Furtak's positive alternative to Stoicism draws heavily on the writings of Søren Kierkegaard, particularly "Either/Or" and "Works of Love," while also engaging with a wide range of other relevant philosophical, literary, and religious sources. He argues that a morality of virtue and narrative awareness is necessary for accurate emotional perception, and then attempts to define a qualified value realism based upon a reverential trust in love as the ground of life as we know it. The outcome of this inquiry into the possibility of reliable emotion is an account of the ideal state in which a person could trust himself or herself to be rational in being passionate. makes an original contribution to the philosophy of the emotions and provides a new and compelling interpretation of Kierkegaard’s work as a whole.