About the book
Author : Mark Manson
Genre : Self Help
Pages : 224
Published : 13 Sep 2016
Goodreads : 3.9 / 5
Review
Learn to stop giving a f*ck from this book by Author and blogger Mark Manson, where he argues that life’s struggles give it meaning, and that the mindless positivity of typical self-help books is neither practical nor helpful. This is the second book from Mark Manson released in 2016 after his first book : Models: Attract Women Through Honesty (2011), and before his latest book called Everything Is F*cked (2019)
The book is divided into 9 chapters, with chapters like “Chapter 1: Don’t Try” to “Chapter 9 : .. And then you die”. The Author goes through a lot of different concepts like understanding that “any problem is not unique to us” or “the problems of having bad values”, but the authors conveys this in his own way, which involves naming the sections, “kill yourself” and “shitty values” respectively. As you might have guessed, the Author is in your face most of the time, and that’s probably what turned some away from this book. But behind all the fucks and shits, there’s some great life values to earn from this book. The Author is honest and blatant about what he believes, and I certainly appreciated that. The degree to which I agree with the Author on the concepts he presents vary, and I’m sure I’ll keep changing my mind, but that just means I’m learning and growing. But be ready to hear sentences like “While not giving a fuck may seem simple on the surface, it’s a whole new bag of burritos under the hood. I don’t even know what that sentence means, but I don’t give a fuck. A bag of burritos sounds awesome, so let’s just go with it.”
“Maturity is what happens when one learns to only give a fuck about what’s truly fuckworthy.”
Personally, I am a person who already gives less f*cks that most of my peers. Most of the things that others my age talks about are menial and (according to the author) not f*ck worthy to me. And I might be a social oddball because of that, but I’m happier than ever minding my own business. Reading this book just reconfirmed and shed some new light into the things I already do. Also I get anxiety thinking about some of the most random est shit, and also always trying to make the “Right Choice” in everything. Don’t worry, I’m not going to say this book cured my anxiety (I wish), but it made me understand some things like: we all are wrong about everything and that’s okay or playing the hand we dealt in life or understanding failure is the way forward.
One of my favorite sections is when he talks about liking the reward vs the struggle. It really hit home as I’m in my 20s and constantly trying out new things I might make a career out of, and most times I’m in my head thinking about how awesome it would be if I was like that person or had that profession, but we never think about the decades of hard work that got them there. When we think about that, we back out. That means we wanted the reward and not the process. These quotes convey that thought very well :
“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. And life doesn’t work that way”
“Who you are is defined by what you’re willing to struggle for.”
The opinions about the book seem pretty diverse, I have seen reviews giving it a 1-star calling the author a sexist, self-indulgent, white male and also plenty of 5-star reviews saying this book gave them confidence and ways to stop caring about menial matters. Me personally, I liked it, but I can also see why people don’t. The author is pretty blatant and some people might find that hard to swallow. But since the author covers such a wide array of topics, I’m sure everyone will find some value from this book, nonetheless.
