Ezra Klein

And it's just something terrible that you cannot affect. It's not even happening to anybody you know. You definitely don't have power over it. But somebody somewhere thought it would grab you to know about it. And it's strange. It both makes you aware of suffering, but also I think it has some kind of other quality, some numbing and exhausting quality that is not healthy enough.

And it's just something terrible that you cannot affect. It's not even happening to anybody you know. You definitely don't have power over it. But somebody somewhere thought it would grab you to know about it. And it's strange. It both makes you aware of suffering, but also I think it has some kind of other quality, some numbing and exhausting quality that is not healthy enough.

And I'd like to do that by asking you to read a short passage from your book, which is on page 174. Sure.

And I'd like to do that by asking you to read a short passage from your book, which is on page 174. Sure.

I like this idea that happiness does not get enough attention or theorizing. So if it's not these proximate forms, amusement and pleasure, to you, what is it?

I like this idea that happiness does not get enough attention or theorizing. So if it's not these proximate forms, amusement and pleasure, to you, what is it?

I didn't write the book. I didn't raise the question.

I didn't write the book. I didn't raise the question.

Well, I wonder if that's because we expect happiness to be simpler and pure. I think sometimes there are periods in my life that I'm certain I will look back on them as virtually perfect. That the problems were small. Nobody I loved was sick in that moment.

Well, I wonder if that's because we expect happiness to be simpler and pure. I think sometimes there are periods in my life that I'm certain I will look back on them as virtually perfect. That the problems were small. Nobody I loved was sick in that moment.

I was surrounded by family and friends, my work was satisfying, even as my experience of that period is often exhausted, overstretched, overscheduled, anxious. This question of maybe one reason people don't write about those middles is that the middle is always more of everything.

I was surrounded by family and friends, my work was satisfying, even as my experience of that period is often exhausted, overstretched, overscheduled, anxious. This question of maybe one reason people don't write about those middles is that the middle is always more of everything.

Your description of your first kiss with your partner, which is functionally cosmic in its language, is probably going to be different than the way you experience a Tuesday when everybody's on deadline and everybody needs to be on the table, even if you'll probably look back on that as a beautiful period. I think we think the feeling of it should be simpler maybe than it ends up being.

Your description of your first kiss with your partner, which is functionally cosmic in its language, is probably going to be different than the way you experience a Tuesday when everybody's on deadline and everybody needs to be on the table, even if you'll probably look back on that as a beautiful period. I think we think the feeling of it should be simpler maybe than it ends up being.

What is different about the relationship between happiness and duty from happiness and fun?

What is different about the relationship between happiness and duty from happiness and fun?

One thing that I really enjoyed about the book is the emphasis on the connectivity of all of these things. That part of just the human experience is you don't get any of them all at once, and you couldn't have any of them in a way without the others. You have an interesting section on how the philosopher William James thought about our thoughts.

One thing that I really enjoyed about the book is the emphasis on the connectivity of all of these things. That part of just the human experience is you don't get any of them all at once, and you couldn't have any of them in a way without the others. You have an interesting section on how the philosopher William James thought about our thoughts.

And particularly, I guess, the connectivity between them, the sort of shadowy substructure of our thoughts. Can you talk a bit about that?

And particularly, I guess, the connectivity between them, the sort of shadowy substructure of our thoughts. Can you talk a bit about that?