It’s not just Harvard professors like Brooks that confront this crisis. Some are even forced to do so because they’ve become too slow, old, and feeble to stay in the game. Cognizant that intelligence peaks for many in their 30s and 40s, he makes reference to the distinction drawn in the 1940s by British psychologist Raymond Cattell between smarts (fluid intelligence) and wisdom (crystallized intelligence).īrooks has spent the last decade fixated on this dilemma, embarking “on a personal quest to turn my future from a matter of dread to an opportunity to progress.” From Strength to Strength is the upshot of a philosophical pilgrimage that sent Brooks across the globe in search of a cure for the “striver’s curse,” which afflicts those who have achieved success but who are eventually forced to step back from it. But unlike the man on the plane, Brooks knew there was an impending expiry date. He’d mastered the hedonic treadmill better than most. In the introduction to his latest book, he recalls wondering: “Which more accurately describes the man-the one filled with joy and pride right now, or the one twenty minutes ago, telling his wife he might as well be dead?” That conversation stuck in Brooks’s craw for a decade, and finally provoked him to ask the same question of himself.Īs a successful writer, bestselling author, and think-tank impresario, Brooks had life by the balls-money, notoriety, prestige. The airline staff recognized and thanked him.Īrthur Brooks was seated just behind the man watching all this, and the whole episode struck him as bizarre. But as he left his seat, passengers began to murmur words of veneration. His life-his entire being and sense of self-worth-were anchored in the past during a time when he meant something, when he got things done, and when people respected him. He confessed to his wife that he felt unneeded and useless. Despite being a household name in America, the elder statesman feared being lost to the sands of time.
The man on the plane wished he were dead.
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