Everyone wants to change their lives for the better (or preserve what's positive), and this is relatively straightforward in a healthy system with positive incentives and a transparent, productive set of rules and feedbacks.

But what if the system is broken? How do we change our lives for the better in a dysfunctional system of unearned privilege and perverse incentives? Needless to say, it's difficult, and this is why we see a rise in inward-directed solutions.

If we can't change the external world we inhabit, then the "solution" is to nurture an inner tranquility. It's no wonder that Taoism--perhaps the ultimate inner-directed philosophy--arose during the Warring States era in China, when social unrest and conflict were endemic.