The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: a Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life

Cover The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: a Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life

Could be the last book I finish before the end of 2016 and I think as the year closes it was a very important one to read. The message is simple, learn how to not care and it is vital to each and every person. I see people stress at work because they can't restrict themselves from getting too involved, sometimes things are just out of our hands so you need to know what to care about and what not. I found the values section incredible important, it is one thing I lack and when you really think ab

...

out it, things begin to take shape. I thought I was quite good at not giving a crap but reading this I learnt I was deeply shut off, I needed to care more about the things that do interest me and less on the things that don't. The book loses a little steam in the last chapter and lost me but when I found myself quoting a specific value message to another friend I realised this book is beneficial to not just me. The message is true and amazing, the book doesn't attempt to confuse with earth shattering opinions by philosophical morons, it just questions our life with technology and how we perceive our lives. Manson has interesting stories and losing a friend at a young age is something that shaped my life as well. Don't just read for the sake of reading, get something out of it and pay it forward. Great book.

MoreLess

Read book The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: a Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life for free

Ads Skip 5 sec Skip
+Write review

User Reviews:

Ilovebts 4 years ago

Why can't I see the sides of the pages?pls tell me how to solve this .I really want to read this book

Guest 5 years ago

How do we select pages? I'm already halfway through this book and i wanna select the page i last stopped reading at

Moiza 6 years ago

Is it the full book here or just chap 1?please oelase please pelase please please please please please tell

Guest 6 years ago

This book may have saved my life..

Guest 6 years ago

Did I ask bitch

Guest 6 years ago

Nice

Guest 7 years ago

I hardly ever read self-help books, but I make an exception for Mark Manson. His book is about carefully choosing what you care about. About accepting that there will always be struggle in your life, and about changing your problems into better problems.

Who is this Mark Manson anyway? He’s a popular blogger who attracted immense hordes of young adult males to his blog. He started out in the troubled, questionable PUA scene, which stands for Pick-Up Artist; in other words, using armchair psychology to create rules for hitting on women. Manson soon figured out that there are some fundamental misunderstandings about human interaction in the “pick-up artistry” books, and that their weak psychology does harm to the people who take it as gospel. In general, if you want to attract good people, it doesn’t help to follow rules and jump through imagined hoops. You got to work on yourself first. He created a site with alternative advice about relationships, and focused more on stimulating self-worth and emotional hygiene.

His advice struck a chord with many people. He concluded his earlier focus on dating and relationships with his book Models, and then branched out to travel, reading and psychological well-being in general. After a couple of years of hard work, he summarized all his new findings in a new book. Maybe it will be his last book, because it sure seems like all his activities culminated towards this undertaking. We will see. In any case, Manson is one of the most clear-minded and lucid writers out there, and it is worth reading what he has to say.

Manson starts from some of the same points that Alan Watts makes in The Wisdom of Insecurity. Desperately trying to find happiness causes more anguish, and trying to avoid pain will only cause more pain. It sounds counterintuitive, but accepting pain and choosing to deal with it is actually a positive experience, and chasing after happiness is a negative experience. Manson argues that this feedback loop swings towards the negative in our modern society in which people feel ashamed to feel unsuccessful. The thing to do is to change your priorities of what matters in life, and care about the right things.

Where Watts lectures like a professor, Manson is like a rough no-nonsense friend who sits you down, points his finger in your face and swears a lot. Like a benevolent Tyler Durden. He’s quite funny, but his prose is a bit try-hard.

So far so good, but after this opening salvo I lose the thread of his arguments. In chapter three he tackles two topics: (1) He makes an extremely broad generalization that traumatic experiences in our upbringing always lead to entitlement in one way or another. And (2) the internet makes us believe that we are horribly mediocre. And then he ties them together. His first generalization is far too broad. Almost every psychological problem in every pop-psych book points towards nurture as having a major influence on all sorts of problems in later life. But in this book it’s there to introduce the second point about the internet. Manson is in fact making his argument backwards, counting the steps from entitlement and insecurity in young adults back to the childhood environment. But presenting it the other way around strains his argumentation.

So yeah, the book isn’t perfect. He uses stories as extended introductions to what he wants to say, but sometimes the topics and arguments become a little bit muddled, so that you wonder: what was the topic of this chapter again?

It gets clearer later on. The final chapters each deal with a specific value that can help you in your life. He discusses values like taking responsibility, accepting uncertainty, daring to be vulnerable and others. Most of these are not really stimulated all that much by our society and people have a thousand ways to avoid a confrontation with difficult or painful feelings, so it is good to be reminded why these values improve your life.

His message is not exactly new or unique. I mentioned before the name Alan Watts, who said similar things, and Nathaniel Branden did the same in his work on self-worth, and Brene Brown is currently a popular advocate of the power of vulnerability and honesty. I’m sure there are more names to be listed here.

It seems like all the good gurus in our society converge to the same messages. That’s an encouraging thought, because it means that we’re on to something here. It also helps to hear the same messages communicated by different voices in different ways. Manson’s book, while not exceptional in the genre, is still a positive addition to it and to the world.

Guest 7 years ago

Great observation mate

Guest 7 years ago

from my opinion it is not merely 'just do it' it is about do it something that is something you give value. a person who has boundaries or a person who is willing to accomplish for the things that are bigger than one conception. If you just do it as listening to your emotional pleasures then it means you did not get the philosophy of this book.

Guest 7 years ago

First couple of pages and I like this book. I've changed my perspective on how I view my life. The first 10 pages I related to, like it was pointing out my character and how I need to change those negative characters.

Guest 7 years ago

Actually ...

Guest 7 years ago

Bhahahahahahahahaha
More comments

Guest 7 years ago

The first few paragraphs sound like the plot of Californication the movie series

Guest 7 years ago

this is brilliant shit must read for everyone

Guest 6 years ago

You missed the whole point of the book. It's not about not giving a fuck at all. it's more about being selective with the fucks you are giving. Give a fuck about what really matters to you and I believe your mother matters. You have to choose between what you care about and what you don't. This is an amazing book so read it carefully and remember you are not a special snowflake, just like the rest of us.

Guest 7 years ago

can someone help me understand how to download the book in pdf? :)
More comments

Guest 7 years ago

I would totally recommend this book. If you survive through first 10 pages full of "f*cks" you will come to a very simple but a deep explaining of the world. It will give you answers and provide directions.

Guest 7 years ago

blabla

Guest 7 years ago

ME TOO
Next 5 reviews

Write Review:

Guest

Guest