The Second Mountain: From Oneself to Others
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Some people have ‘cracked the code of life.’
They are successful in careers and very humble. Smart and willing to listen and learn. Powerful without appearing thirsty for power.
They have different auras, which are very calming and comforting.
The First Mountain
Thankfully there are books around the house, so I can explore what made these people.
The opening of David Brooks’ The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life struck me as something similar:
“Every once in a while, I meet a person who radiates joy. These are people who seem to glow with an inner light. They are kind, tranquil, delighted by small pleasures, and grateful for the large ones. These people are not perfect. They get exhausted and stressed. They make errors in judgment. But they live for others and not for themselves. They’ve made unshakable commitments to family, a cause, a community, or a faith.”
Brooks sees life as two mountains, and most of us are on the first.
The first mountain is what society thinks we should climb: A great career, money, some fame, fancy cars, the usuals.
One characteristic of the first mountain people, as Brooks said, “spend a lot of time thinking about reputation management.”
The psychologist James Hollis says, “we tend to think at that stage. I am what the world says I am.”
The Valley
Then something happens…
None of the first mountain climbers is satisfied.
Some people who successfully climbed the first mountain felt…dissatisfied. They asked, “Is this all there is?”
Others fell from the first mountain and failed to reach the top, feeling they were failures. And some experienced the unexpected: death of children, cancer, drugs, jailed…or other unpleasant events.
In the Valley, many of us learn about who we truly are. “These seasons of suffering have a way of exposing the deepest part of ourselves and reminding us that we’re not the people we thought we were.”
We learn about the deepest side of ourselves, not the side we display this whole time.
The Second Mountain
The valley changes some people. They become more caring to themselves but more towards others.
They realised that the first mountain wasn’t the mountain they had searched for. There’s a bigger mountain for them.
Their motivation switch from oneself to others.
Brooks said, “If the first mountain is about building up ego and defining the self, the second mountain is about shedding the ego and losing the self.”
If the first mountain is about acquisition, the second mountain is about contribution. Brooks added, “If the first mountain is elitist—moving up—the second mountain is egalitarian—planting yourself amid those who need, and walking arm in arm with them.”
The Summoned Self
These second mountain people are those who have ‘cracked the code of life.’
It’s not about themselves anymore. They are summoned.
“If they are principals, their joy is in seeing their teachers shine.”
“If they work in a company, they no longer see themselves as managers but as mentors; their energies are devoted to helping others get better.”
“They want their organisations to be thick places, where people find purpose, and not thin places, where people come just to draw a salary.”
Be like them.
*Post wallpaper by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
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