Summary of ‘The Subtle Art of Nor Giving a F*ck’ by Mark Manson
This article is a summary of ‘The Subtle Art of Not Giving a f’. Generally, it describes to the reader how they should shift their expectations of reality. By acknowledging our own faults, we must choose what to focus on in life. Similarly, our reaction after tragedy matters as unfortunate events just happen (these events are unavoidable). Hence, we need to take more culpability over our responses and this book serves as a wake-up call.
Table of Contents
Don’t Try
Self-awareness is the most important trait in realizing our own abilities. By recognising our strengths and weaknesses, we can choose what skills to hone / avoid. For example, if you’re good at math a career in technology would be ideal over literature. This requires honest self reflection which includes acknowledging the worst parts of ourselves. It is difficult to change who we inherently are.
In life there are many possible things to focus your attention to. But we should determine what to care about, for the sake of our mental health.
Caring about too many objects causes never-ending unease. Avoid the negative feedback-loop which denotes how we begin to hate ourselves for the mere fact that we hate something.
However, negative experiences are OK since they are normal part of everyone’s lives. Therefore, it is counter intuitive to be overly stressed/ self-loathing.
More often than not the things we choose not to care about work out in our favour.
Why is this?
The less emotional investment at stake, the more we are willing to accept the outcome.
Happiness is a Problem
Suffering is universal, making it pointless to try to resist it because it is inevitable. We need to change our expectations. Discontent and discomfort are necessary as counterpoints to identifying happiness.
You can choose when to be happy, as happiness is not contingent on a specific variable.
Yes, even when confronted with the death of a loved one, you are responsible full how do you react. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be sad (what am I, a monster?).
Rather, after some time you can opt to look back with happy memories and confront the future head on.
Suffering occurs in the natural world to aid humans in change. Humans adapt based on their experiences, composed of lessons learnt from painful encounters.
Happiness comes to us when we solve a problem, making it an action and not something that spontaneously emerges.
Constantly changing day to day, achieving daily happiness is a work in progress. There are two approaches to a problem, which make it difficult to achieve happiness.
- Claiming the problem does not exist. This leads to emotional repression and future insecurity.
- Victim Mentality. Blame external circumstances (others and world around them). People feel an inescapable hopelessness because of this nihilistic attitude, rendering meaningful attempts to change.
Notice how people constantly think they know what interests them until they actually begin to participate in related activities. In which case they lose interest.
People want the end result but not the process, which involves struggle and failure. There exist numerous successful business leaders who learnt from experiences of failure from their past businesses.
The Question is not ‘what do you want in life?’. Instead, it is ‘what pain are you willing to sustain in order to achieve your goals?’
You are Not Special
Everyone thinks that their lives are full of unsolvable problems, making us different to everyone else. We become entitled in this process, believing we deserve special treatment. Noticeably, we contend that we are either deficient whilst everyone else is competent or vice versa. In reality these problems are not exclusive to us and many other people suffer from the same things.
After the realisation that we are not special we can begin to solve the problem of the entitlement attitude. Social media has made being exceptional normalised when the reality is everyone is living average lives.
To fill this void, due to our own deficiencies, we need to feel special with grand goals which are unachievable. Being average wrongfully equates to worthlessness.
The people who do become exceptional at things focus on improvement, as they feel as though they are not special. In short there is a need to better themselves.
If there is any message, I would like you to take away after reading this post, it is that:
Having a normal uneventful mundane life is perfectly acceptable when we stop comparing ourselves to others.
The Value of Suffering
There are three levels of self-awareness:
- Understand when you are happy / sad. For instance, waking up late makes me feel sad.
- Why do we feel certain emotions? This helps us to understand the root cause of our issues. Using the aforementioned example, we feel bad about sleeping late because we feel as though we’re wasting our life. Clearly, we resort to these actions to avoid starting work.
- Personal values. Why do I consider this a success or failure? Being unable to start work is a failure since I need to get a job. Alongside which is a measure of success.
