"We all worry about what others think of us. We all long to succeed and fear failure. We all suffer - to a greater or lesser degree, usually privately and with embarrassment - from status anxiety.
For the first time, Alain de Botton gives a name to this universal condition and sets out to investigate both its origins and possible solutions. He looks at history, philosophy, economics, art and politics - and reveals the many ingenious ways that great minds have overcome their worries. The result is a book that is not only entertaining and thought-provoking - but genuinely wise and helpful as well."

Picked up at the Unconvention.

Given the vast inequalities we are daily confronted with, perhaps the most notable feature of envy is that we manage not too envy everyone. There are people whose enormous blessings leave us wholly untroubled, others whose minor advantages act as sources of relentless torment. We envy only those whom we feel ourselves to be like; we envy only members of our reference group. There are few successes more unendurable than those of our close friends.

At different times and places, an individual’s status in society has been based on many different things, but in the West in the last 200 years or so, high status has become equated to financial success. Status Anxiety is the feeling we get when we feel a failure, unappreciated and not respected by our fellow men. When we feel that we haven’t reached a high enough rung on the status ladder or that we could lose our grasp and slip further down, we feel ashamed and worry that other people despise us.
In the first half of the book Alain de Botton assesses how status anxiety has increased over the centuries, while at the same time the financial and political lot of ordinary people has improved, with status no longer unchangeable and fixed at birth as it was in the Middle Ages. He then turns to the ways that people have devised for ridding themselves of status anxiety, such as the philosophy of the ancient Greek, Christianity or leading a bohemian lifestyle.

I'd wanted to read this book since seeing the author's television series on the subject - Interesting.

RELEASE NOTES:

To be released at Saturday's book crossing meet.

Discovered with delight at the Birmingham Meetup today. I had only been thinking about this book the other day and wondering whether or not to buy it, so what a lovely surprise. Thank you Kittiwake!

This is one of those rare books that can effect a permanent alteration in mental perspective almost instantaneously. You won't stop envying other people, feeling inadequate and wanting more after reading this. Indeed, as De Botton points out, such feelings are endemic amongst and perhaps intrinsic to all humans, and are likely to remain so.

But it is hard to feel 'status anxiety' in quite the same way after reading this book, thanks to De Botton's remarkable treatment of the subject - ostensibly simple yet in reality quite profound.

What I liked most about this book is that instead of locating the problem at the level of the individual it pointed more towards the larger social context. Status anxiety is not a 'disease' suffered by the vain or those low in self-esteem. It is a product of a society that selects arbitrary markers of success and then penalizes those who do not or cannot achieve such goals.

De Botton has such a gift for clear writing that can produce a real 'punch' in only a few words. This enabled me to read with ease about philosophy and politics - subjects I normally find very difficult to understand without laborious re-reading. The book also motivated me to find out more about Marxism and socialism and has thus opened up a whole new political horizon for me.

I don't think there is anyone who could not benefit from reading this book. I am truly sorry to see it go, but a book like this really is for giving not for keeping.

RELEASE NOTES:

In one of the lifts.