Susan Wolf And William James: A Literary Analysis

After reading the writings of Susan Wolf and William James, I feel that I was successful in my initial approach to the prompt of defining the things of significance in my life. While I might have been lacking in the way of providing a lot of terms or having relatively superficial descriptions, the closing sentences that describe contentedness seem to be very compatible with certain elements in William James’s piece. The way James traces his mental epiphany when he sees the railroad worker on the tracks closely corresponds with the metacognitive journey I have been on for the last couple of months. Specifically, finding joy in the everyday when I had been obsessing over long-term goals in order to create an “impactful” future life.

I was talking to my mom over the phone yesterday when we started talking about finding joy in life. I mentioned how saying hello to a stranger made me feel good and like I was living in the

Contrariwise to those of our own class, who protest against destiny and grow indignant at its rigor, these people receive maladies and misfortunes without revolt, without opposition, and with a firm and tranquil confidence that all had to be like that, could not be otherwise, and that it is all right so…The more we live by our intellect, the less we understand the meaning of life.” While I don’t concur with his harsh stereotyping of the class structure in society, it does have a certain ring of truth to it. The constant rush in the social circles I usually find myself in are mentally draining. The constant striving to get that next internship, network connection, letter of recommendation, or grade seems unnecessarily stressful, even neurotic, when looked at from a broader