> Almost no one thinks about actively retraining the way they think. In fact, I don’t think this last idea even crosses most of our minds. Really? I'm pretty sure there are thousands of years of philosophical and religious traditions that teach something along the lines of "looking for happiness in the external world is a bad idea, instead try working on yourself". I mean the four noble truths of Buddhism, a religion…
suffering can be deeper, but that's also probably stepping into psychiatry territory.. my point is you cannot reason or meditate everything away
My point is that the author claiming "I don’t think this last idea even crosses most of our minds" seems off given that "change yourself not the world" is arguably the dominant theme regarding suffering for most philosophies throughout human history, from religions to pop-psychology self-help books (even the idea of "self-help" implies working on yourself to solve your problems).
Even deeper, the clear divide between the "external" and "internal" is pretty suspect in nearly all Western philosophical traditions in at least the last 200 years. This is something I would expect a PhD in Philosophy at Oxford to at least be passingly familiar with.