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3.39 AVERAGE
3.39 AVERAGE
I would recommend this to someone who is feeling somewhat lost of like they are having a hard time finding hope in our society. This book degrades religion heavily, so if you are a religious person this book is likely not going to be your cup of tea.
I was surprised that I liked this book. I found The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck to be fairly cringey. It felt to be mostly filled with generic platitudes on loving yourself mixed with a ‘look at me, I use swear words so I’m edgy’ kind of vibe thick throughout. His second book however seems to take a different approach. Less of a declaration upon how Mark was able to overcome embarrassment and more of a reflection upon philosophy, science, religion, and our culture at large. Surprising! A further surprise was that a lot of his work seems to align with Buddhist concepts of accepting suffering and living in the present moment as is, rather than holding out for a better future.
Overall, I think I enjoyed this book because I found myself agreeing with enough of the content to be entertain and engaged, while also being challenged enough to stay interested in what he had to say. In the first half of the book Manson explores our psychology, why humans think the way we do and how strongly we are ruled by our emotions. He threads together anecdotal historical examples with one-off studies that supply a flimsy yet promising support for his theories. This is not a science-based book. However, philosophy and science often have a hard time cooperating. He explains to us that we need to appreciate that emotions rule our lives and we cannot think our way out of them. Opposingly he further explains that we cannot be ruled by our emotions exclusively, part of what being human is thinking logically and finding the best path forward.
This leads us to the second half of the book. Here he drops his shocking thesis. Hope is stupid. Don’t ever hope for things to get better because they won’t. You will run yourself to exhaustion on the treadmill of hope, constantly waiting for a better marriage, a better job, a better body and so on. This idea certainly stabs at a fundamental notion of the human spirit; the ability to find hope, even in the darkest of places. He references Viktor Frankl and Man’s Search for meaning (review coming soon) and explains how is a total badass for maintaining hope in the darkest situation possible. I found this reference to be confusing, but it lead me to a great book.
The more Manson explores his notion, the more palatable it becomes. Again, I think he introduces his ideas with an intentional amount of shock, but as he fleshes them out the do seem more agreeable. However, I don’t think a lot of people will necessarily be on board with this type of thinking. It goes directly against the Western ideology of constantly striving for a better life and directly contrasts most religions. Additionally, if you hold religious beliefs - unless you like to be heavily tested – this book is not for you. He spends about a quarter of the book tearing apart religions (all religions to be fair: faith, economic, and politically based) to get to his point that hope does not serve its purpose.
This book was a surprisingly thoughtful and deep look into how the notion of hope can often blind us to appreciating what we currently have instead of longing for an idealized future. This book it also fairly ripe with “like a boss” type humour and dated Generation X level references and humor. Sometimes his jokes connect but often I just wish they were omitted. Mark Manson surprisingly stepped up his game from his previous bestseller and provided some useful insight that I think our society could benefit from hearing, perhaps with several grains of salt.
I was surprised that I liked this book. I found The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck to be fairly cringey. It felt to be mostly filled with generic platitudes on loving yourself mixed with a ‘look at me, I use swear words so I’m edgy’ kind of vibe thick throughout. His second book however seems to take a different approach. Less of a declaration upon how Mark was able to overcome embarrassment and more of a reflection upon philosophy, science, religion, and our culture at large. Surprising! A further surprise was that a lot of his work seems to align with Buddhist concepts of accepting suffering and living in the present moment as is, rather than holding out for a better future.
Overall, I think I enjoyed this book because I found myself agreeing with enough of the content to be entertain and engaged, while also being challenged enough to stay interested in what he had to say. In the first half of the book Manson explores our psychology, why humans think the way we do and how strongly we are ruled by our emotions. He threads together anecdotal historical examples with one-off studies that supply a flimsy yet promising support for his theories. This is not a science-based book. However, philosophy and science often have a hard time cooperating. He explains to us that we need to appreciate that emotions rule our lives and we cannot think our way out of them. Opposingly he further explains that we cannot be ruled by our emotions exclusively, part of what being human is thinking logically and finding the best path forward.
This leads us to the second half of the book. Here he drops his shocking thesis. Hope is stupid. Don’t ever hope for things to get better because they won’t. You will run yourself to exhaustion on the treadmill of hope, constantly waiting for a better marriage, a better job, a better body and so on. This idea certainly stabs at a fundamental notion of the human spirit; the ability to find hope, even in the darkest of places. He references Viktor Frankl and Man’s Search for meaning (review coming soon) and explains how is a total badass for maintaining hope in the darkest situation possible. I found this reference to be confusing, but it lead me to a great book.
The more Manson explores his notion, the more palatable it becomes. Again, I think he introduces his ideas with an intentional amount of shock, but as he fleshes them out the do seem more agreeable. However, I don’t think a lot of people will necessarily be on board with this type of thinking. It goes directly against the Western ideology of constantly striving for a better life and directly contrasts most religions. Additionally, if you hold religious beliefs - unless you like to be heavily tested – this book is not for you. He spends about a quarter of the book tearing apart religions (all religions to be fair: faith, economic, and politically based) to get to his point that hope does not serve its purpose.
This book was a surprisingly thoughtful and deep look into how the notion of hope can often blind us to appreciating what we currently have instead of longing for an idealized future. This book it also fairly ripe with “like a boss” type humour and dated Generation X level references and humor. Sometimes his jokes connect but often I just wish they were omitted. Mark Manson surprisingly stepped up his game from his previous bestseller and provided some useful insight that I think our society could benefit from hearing, perhaps with several grains of salt.
Idk I didn’t think it was as groundbreaking and illuminating as he sought out for it to be. The author sounded condescending and patronising and at times it just felt like a messy copy and paste of random philosophers’ lives and quotes.
A thoroughly different follow-up to his first book, Everything is F*cked tries to be too many things at once: academic, funny, spiritual text, and more. Manson's always got interesting things to say, but he's so wrapped up in saying it in the funniest, most interesting way possible, he gets in his own way.
This is my first time reading Mark Manson and I enjoyed more than I expected. The first part of the book is as cheeky as the title suggests. It was also starting to feel like a downer with a lot of the foul language (as expected) being used in a very negative style. I didn't think the how to start a cult section was really necessary. A chapter on religion definitely fits with the book's agenda, but that was a bit excessive and wandered off topic at points. The second half of the book is the most engaging part. It very much appealed to my Feeling Brain's interested in trying to act more like my Thinking Brain.
funny
emotional
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Loved the concept of the "thinking brain vs. feeling brain," but unfortunately, many of the rest of the concepts just didn't do it for me.
Fijn boek dat me beter beviel dan de voorganger, top! Feitelijker, maar met nog steeds dezelfde grappige en gevatte schrijfstijl en lekker veel voetnoten (love it). Achteraf had ik gewild dat ik wat stukjes had onderstreept of gemarkeerd met een plakkertje. Vermoed dat ik ‘m nog eens zal herlezen.
Not quite as good as the first, but I still enjoyed it and left with some takeaways.
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
lighthearted
fast-paced