"How should we live?" is the crucial question Socrates asks at the beginning of one of the first books of philosophy, Plato's Republic. This very important and practical, but also challenging and wide-ranging question preoccupied the ancient Greek and Roman philosophers, and is especially pressing for us today, as some traditional sources of authority have lost credibility and more possibilities have opened up to many of us than in the past.

The key aspects of how we should live which this book will focus on are self-realization and inner necessity. The book develops novel ways of looking at both of these topics after considering what some of the greatest thinkers of the last 2000 years or so have had to say about them, ideas which are both relevant and fascinating for us today. Self-realization is often rightly seen as emancipatory and for this reason it is an ideal which appeals to most of us. Inner necessity is about discovering our deepest impulses and following them.

This book is written for people who are interested in philosophy but have no training in the subject. It avoids philosophical jargon and uses a lot of examples to make the issues clearer. These examples are taken from very varied sources, which include novels, poetry, opera, popular music, newspapers, films, painting, history, politics, psychiatry and psychology, reflecting the wide-ranging educational background, experience and interests of the author.