How to Fall in Love with Questions

Journalist and applied behavioral scientist Elizabeth Weingarten charts a new path to embrace the questions of our lives instead of seeking fast, easy answers, inspired by cutting-edge research and age-old wisdom from the poet Rainer Maria Rilke. What do you do when faced with a big, important question that hectors you day and night? Many people, understandably, seize answers dispensed by experts, influencers, gurus, and more. But these fast, easy, one-size-fits-all solutions often fail to satisfy. Indeed, the notion of taming uncertainty is an illusion. What if the questions of our lives--the ones we ask about our relationships, work, meaning, identity, and purpose--are not our tormentors, but our teachers? That is the provocative premise of How to Fall in Love with Questions. Elizabeth Weingarten offers a fresh, counterintuitive approach, inspired by 150-year-old advice from Austrian poet Rainier Maria Rilke, and backed by much contemporary science, to deal with questions by learning to live into them, as opposed to trying to resolve them expediently. She recounts her own humbling and messy journey to find a new way to grapple with uncertainty. In her quest, she tells the stories of many others on a comparable path, including famous figures in the arts and academy, whose lives have transformed through a different, and better, relationship with questions. Designed to inspire anyone who feels stuck, powerless, and drained, How to Fall in Love with Questions presents a simple, radical way forward. Weingarten challenges us, helping us to unlock our minds and embark on the kind of self-discovery that''s only possible when we feel most alive--that is, when we don''t know what will happen next.

Autorentext

Elizabeth Weingarten is a journalist and applied behavioral scientist who works at the intersection of science and storytelling. She has worked at The Atlantic, Slate, and Qatar Today, and was managing editor of Behavioral Scientist. Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Slate, the Financial Times, Harvard Business Review, and Time. She lives in Northern California with her husband and son.

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Zusammenfassung

“In a world stupefied by quick fixes and easy answers, Elizabeth Weingarten delivers a smart and urgent wake-up call.”—Daniel H. Pink

“An interesting, insightful, and surprisingly reassuring read.”—Adam Grant, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Think Again and Hidden Potential

Journalist and applied behavioral scientist Elizabeth Weingarten charts a new path to embrace the questions of our lives instead of seeking fast, easy answers.

What do you do when faced with a big, important question that keeps you up at night? Many people, understandably, seize answers dispensed by “experts,” influencers, gurus, and more. But these fast, easy, one-size-fits-all solutions often fail to satisfy, and can even cause more pain.

What if our questions—the ones we ask about relationships, work, meaning, identity, and purpose—are not our tormentors, but our teachers? Inspired by 150-year-old advice from Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke and backed by contemporary science, Elizabeth Weingarten offers a fresh approach for dealing with these seemingly unsolvable questions. In her quest, Weingarten shares her own journey and the stories of many others, whose lives have transformed through a different, and better, relationship with uncertainty.

Designed to inspire anyone who feels stuck, powerless, and drained, How to Fall in Love with Questions challenges us to unlock our minds and embark on the kind of self-discovery that’s only possible when we feel most alive—that is, when we don’t know what will happen next.