Review of Toward Happier Choices
Posted: 31 Aug 2021, 11:51
[Following is a volunteer review of "Toward Happier Choices" by Michael Oborn.]
The reexamined life is a life worth living.
With this comes the adage, “Know thyself.”
When taken to heart, this nugget of wisdom brings forth a lifetime of unparalleled bliss.
In Toward Happier Choices.. by Michael Oborn, the readers are confronted by the somewhat tragic life story of the author himself who took a leap of faith and eventually “reinvented” himself all in the pursuit of happiness.
The book starts with the author whose grand ambition when he was a young man was to work at the theater. However, this dream was abruptly cut short when a letter arrived one day informing him that he was selected for the ministry in the Lutheran church. A calling that was not to his liking. However, being a dutiful son, he relented to his domineering father's wish. Little did he know that what would lie ahead will be an ill-fated journey wrought with nothing but pain and misery.
Oborn then focuses the rest of his book on his gradual alienation from family members and friends. Whose opinion regarding his decision to renounce his former religion was grossly unacceptable in their eyes. His married life had gone to the rocks. A calculated move to relocate somewhere off the beaten path wherein he contemplated suicide but ended up instead as an alcoholic. The “dark” secret that was kept from his knowledge while he was still a child. The mournful events leading to the death of both of his parents. And the final episode wherein the author had finally seen the light at the end of a long and tumultuous tunnel after he found the ultimate “life-choice”; along with a newfound love that would sustain him for the rest of his days.
I loved the amusing story about the inebriated black man who was so drunk but surprisingly kept on winning during a card game in a casino. But moreover, the crowd that had gathered around the former intuitively felt for themselves for some reason, that the card game he was on was somehow rigged. The next thing you know, they were obviously rooting for this little nobody who had somehow beaten the corrupt system by positively turning the odds to his favor.
At first, I thought this book would provide fresh and insightful feedback about the deplorable human condition which has been in existence since time immemorial. Based on what I’ve gleaned from the preface of the book which I have read with gusto. But as I delve further on and read between the lines. I found some of the logic presented in this book just quite unappealing and therefore wholly contradictory to my point of view.
Consider what the author said during his discourses about “salvation” merely being a concept born out of man’s need to survive. And the idea about the“hereafter” or the life after one’s death. Which he has a hard time accepting to be an irrefutable truth rather than merely being “models” to represent nothingness.
With this in mind and for these reasons, I would rate this book two out of four stars. With an emphasis on several grammatical errors and along with a simian hive of profanities I have spotted which therefore made me conclude that this book is not professionally edited. Although I now have some reservations about recommending this book to anyone. It appears unfortunately, a “choice” I’m now willing to risk. Read this book at your own discretion lest you fall under the wrong impression.
******
Toward Happier Choices
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
The reexamined life is a life worth living.
With this comes the adage, “Know thyself.”
When taken to heart, this nugget of wisdom brings forth a lifetime of unparalleled bliss.
In Toward Happier Choices.. by Michael Oborn, the readers are confronted by the somewhat tragic life story of the author himself who took a leap of faith and eventually “reinvented” himself all in the pursuit of happiness.
The book starts with the author whose grand ambition when he was a young man was to work at the theater. However, this dream was abruptly cut short when a letter arrived one day informing him that he was selected for the ministry in the Lutheran church. A calling that was not to his liking. However, being a dutiful son, he relented to his domineering father's wish. Little did he know that what would lie ahead will be an ill-fated journey wrought with nothing but pain and misery.
Oborn then focuses the rest of his book on his gradual alienation from family members and friends. Whose opinion regarding his decision to renounce his former religion was grossly unacceptable in their eyes. His married life had gone to the rocks. A calculated move to relocate somewhere off the beaten path wherein he contemplated suicide but ended up instead as an alcoholic. The “dark” secret that was kept from his knowledge while he was still a child. The mournful events leading to the death of both of his parents. And the final episode wherein the author had finally seen the light at the end of a long and tumultuous tunnel after he found the ultimate “life-choice”; along with a newfound love that would sustain him for the rest of his days.
I loved the amusing story about the inebriated black man who was so drunk but surprisingly kept on winning during a card game in a casino. But moreover, the crowd that had gathered around the former intuitively felt for themselves for some reason, that the card game he was on was somehow rigged. The next thing you know, they were obviously rooting for this little nobody who had somehow beaten the corrupt system by positively turning the odds to his favor.
At first, I thought this book would provide fresh and insightful feedback about the deplorable human condition which has been in existence since time immemorial. Based on what I’ve gleaned from the preface of the book which I have read with gusto. But as I delve further on and read between the lines. I found some of the logic presented in this book just quite unappealing and therefore wholly contradictory to my point of view.
Consider what the author said during his discourses about “salvation” merely being a concept born out of man’s need to survive. And the idea about the“hereafter” or the life after one’s death. Which he has a hard time accepting to be an irrefutable truth rather than merely being “models” to represent nothingness.
With this in mind and for these reasons, I would rate this book two out of four stars. With an emphasis on several grammatical errors and along with a simian hive of profanities I have spotted which therefore made me conclude that this book is not professionally edited. Although I now have some reservations about recommending this book to anyone. It appears unfortunately, a “choice” I’m now willing to risk. Read this book at your own discretion lest you fall under the wrong impression.
******
Toward Happier Choices
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon