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

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Conventional self-help advice which tells you to visualize success and think about the type of person you want to be only reinforces the idea that you are not that thing. I'm a Buddhist, and would like to consider myself at least somewhat familiar with Buddhism. As the enlightenment is accepted to be related to letting go of the worldly pleasures according to Buddhism, Manson takes this as an example to justify his opinions. Then, he goes and creates a line, which he thinks is from where the letting-go should be applied to. It's not that the content are false, but everything's completely taken out of the original context, and I'm failing to see how any of this is supposed to be 'helpful'. One could certainly empathize with everything stated here, and agree to most of it, but that's pretty much it: I couldn't find the self-help part (if there was any). If the book's intention was to make one immune (or resistant) to the difficulties the society put in one's way (as the name implies), at least for me, it failed spectacularly. After the first few chapters, it often felt like the author contradicting himself with what followed. Life is essentially an endless series of problems, Mark,” the panda told me. He sipped his drink and adjusted the little pink umbrella. “The solution to one problem is merely the creation of the next one.” To truly appreciate something, you must confine yourself to it. There’s a certain level of joy and meaning that you reach in life only when you’ve spent decades investing in a single relationship, a single craft, a single career. And you cannot achieve those decades of investment without rejecting the alternatives.” Uncertainty is the root of all progress and all growth. As the old adage goes, the man who believes he knows everything learns nothing. We cannot learn anything without first not knowing something. The more we admit we do not know, the more opportunities we gain to learn.”

Not gonna lie though, right or wrong, this book definitely appealed to my snarky, crass kind of humor, reminding me once again that I apparently have the personality and sense of humor of a dude. In the long run, completing a marathon makes us happier than eating a chocolate cake. Raising a child makes us happier than beating a video game. Starting a small business with friends while struggling to make ends meet makes us happier than buying a new computer. These activities are stressful, arduous, and often unpleasant. They also require withstanding problem after problem." The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience. And, paradoxically, the acceptance of one’s negative experience is itself a positive experience.” That thing about the plane is 100% me!! So I get it know: if you think you’re special—decide not to be. Accepting your experience of life as being great and wonderful is the single greatest thing you can do for your happiness.One of the ideas we have in Buddhism is that there is a Buddha in everyone. “ A flower for you, a Buddha to be.” But although all of us have the Buddha within us and are inherently deserving of loving-kindness, we should each individually attempt to think and act more intentionally, with more love, with more understanding. While we are heaven just as we are, it is still our responsibility moving forward to continue bettering ourselves. We are always in the process of approaching truth and perfection without actually ever reaching truth or perfection. And I believe that’s the point. That’s life. Because here’s something that’s weird but true: we don’t actually know what a positive or negative experience is. Some of the most difficult and stressful moments of our lives also end up being the most formative and motivating. Some of the best and most gratifying experiences of our lives are also the most distracting and demotivating. Don’t trust your conception of positive/negative experiences. All that we know for certain is what hurts in the moment and what doesn’t. And that’s not worth much.” The more exposed we are to opposing viewpoints, the more we seem to get upset that those other viewpoints exist. This seems like a logical trend to me because before the internet and our hyper-connected modern world, people didn’t have as much likelihood of running into ideas that disagreed with their own. Today, alternate ideas are far more likely to cross your radar screen. Much as the pain of touching a hot stove teaches you not to touch it again, the sadness of being alone teaches you not to do the things that made you feel so alone again. Emotions are simply biological signals designed to nudge you in the direction of beneficial change.”

People will often fight over who gets to be responsible for successful and happiness. But taking responsibility for our problems is far more important because that’s where real learning comes from.This is narcissism, pure and simple. You feel as though your problems deserve to be treated differently, that your problems have some unique math to them that doesn’t obey the laws of the physical universe. The zen in me tells me lesson is learned, don't fall for arresting titles and stop being impressed by introductory chapters referencing Bukowski. Don't make this mistake again!!! The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience. And, paradoxically, the acceptance of one’s negative experience is itself a positive experience. But the truth is far less interesting than any of these explanations. The truth is, I thought I wanted something, but it turns out I didn’t. End of story. I wanted the reward and not the struggle. I wanted the result and not the process. I was in love with not the fight but only the victory.” No truly happy person feels the need to stand in front of a mirror and recite that she's happy. She just is.”