Tuesdays with Morrie: Chapters 8–15

by Mitch Albom
In this work of nonfiction, Mitch Albom reconnects with a favorite college professor and learns valuable lessons in the last months of the elderly scholar's life.

Here are links to our lists for the book: Chapters 1–7, Chapters 8–15, Chapters 16–21, Chapter 22–Afterword
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. cynical
    believing the worst of human nature and motives
    So, I said, in a reflexively cynical response, I guess the key to finding the meaning of life is to stop taking out the garbage?
  2. compassion
    a deep awareness of and sympathy for another's suffering
    We talked about one of Morrie’s favorite subjects, compassion, and why our society had such a shortage of it.
  3. imminent
    close in time; about to occur
    The first time I saw Morrie on “Nightline,” I wondered what regrets he had once he knew his death was imminent.
  4. ambivalence
    mixed feelings or emotions
    He studied my face, and perhaps he saw an ambivalence about my own choices.
  5. egotistical
    having an inflated idea of one's own importance
    We’re so wrapped up with egotistical things, career, family, having enough money, meeting the mortgage, getting a new car, fixing the radiator when it breaks — we’re involved in trillions of little acts just to keep going.
  6. grapple
    work hard to come to terms with or deal with something
    On the plane ride home that day, I made a small list on a yellow legal pad, issues and questions that we all grapple with, from happiness to aging to having children to death.
  7. antidote
    a remedy that stops or controls the effects of a poison
    Eva would accept nothing less than excellence in school, because she saw education as the only antidote to their poverty.
  8. exploit
    use or manipulate to one's advantage
    He made another vow that he kept to the end of his life: he would never do any work that exploited someone else, and he would never allow himself to make money off the sweat of others.
  9. agnostic
    a person who claims the existence of God is unknowable
    Morrie borrowed freely from all religions. He was born Jewish, but became an agnostic when he was a teenager, partly because of all that had happened to him as a child.
  10. transcend
    go beyond the scope or limits of
    And the things he was saying in his final months on earth seemed to transcend all religious differences.
  11. exuberance
    joyful enthusiasm
    I once told a friend of mine, in a moment of exuberance, ‘I’m gonna be the healthiest old man you ever met!’
  12. deficient
    inadequate in amount or degree
    "Mitch," he said, laughing along, "even I don't know what 'spiritual development' really means. But I do know we're deficient in some way.
  13. materialistic
    marked by a desire for wealth and possessions
    We are too involved in materialistic things, and they don’t satisfy us.
  14. dilemma
    state of uncertainty in a choice between unfavorable options
    I told Morrie about my generation's dilemma with having children, how we often saw them as tying us down, making us into these "parent" things that we did not want to be.
  15. vulnerability
    the state of being exposed to harm
    You’re afraid of the pain, you’re afraid of the grief. You’re afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails.
Created on Sun Nov 29 17:27:40 EST 2015 (updated Thu Jun 26 10:45:54 EDT 2025)

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