There is a new book out by  David Brooks, a New York Times op-ed columnist, that has spoken volumes to me. And I haven’t even read it yet!

The name of the book is The Social Animal, and I came across a review of it on my Twitter feed this week. I immediately downloaded it on my Kindle, well, after trying to buy it in a bookstore only to realize it was THREE times more expensive to buy it in there. No wonder Borders couldn’t make it. Sigh. But that’s not really the point of this post, so I’ll move on.

So far, I have only read the review, but I’ve read the review multiple times. Just in that snippet of copy, the author articulated much of what I’ve come to realize and grapple with lately.

The reviewer is a business executive named Tony Schwartz. He shared his insight on the book through a Harvard Business Review blog. According to Schwartz, this book eloquently explains why we’ve gone so far off course in our society, pinning it on “human failings we haven’t begun to recognize, much less acknowledge.”

He goes on to share Brooks’ core argument, “that the vast majority of us have very little understanding of why we make the choices we do, and that we’re influenced instead by peer pressure; impulsive and reactive emotions; a deep and bottomless need for admiration and status; overconfidence in the present; excessive worry about the future; the evolutionary instinct to avoid pain and move towards pleasure; and precious little capacity to delay gratification.”

This isn’t a spiritual book. But man, did he just sum up my struggle in one fast-moving, heavy-hitting paragraph.

The Social Animal explores our subconscious, which takes up most of our mental space, and it zeros in on the fact that “instead of drawing on our rational faculties to more deeply understand our interior impulses and motivations, we too often try to rationalize, justify, minimize and explain away the unconsciously driven actions we’ve already taken.”

In short, we have an infinite capacity for self-deception.

Schwartz reports that Brooks lays out a path to “a more meaningful life – one that balances action with introspection, confidence with restraint.”

As you can tell, I’m a big fan of his review. And I think I will be a big fan of this book as well. As I said to open this post, the book has already spoken deeply to me without turning a page.

I literally just woke up to the fact that my capacity for self-deception is indeed infinite. That I really need to get more in tune with my nature and how I’m wired. I just blogged about it a few weeks back. Brooks, and even Schwartz are saying it much more effectively than I could have hoped to say it, so I’m thankful to have stumbled upon their words. It helps crystallize what has been rolling around in my head.

I’ll report back after reading the book. I really hope it lives up to the lofty expectations I’m now placing on it. I’m hopeful that it will help my spiritual walk through better understanding of my physical being, plugging me in more directly with the mass of unconsciousness that secretly dictates success or failure in my life far too often.