The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourselves book club questions

1. 1.

   Grosz argues that symptoms protect us. What is something in your own life that might be functioning as a protection rather than simply as a problem?

2. 2.

   Several patients in the book know exactly what is wrong with them but cannot change. What is the difference between knowing and actually changing?

3. 3.

   Which of the cases in the book felt most familiar — not necessarily as a personal experience, but as a pattern you've recognized in someone close to you?

4. 4.

   Grosz writes about patients who prefer a familiar unhappiness to an unknown freedom. When have you made a similar trade?

5. 5.

   The book treats genuine mourning as rare and necessary. What are the losses in your life that you suspect you haven't fully grieved?

6. 6.

   How does the relationship between analyst and patient in these cases differ from what most people expect from therapy?

7. 7.

   Grosz rarely offers tidy conclusions after his cases. Did that frustrate you, or did it feel more honest than the usual explanatory ending?

8. 8.

   A number of chapters deal with the stories people tell about themselves. What narrative about yourself do you return to most often, and where did it come from?

9. 9.

   The book suggests that children's symptoms are often family symptoms. Looking back, can you see a connection between something you struggled with as a child and the dynamics in your household?

10. 10.

    Grosz is restrained about solutions. What does it mean to have a book about change that doesn't offer much in the way of direct instructions?

11. 11.

    Which case changed how you think about a human behavior you'd previously judged quickly or dismissed?

12. 12.

    If you had to name the single idea from this book that is most applicable to the way you see yourself right now, what would it be?

How to run the discussion

• Pick six to eight, not all of them. An hour of real discussion covers fewer questions than anyone expects, and racing the list is what makes a book club feel like homework.
• Open with what people noticed, not what they concluded. Asking for a verdict first hardens opinions before anyone has heard each other.
• Let the disagreement run. The questions below that split a room are the ones worth the time; the ones everyone answers the same way can be skipped.
• Ask the quiet person a specific question. A direct, narrow question is far easier to answer than an open invitation to contribute.