two, it would help to have a refined look at the sphere of work rather than the examination being of one’s life overall. It could be said that one’s home environment can influence one’s behaviour at work, but I felt that some of these kinds of recommendations stretched a bit further from the title and primary subject of the book as being ‘Fearless at Work’.
There are about 6 paragraphs of the book on the vajra view of aggression that are alone worth the cover price as they are truly that good. Truly. In addition to this, the Appendix that covers how mindfulness-awareness cultivates social intelligence is in my opinion, is where my interest was truly piqued. The author gets into an analysis of how Daniel Goleman’s book “Social Intelligence: The Revolutionary New Science of Human Relationships” and reasons how mindfulness-awareness practice supports all seven of Goleman’s postulated skills for the cultivation of healthy human relationships.
All in all, if you are a fan of Micheal Carroll’s work (as I am), geek out on sociology, human interaction or are looking for help in cultivating fearlessness and confidence in your working life, I would encourage you to check out this book.