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A review by moominbit
The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking by Oliver Burkeman
5.0
“True security lies in the unrestrained embrace of insecurity - in the recognition that we never really stand on solid ground, and never can.”
― Oliver Burkeman, The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking
I first read this book in 2016 when I graduated from university and found myself stuck in a nasty post-grad depression with intense feelings of failure, despite having actually graduated and done well. It helped me immensely back then by showing me that the only constant in life is chaos and that the only control to be attempted is a surrender to the knowledge of human mortality and a practiced acceptance of chaos itself.
It taught me to stop fighting the chaos, cause you'll only make it worse.
Stop avoiding failure, because it will only hurt more if you run away from your failures instead of owning them and seeing them for the help and knowledge they can provide.
Stop hiding on the bright side and turn around and face the shadow.
And more often than not facing the darker side of life was far less painful than I thought it would be.
A little over 4 years later and I find myself rereading this book because in the post 2020/Covid-19 constant-stream-of-trauma-enducing-crisies I needed to be reminded of this once again.
This book never claims to have "the answer".
If anything it only adds more mysteries to your life.
But, as this book keeps showing me, we all at times need mysteries and questions more than we need fixed goals and closed off answers that might not match up with actual reality.
Turn around and look at the darker side of life and face what lurks there.
You don't have have the answer to life, you just have to be willing to look, question and face the uncertainty of not knowing everything. Of never knowing everything.
After 2020 we can all stand to be reminded that chaos often brings about opportunities and that failure doesn't have to be a dreaded end to all endevours, but merely you pushing at the limits of your current capabilities (like the freakin' book says). And then next time going beyond them til you meet the next set of limits. And so forth.
Failure is painful, but useful. You break, you heal, you grow.
And like Beckett said you can't go on, yet you go on.
So if you feel shaken by the past year (or by life in general) and find yourself ready to punch the next person who tells you to "just look on the bright side" and "stay positive!" this book is for you. It might help you to keep going.
― Oliver Burkeman, The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking
I first read this book in 2016 when I graduated from university and found myself stuck in a nasty post-grad depression with intense feelings of failure, despite having actually graduated and done well. It helped me immensely back then by showing me that the only constant in life is chaos and that the only control to be attempted is a surrender to the knowledge of human mortality and a practiced acceptance of chaos itself.
It taught me to stop fighting the chaos, cause you'll only make it worse.
Stop avoiding failure, because it will only hurt more if you run away from your failures instead of owning them and seeing them for the help and knowledge they can provide.
Stop hiding on the bright side and turn around and face the shadow.
And more often than not facing the darker side of life was far less painful than I thought it would be.
A little over 4 years later and I find myself rereading this book because in the post 2020/Covid-19 constant-stream-of-trauma-enducing-crisies I needed to be reminded of this once again.
This book never claims to have "the answer".
If anything it only adds more mysteries to your life.
But, as this book keeps showing me, we all at times need mysteries and questions more than we need fixed goals and closed off answers that might not match up with actual reality.
Turn around and look at the darker side of life and face what lurks there.
You don't have have the answer to life, you just have to be willing to look, question and face the uncertainty of not knowing everything. Of never knowing everything.
After 2020 we can all stand to be reminded that chaos often brings about opportunities and that failure doesn't have to be a dreaded end to all endevours, but merely you pushing at the limits of your current capabilities (like the freakin' book says). And then next time going beyond them til you meet the next set of limits. And so forth.
Failure is painful, but useful. You break, you heal, you grow.
And like Beckett said you can't go on, yet you go on.
So if you feel shaken by the past year (or by life in general) and find yourself ready to punch the next person who tells you to "just look on the bright side" and "stay positive!" this book is for you. It might help you to keep going.