The mattering instinct : how our deepest longing drives us and divides us / Rebecca Newberger Goldstein.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Goldstein, Rebecca Newberger, 1950- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Existential psychology.

Self.

Genre:

Self-help publications.

Physical Description:

xviii, 329 pages : illustrations, map ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Other Title:

How our deepest longing drives us and divides us

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Liveright Publishing Corporation, a division of W.W. Norton & Company, [2026]

Summary:

"Offering a new framework for understanding what can go tragically wrong in our lives and in society and how progress in each can be enhanced, best-selling author and MacArthur Fellow Rebecca Newberger Goldstein returns with a book about the primal, biological drive in every living thing that, in our species alone, is transformed into one of the most persistent forces in human motivation and a force essential to human flourishing: the longing to matter. Mattering, Goldstein posits, is lodged deep in the core of humanity - it is our most profound longing, and our most opaque. It is the source of endless frustration, division, and tribalism (if this matters, how can this matter too; if we matter, how can you matter too?). And yet, this desire to matter can also save us. In a world where many of us are experiencing what Goldstein calls a crisis of mattering, perhaps we are finally poised to accept that this insatiable longing that drives humans to such different ends may also be the key to truly understanding each other. Goldstein first described "the mattering map"-a central idea in this book-in her 1983 novel, The Mind-Body Problem, and she has written many articles and given many talks on the subject for years. No surprise, then, that talk of 'mattering' has started to crop up in the mainstream conversation, especially in positive psychology and business circles. But Goldstein's decades-long obsession with the idea means that no one else can write the book Goldstein is writing: The Mattering Instinct is a major intellectual contribution, decades in the making, unfolded for a wide audience by a superb writer and storyteller"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction: Why mattering matters

The most peculiar and most human thing about us

The transformation from within

Becoming human

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of eudaimonia

The cartography of the mattering map, part one: the social and the heroic

The cartography of the mattering map, part two: the transcendent and the competitive

Getting mattering wrong

Getting mattering right.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 297-311) and index.

ISBN:

9781324096856

1324096853

OCLC:

1519445672