You are Always Choosing
There is a difference in how we perceive problems based on if we wilfully choose it, thereby assuming responsibility. For, if an action is forced against our will, it is interpreted as painful.
Humans are accountable in how they interpret a situation regardless of the external situation. By accepting responsibility for the problems in our lives we will exercise more control over our destiny. This includes changing our values or metrics to morph our attitudes / corresponding choices towards events.
There are lots of reasons why you are unhappy, but nobody but yourself is responsible for your own happiness. How you manage the psychological and emotional fallout is up to you in the case of being subject to tragedy.
On a similar note, when it comes to bad genetics once again you are responsible for your own response. As you can either willow in self-pity with your superficial values or create new values. These values suggest an indicator of personal success.
There is no one solution to changing your outlook, but what matters is:
your choices which you are currently doing / not doing, because they greatly influence the conclusion.
You are Wrong About Everything (but so am I)
Being correct is a dynamic fluid process. Accordingly, our answer gets closer to the degree of ‘right’ as opposed to ‘wrong’ when something is learnt. We can’t reach binary right / wrong labels since it would imply perfection in our beliefs (there are always exceptions).
Henceforth, we slowly cultivate and move away from the wrongs of today towards a tomorrow with ‘less wrongs.’ Certainty is the natural enemy of growth. We need to doubt our beliefs, feelings, goals, as our values are imperfect.
Normally, we don’t know what a positive experience is, until the future – when we look back at it. An example is when we are rejected from our first choice university. Eventually we realize we ended up in a university with a more suitable learning environment for us.
Presently stressful negative experiences can become positive later on. The less certain you feel about something, the more relaxed you feel about the fact that you don’t know.
All things considered everyone has knowledge gaps and learnt observations are enhanced by uncertainty – removing judgement of all things. There are acts humans pass up on in the moment if they threaten how we feel / view ourselves. Although a more beneficial approach is to keep discovering who you are, prescribing more values onto yourself. Overall, your identity is constantly in a state of flux.
Failure is the Way Forward
The concept of failure is relative and depends on how you measure it, defined by your aims. Most people choose to live their life in comfort due to fear of failure and rejection. They prefer the tried and tested way of life which they know they have some success with.
But, we need to reorient our values that we are in control over in this process of constant negotiation. There are no opportunities to progress if the value is something narrow and surface level. A common case is how many people desire to get married.
But what happens afterwards?
Once the value has been achieved people do not know what to do next. This is all because of a static end objective. In contrast the value itself needs to be changed to something such as maintaining a loving healthy relationship. Instantly, this is a better alternative as there are many things that constitute success within this statement.
Some of our greatest achievements which we praise ourselves for, occur in the aftermath of positions of immense hardship. The higher our mental fortitude is, the more we are able to question our failing values.
By choosing new values we are introducing new experiences of pain in our lives. It is going to be suffocating at first, but we can thrive on it by acting despite our initial apprehension.
Motivation Cycle
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F claims that motivation is a chain that paradoxically begins with action. Action leads to doses of inspiration. When we are inspired, we are motivated and consequently act.
Did you notice this circular cycle?
If you are in dire need of motivation, DO ANYTHING.
Perform any act, related to the task, for just three minutes and the answers will naturally follow suit. Moreover, breakdown the task into small doable subsections and eventually you won’t be wary of failure. Since issues become just another small task which can be tweaked affecting the overall picture.
The ‘Help the Introvert’ Scale
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F
Rating: 3 Stars
Pros: This book is a great guideline into changing how your mindset works. Significant emphasis is placed on to what you choose to value / what is important to you. The book does not shy away from the fact that life is not all sunshine and rainbows. It is OK to momentarily cry, as that is a natural part of your feelings. Uniquely, the book is written in a way that is easily readable, so the information can be digested without resistance. | Cons: The book limits itself in how it strictly talks about mentality. The contents of the book is similar to other self-help books, suggesting the case of repetitive word padding and unoriginality. |
Should you want to rewire your value system, the book is available for purchase here.
If one of your values is to find a romantic relationship, click the article here, to begin your quest.