{"product_id":"9780385551571","title":"Will and Attention: A Memoir","description":"\u003ctable\u003e\u003ctbody\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAuthor\/Contributor(s):\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eO'Gieblyn, Meghan\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eDoubleday\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDate:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003e10\/6\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBinding:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eHardcover\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCondition:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eNEW\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/tbody\u003e\u003c\/table\u003e\u003cb\u003eIn her exquisite memoir of secret drinking, fragile recovery, and the deep pull of religion, award-winning essayist Meghan O’Gieblyn seeks to understand why it is so hard to sustain the difficult work of personal change.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAfter leaving evangelical Christianity in her early twenties, kicking an addiction, and building a life as a writer, Meghan O’Gieblyn was admired by her friends for having a strong will. Then, in her late thirties, she began secretly attending Catholic mass and meeting with a priest to discuss conversion. After eleven years of sobriety, she began drinking again. Both returns—to organized religion and to alcohol—felt to her like a regression, a personal defeat. Knowledge and determination had proven useless when it came to her most vexing personal battles. She was forced to reckon with her inner doubleness, a self “who both wants and wants not to want,” as she puts it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eWill and Attention\u003c\/i\u003e O’Gieblyn captures those perplexing days. Soon after her return to sobriety, she turned to a series of spiritual texts—by Simone Weil, Iris Murdoch, the Desert Fathers—and began putting them in conversation with her life. She set out to find a spirituality that could meet her longings and prove capacious enough to hold the dark side of human nature. Beautifully written, intellectually sparkling, wryly funny, this memoir from a beloved essayist explores a fundamental question of being human: the mystifying nature of our power over ourselves.","brand":"Doubleday","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48042927489279,"sku":"9780385551571","price":30.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0452\/0886\/2873\/files\/9780385551571_s600x595.jpg?v=1777912299","url":"https:\/\/massivebookshop.com\/products\/9780385551571","provider":"MASSIVE BOOKSHOP","version":"1.0","type":"link"}