Reviews
The philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein’s latest book looks beyond happinessas the goal of a well-lived life.
By John Kaag.
“Philosophers are generally expected to display wisdom and calm in the face ofexistential questions. I am just not one of those philosophers. I spent 30 years racingaway from these thoughts by running and swimming obsessively, pretending that Ihad no physical limits. Certain evasions are bound to fail: At 40, I suffered a cardiac arrest after an ill-advised treadmill workout. The sheer physicality of the event—the stopped heart, the failing body, the onerous recovery—threw into sharp relief aquestion that had always lurked beneath the surface: Does my life have a purpose? Or, put another way, how can I justify my existence? This dilemma gnaws at us in times of crisis and whispers to us in quiet moments of self-reflection. Rebecca Newberger Goldstein’s new book, The Mattering Instinct, helped me understand this feeling, tosee it not as a personal quirk or a philosophical indulgence but as a fundamental aspect of what it means to be human…
…The Mattering Instinct is a testament to the idea that humans find purpose when, as the poet Rumi wrote, we “let the beauty we love be what we do.” In a world fractured by competing claims on what’s important, Goldstein offers a vision that is both intellectually resonant and humane, reminding us that the struggle to justify our existence is the very thing that makes our existence matter.”