The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck - Mark Manson

Read 02.15.18

I picked this book up because it was advertised on my Instagram feed for far too long. I didn’t expect much of it. A generic self-help book that offers shallow life-tips using swear words as a marketing strategy at best. However, I was surprised at the level of depth Manson displayed in the following texts, and equally surprised at the delivery of his thoughts. Specifically, his use of “fuck” and “dickhead” were brazen, but not corny or awkward at all. I’ve only read a few books that successfully implement expletives without disrupting the tone of writing, but this is definitely one of them. Anyways, there’s more to this book than just good writing, so let’s dive into it.

“This book will not teach you how to gain or achieve, but rather how to lose and let go.” (22)

We all want life to be a positive experience. This desire is usually depicted as chasing after the “pleasures” of life: love, drugs, sex— whatever gets your dopamine flowing. Most self-help books convey this behavior as superficial, and recommend you to search for deeper, meaningful positive experiences. Go travel, learn something new, make some friends, the usual. Manson, on the other hand, takes a different interpretation. Instead of gaining positive experiences, why not take care the negative ones?

“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.” (9)

Like many (if not all) things, life carries a balance of positive and negative experiences. In fact, one would not exist without the other. Then, given that negative experiences are unavoidable, we are tasked with the question of how to live with them:

“If suffering is inevitable, if our problems in life are unavoidable, then the question we should be asking is not “How do I stop suffering?” but “Why am I suffering— for what purpose?”” (69)

I think Manson hits a good point here— one we tend to forget as we live captivated by the present. We live in the present, but exist throughout time. In other words, perhaps we should bring life into perspective as a line instead of a point. It is only then that suffering in the present, for a better present in the future, is meaningful. Consequently, exclusively pursuing short-lived pleasures become insignificant and maybe even harmful.  

“Constant positivity is a form of avoidance, not a valid solution to life’s problems.” (84)

There’s just one small problem. To endure suffering necessitates a sacrifice of what Manson calls “Freedom.” Freedom, by his definition, is the lack of commitment, which of course, is good and bad.

“Freedom grants the opportunity for greater meaning, but by itself there is nothing necessarily meaningful about it.” (166)

“Commitment gives you freedom because you’re no longer distracted by the unimportant and frivolous. Commitment gives you freedom because it hones your attention and focus, directing them toward what is more efficient at making you healthy and happy. Commitment makes decision-making easier and removes any fear of missing out; knowing that what you already have is good enough, why would you ever stress about chasing more, more, more again? Commitment allows you to focus intently on a few highly important goals and achieve a greater degree of success than you otherwise would.” (188-189)

Just as how the symbol of Yin-yang teaches us of order in chaos and chaos in order, Manson describes the opportunity to experience freedom through commitment. The question then becomes, how do we commit? Or rather, what do we commit to? This can also be paraphrased to the commonly asked: what is the meaning of life? Manson’s deconstruction and personalization of purpose diverges from the notion that mankind shares one true meaning, and suggests to his readers to search within instead of around. And to kick-start this grand quest, he introduces the concept of death. To Manson, the acceptance of mortality is the gateway to finding meaning. It is the inevitable absence of existence, the darkness that surrounds light.

“You too are going to die, and that’s because you too were fortunate enough to have lived.” (208)

And this is where I disagree— slightly. Yes, the acknowledgement of death and its inevitability can be an explosive catalyst to value life. There are countless stories of near-death experiences that were eye-opening and transformative, sometimes leading to a discovery of purpose and meaning. However, to be thinking about the certainty of death in the face of suffering in order to find meaning just doesn’t seem efficient to me. I’ve been thinking about death after reading this book— nothing related to self-harm or anything dangerous, just the concept of it, and found that it doesn’t really help me value life. Rather, it began pushing me towards nihilistic thoughts. If the motivation behind my every action is to do something significant since my consciousness will eventually disappear, there is equal motivation to do nothing at all. So perhaps the answer does not necessary lie in death. It may be a good starting point, but there is not enough fuel there to keep me on the path of commitment. In Manson’s words, accepting mortality may assist in losing the negative aspects of life, but it does not add any positive aspects either.

And so the search continues.

Favorite snippets:

“Self -improvement and success often occur together. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re the same thing.” (3)

“The key to a good life is not giving a fuck about more; it’s giving a fuck about less, giving a fuck about only what is true and immediate and important.” (5)

“…Here’s the sneaky truth about life. There’s no such thing as not giving a fuck. You must give a fuck about something. It’s part of our biology to always care about something and therefore to always give a fuck. The question, then, is, what do we give a fuck about? What are we choosing to give a fuck about? And how can we not give a fuck about what ultimately does not matter?” (15)

“Maturity is what happens when one learns to only give a fuck about what’s truly fuck-worthy.” (19)

“And this is what’s so dangerous about a society that coddles itself more and more from the inevitable discomforts of life: we lose the benefits of experiencing healthy doses of pain, a loss that disconnects us from the reality of the world around us.” (29)

“Hedonic treadmill: the idea that we’re always working hard to change our life situation, but we actually never feel very different.” (35)

“Because happiness requires struggle. It grows from problems. Joy doesn’t just sprout out of the ground like daisies and rainbows. Real, serious, lifelong fulfillment and meaning have to be earned through the choosing and managing of our struggles. Whether you suffer from anxiety or loneliness or obsessive-compulsive disorder or a dickhead boss who ruins half of your waking hours every day, the solution lies in the acceptance and active engagement of that negative experience— not the avoidance of it, not the salvation from it.” (37)

“The problem with the self-esteem movement is that it measured self-esteem by how positively people felt about themselves. But a true and accurate measurement of one’s self-worth is how people feel about the negative aspects of themselves.” (44)

“The truth is that there’s no such thing as a personal problem. If you’ve got a problem, chances are millions of other people have had it in the past, have it now, and are going to have it in the future. Likely people you know too. That doesn’t minimize the problem or mean that it shouldn’t hurt. It doesn’t mean you aren’t legitimately a victim in some circumstances. It just means that you’re not special.” (56)

“Something about recent technology seems to allow our insecurities to run amok like never before. The more freedom we’re given to express ourselves, the more we want to be free of having to deal with anyone who may disagree with us or upset us. The more exposed we are to opposing viewpoints, the more we seem to get upset that those other viewpoints exist. The easier and more problem-free our lives become, the more we seem to feel entitled for them to get even better.” (57)

“Our lives today are filled with information from the extremes of the bell curve of human experience, because in the media business that’s what gets eyeballs, and eyeballs bring dollars. That’s the bottom line. Yet the vast majority of life resides in the humdrum middle. The vast majority of life is un-extraordinary, indeed quite average. This flood of extreme information has conditioned us to believe that exceptionalism is the new normal. And because we’re all quite average most of the time, the deluge of exceptional information drives us to feel pretty damn insecure and desperate, because clearly we are somehow not good enough. So more and more we feel the need to compensate through entitlement and addiction. We cope the only way we know how: either through self-aggrandizing or through other-aggrandizing.” (58-59)

“When a culture’s standard of success is to “be extraordinary,” it then becomes better to be at the extreme low end of the bell curve than to be in the middle, because at least there you’re still special and deserve attention. Many people choose this strategy: to prove to everyone that they are the most miserable, or the most oppressed, or the most victimized.” (61)

“Honest self-questioning is difficult. It requires asking yourself simple questions that are uncomfortable to answer. In fact, in my experience, the more uncomfortable the answer, the more likely it is to be true.” (73)

“If you want to change how you see your problems, you have to change what you value and/or how you measure failure/success.” (79)

“The fact is, people who base their self-worth on being right about everything prevent themselves from learning from their mistakes. They lack the ability to take on new perspectives and empathize with others. They close themselves off to new and important information. It’s far more helpful to assume that you’re ignorant and don’t know a whole lot. This keeps you unattached to superstitious or poorly informed beliefs and promotes a constant state of learning and growth.” (83)

“Fault results from choices that have already been made. Responsibility results from the choices you’re currently making, every second of the day.” (98-99)

“”Victimhood chic” is in style on both the right and the left today, among both the rich and the poor. In fact, this may be the first time in human history that every single demographic group has felt unfairly victimized simultaneously. And they’re all riding the highs of the moral indignation that comes along with it.” (110-111)

“Being wrong opens us up to the possibility of change. Being wrong brings the opportunity for growth.” (119)

“We cannot learn anything without first not knowing something.” (135)

“These are good, important opportunities that we consistently pass up because they threaten to change how we view and feel about ourselves. They threaten the values that we’ve chosen and have learned to live up to.” (137)

“Just as one must suffer physical pain to build stronger bone and muscle, one must suffer emotional pain to develop greater emotional resilience, a stronger sense of self, increased compassion, and a generally happier life.” (154)

“Action isn’t just the effect of motivation; it’s also the cause of it.” (160)

“The point is this: we all must give a fuck about something, in order to value something. And to value something, we must reject what is not that something. To value X, we must reject non-X.” (171)

“The truth is, there are healthy forms of love and unhealthy forms of love. Unhealthy love is based on two people trying to escape their problems through their emotions for each other— in other words, they’re using each other as an escape…Wherever there is a healthy and loving relationship, there will be clear boundaries between the two people and their values, and there will be an open avenue of giving and receiving rejection when necessary.” (174-175)

“The mark of an unhealthy relationship is two people who try to solve each other’s problems in order to feel good about themselves.” (177)

“These are the yin and yang of any toxic relationship: the victim and the saver, the person who starts fires because it makes her feel important and the person who puts out fires because it makes him feel important.” (178)

“Without conflict, there can be no trust. Conflict exists to show us who is there for us unconditionally and who is just there for the benefits.” (182-183)

“When trust is destroyed, it can be rebuilt only if the following two steps happen: 1) the trust-breaker admits the true values that caused the breach and owns up to them, and 2) the trust-breaker builds a solid track record of improved behavior over time.” (185)

“But while investing deeply in one person, one place, one job, one activity might deny us the breadth of experience we’d like, pursuing a breadth of experience denies us the opportunity to experience the rewards of depth of experience.” (187)

“Yet, in a bizarre, backwards way, death is the light by which the shadow of all of life’s meaning is measured. Without death, everything would feel inconsequential, all experience arbitrary, all metrics and values suddenly zero.” (195)

“Without acknowledging the ever-present gaze of death, the superficial will appear important, and the important will appear superficial. Death is the only thing we can know with any certainty. And as such, it must be the compass by which we orient all of our other values and decisions. It is the correct answer to all of the questions we should ask but never do.” (206)