The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck: Happiness Is A Problem (Chapter 2 Summary)

This is a chapter-by-chapter summary of a book by Mark Manson’s The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life (2016) series. One chapter, one article. Read this summary, buy the book. Enjoy!

“Dissatisfaction and unease are inherent parts of human nature
and necessary components to creating consistent happiness.”
(Mark Manson)

                                       

The second chapter starts off with the story of a prince whose father decided to shield him from all human suffering – to keep him within the confines of the palace grounds and surrounded by luxury; so far away from the poor and hungry that he never even knew they existed. One day the prince discovered what his father had done and was horrified by the state of the world he found outside his pain-free, problem-free bubble. So, the prince began to believe that he could achieve happiness by stripping himself of all of his worldly pleasures, and then replacing those luxuries with a life full of suffering.

But that didn’t work either.

Eventually this prince became known as the Buddha, and his philosophy – that pain and loss are an inherent part of the human existence and shouldn’t be resisted – swept across the globe and continues to be widely practiced today. The actionable insight here is this: We can choose happiness every day of our lives, rather than imagining that we will eventually, someday, be happy. So, pause for just a moment – right here and right now – and make a deliberate decision that, from here on out, you will defeat “someday syndrome” by choosing to be happy right now. Stop saying, “someday I’ll be happy when I can get X or do Y,” and that you will instead start choosing to be happy right now – on a moment to moment basis – regardless of what’s going on in your life.

Discover happiness through the process of consistently solving your problems.

Don’t Give A F*ck!

The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck: Don't Try (Chapter 1 Summary)

This is a chapter-by-chapter summary of a book by Mark Manson’s The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck (2016) series. One chapter, one article. Read this summary, buy the book. Enjoy!

“Everything worthwhile in life is won through surmounting the associated negative experience”

(Mark Manson)

The author introduce his book with the story of a man who, for the majority of his life, was a complete failure and a loser. Eventually, this man – Charles Bukowski – found success in his writing career. But that didn’t really make him much less of a loser-like behaviours that had become a habit for much of his adult life – getting drunk every night, spending his time with prostitutes, and exposing himself in public, just to name a few.

Interestingly enough, when Bukowski died, the epitaph engraved on his tombstone said: “Don’t Try.” This advice and Bukowski’s story, completely flies in the face of the thousands of books, movies and seminars that all preach that if you don’t give up, you can overcome your shortcomings and become great. But Manson tells us that this supposedly positive self-help advice is actually contributing to your unhappiness because it highlights everything that you lack, essentially saying that in order to improve, you have to feel really bad about yourself first.

Manson insists that the conventional “think positive” approach teaches us that we need to give a fuck about too many things – nice cars, perfect bodies, the biggest house, the most attractive family, etc. And every day we are bombarded with images from our TV and smartphone screens that show us other people that have these kinds of amazing lives. We begin to believe that feeling anxious or sad or unsatisfied is simply unacceptable at all times, which makes us feel even worse for feeling these emotions.

So Manson has an alternative theory. Since the desire for a better life actually has a negative effect on our emotions, we should instead accept the negative aspects of our life. Doing this will lead to a more positive experience, because as soon as we stop fearing the pain of our negative experiences, we are able to truly challenge ourselves without allowing anything to hold us back. Don’t try to achieve happiness by escaping the negative aspects of your life, but rather by embracing them. “To not give a fuck is to stare down life’s most terrifying and difficult challenges and still take actions.”

Manson is quick to clarify that he does not mean that a person should be indifferent to everything in life – those kinds of people are known as psychopaths. Rather than being indifferent, we should learn how to be comfortable with being different. This means not caring what someone thinks of our outfit or our choice of career – standing by our choices in the face of adversity. And to stare down adversity, we must first learn how to care about something bigger than adversity – rising above the trivial annoyances of our lives in order to find a problem worth “giving a fuck about.” And we do control what we give a fuck (care a lot) about.

Bottom line? You have the choice to care or not to care about the things that happen in your life. So you need to choose to care about something that’s really and truly important. Manson writes, “Choose to give a fuck only about the things that are truly important.”

Don’t Give A F*ck!

How to Choose Optimism #6 Don't Believe It Was Better Before ('Carpe Diem')

Being optimistic means living in the present without constantly encumbering ourselves with the idea that it was better before or that happiness will come later. Said French philosopher Andre Comte-Sponville, “There is no point in hoping for what one doesn’t have without enjoying what one does have.” By not being fully in the moment we may miss satisfying experiences.

It is a philosophy of happiness. It’s in the here and now, in the carpe diem (‘seize the day’) of the ancients, that you should learn from your failures and successes, improve yourself, not pass up opportunity and, of course, never put things off. What you do today determines what will happen tomorrow. Your decisions and actions influence your tomorrow in some way. So, if you want to have more success, a better relationship, a healthier body, or anything else, then make the most of today and do the things that will help you get where you want to be…

…don’t believe it was better before

Lord, Give Us Today Our Daily Idea(s)

How to Choose Optimism #5 Put Things in Perspective

Why take the full force of everything that happens to us? Instead, take a step back and put an event into perspective by comparing it with others that we have experienced. That’s not distancing ourselves from reality – it’s actually giving its rightful place. To those who doubt this, I recommend listening to the stories of people who had cancer from early period and who were fighting and even finding new reasons to live and hope. I’ve been with students at hospital and most of them displayed incredible desire to improve their mindsets.

Joel Osteen, a motivational teacher, once said: “Nothing happens to you, it happens for you. See the positive in negative events.” When things happen “to” you, you feel helpless and victimized. However, if you look at things as happening “for” you, then you take some of your power back. This allows you to look at the lessons and blessings (a.k.a. silver linings) within anything you might experience. Give the right and positive perspective from your experience.

How important are your frustrations and upsets, really?

Lord, Give Us Today Our Daily Idea(s)

How to Be Innovative #2 Don't Think About Failure, Think About What Have You Learned

“Innovation is the ability to see change as an opportunity – not a threat”

Steve Jobs, 2010

Many of us are brought up believing that failure is a bad thing. Our early childhood experiences typically involve being laughed-at for getting things wrong. Although we have to learn the difference between right and wrong and what is ‘good’ and ‘bad’, we are often not taught how to learn from our mistakes.

The famous inventor Thomas Edison story tells of how he invented the light bulb. He tried more than 2,000 experiments before he got the electric bulb to work (although, I suspects that it was not exactly 2,000 experiments. It just mean lots of failed experiments). A reporter asked him how it felt to fail so many times, Edison responded, “I never failed once. I invented the light bulb. It just happened to be a 2,000 step process.” At every stage, he learnt what worked and what did not. If he had given up at stage one, the world would be a darker place today!

The problem we have today is that we have a low tolerance for failure, especially in evangelism and business environment. Failure or the perception of failure is often treated with dismissal, although the reality is that although the expected results may not have been achieved, those involved learned a valuable lesson. A 1976 study carried out by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, on the reasons for major engineering failures, found insufficient knowledge to be their primary cause. The more information we have, the less likely we are to fail, so engineers today are more likely to get things right by learning from what didn’t work in the past.

This is true for all aspects of our lives, whether it is work, at home or during leisure. We need to learn from our mistakes rather than trying to forget them and move on. In every situation, it can be worthwhile jotting down or take a mental note on what has worked and what hasn’t. Commits it to memory because it can provide a useful reference when you face a similar situation or a new challenge. Don’t think about failure, instead think about unexpected outcome!

Practical Suggestions:

§  If something hasn’t worked, don’t focus on the failure, instead think about what did work and learn from it

§  Think about what hasn’t worked for you in the past and reflect on how you dealt with the situation and what you leaned. What this a positive or negative or growing experience? Did you come out of the situation a better person?

Lord, Give Us Today Our Daily Idea(s)