The Second Mountain cover art

The Second Mountain

 Preview
LIMITED TIME OFFER

3 months free
Try for £0.00
£8.99/mo thereafter. Renews automatically. Terms apply. Offer ends 31 July 2025 at 23:59 GMT.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for £8.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly.

The Second Mountain

By: David Brooks
Narrated by: Arthur Morey
Try for £0.00

£8.99/mo after 3 months. Offer ends 31 July 2025 23:59 GMT. Cancel monthly.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Secnd Mountain, written by David Brooks, read by Arthur Morey.

Are you on your first or second mountain?
Is life about you - or others?
About success - or something deeper?

The world tells us that we should pursue our self-interest: career wins, high status, nice things. These are the goals of our first mountain. But at some point in our lives we might find that we're not interested in what other people tell us to want. We want the things that are truly worth wanting.

This is the second mountain.

What does it mean to look beyond yourself and find a moral cause? To forget about independence and discover dependence - to be utterly enmeshed in a web of warm relationships? What does it mean to value intimacy, devotion, responsibility and commitment above individual freedom? In The Second Mountain David Brooks explores the meaning and possibilities that scaling a second mountain offer us, and the four commitments that most commonly move us there: family, vocation, philosophy and community. Inspiring, personal and full of joy, this book will help you discover why you were really put on this earth.

©2019 David Brooks (P)2019 Penguin Audio Ethics & Morality Personal Development Personal Success Philosophy Society Sociology Inspiring Morality

Listeners also enjoyed...

 The Social Animal cover art
Beqoming cover art
The Light We Give cover art
The Paradox of Choice cover art
The Search cover art
Die with Zero cover art
The Elephant in the Brain cover art
Low Anthropology cover art
Rediscover the Saints: Twenty-Five Questions That Will Change Your Life cover art
Falling Upward cover art
Maps of Meaning cover art
Ego Is the Enemy cover art
Cassandra Speaks cover art
On the Road with Saint Augustine cover art
Emotionally Healthy Spirituality cover art
Better Decisions, Fewer Regrets cover art

Critic reviews

Brooks's best book yet ... Powerful ... His stirring new book is a self-help guide to escaping the prison of self. (Oliver Burkeman)
The book overall, candid about the reality of stress and failure in the author's life, has earned the right to put forward with equal candour the experience of finding, or being found by, faith. (Rowan Williams)
All stars
Most relevant  
a must read. brings perspective to what is important and what's not. At times the stories are a bit too long at other times not long enough. Very thoughtful and enjoyable

the second mountain the important peak

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A lot of brilliant, thought provoking ideas in the book. It does seem to resonate quite well with my experience of the ego based lifestyle of seeking pleasure, money and reputation feeling empty and meaningless, while giving and caring for a few close relationships feeling extremely meaningful.

The book has a couple of chapters that are really insistent on faith and religion and spirituality, that can be a very off-putting for readers who weren’t looking for this - seeing these chapters almost made me abandon the book. The rest of the book is great though.

A very powerful message

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The book speaks to my soul. It has put everything I've been feeling into words. A truly wonderful read worthy of reading.

Beautiful book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Genuine wisdom, like a lighthouse guiding our ships that pass in the night. Worth reading again and again. I feel like I found a treasure in the attic, a guide about HOW to live in he good life.

Probably the most important book I've ever read

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Brooks has written an extraordinary treatise on the value of a moral life and how each and every one of us is already qualified to begin to live such a life. I can’t recommend this book highly enough.

Deeply, lastingly thought provoking

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I am humbled by this very thoughtful book about personal transformation. It's both heart-felt and rational. As a religious, I cannot imagine a more convincing argument for what we call mysticism. Though I'm embarrassed to make such a confession, I must attempt to be as honest as the author: traditional Mystics are good at describing their experience but not so good at making a rational apology that so keenly appeals to our modern minds. Here is a mostly secular guy (al be it, one that stands on the shoulders of two great mystical traditions--Jewish and Christian) who is well able to describe our experience in modern, well-informed language. Bravo, David Brooks. You've helped to clear away some of the dust and cobwebs of my mind...not by "answers" but by opening cracks. "That's how the light gets in!" Thanks

Thank you, David Brooks

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The more we get to know the author the less we like him. The premise for this book is a good one. Many people struggle to find meaning in their lives once they reach mid-life. The idea that service to something greater than yourself or tending to a flock brings the satisfaction a career once did seems valid but once the author starts pontificating about Jesus and then tells us how he left his wife of 27 years for his researcher 23 years his junior we start to feel like he's preaching to himself and trying to justify his actions. Nevertheless there are some decent touch-points in the book and good lessons to be learned. The side of the book that talks generally about observations made in relationships and the workaday world is well written and thought provoking, he proposes the idea of 'turning towards' people close to us who seek out attention rather that 'turning away' with our responses and I have found that practice useful. I also like the message that when you decide to work at a company you are agreeing to become the type of person that works at that company. For me the parts of the book that were more memoir than non-fiction/philosophical did not add to the overall experience. Narration was excellent.

It's a good message well delivered but...

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
This book is pure gold.

It talks about how “self” and the pursuit of happiness no longer works, and shows an alternative where the society at large, and the reader in particular, could follow.

Really great book, worth the read.

This book is a jewel

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
this audiobook is fascinating, the author goes into great detail with each of the four areas of one's life - vocation, marriage, faith/religion and community. while the religious element had the least appeal to me, it was interesting to hear the author's journey into becoming a religious person. I would have liked to hear more on community and less on religion.
I found the audiobook excellent but quite long.

fascinating view on life

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Good book all in all but unfortunately a bit to scattered and long and therefore difficult to finish. It should be possible to say what he's trying to say in a shorter way.

Interesting ideas but could be more efficiently described

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews