The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson was one of my earliest adult reads. Colorful orange cover🍊 and (at the time) shocking title aside, I was pleased with how down to earth and useful the advice in this book was😊. Mark Manson is like that friend who is never afraid to give it to you straight. At times I felt like the book was taking out my frustrations for me while I was reading it, and it made for a very humorous and enjoyable journey🤣.
Here are some of my takeaways:
- Life sucks sometimes. Not every day will be easy, not every problem has a perfect solution, and we can’t always be happy. The sooner we realize this, the sooner we can get over it and focus on what problems are worth having and working through⚖️.
- Figure out what you care about and let go of the rest. There are only so many hours in a day and some problems aren’t worth the time and effort, especially if they aren’t even important to us. Set aside time to reflect and actually clarify your values and priorities. Doing this will allow you to give your attention to the things you actually want to give your attention to🤩.
- Failure is inevitable, but there is always a lesson to be learned. Failure is unavoidable, and running away from failure means also running away from some important parts of life like taking risks, picking ourselves up, and learning from our mistakes. As a person who is always afraid of failure, this was a hard reset for me🔁. Sometimes we need to embrace failure to embrace growth.
- Take control of your life and be more present. Our problems are our own and we can’t blame others. We need to make choices that align with our identity and make a concerted effort to be in the present moment. Spending time stressing over things that cannot be changed or worrying about things that have yet to happen are largely pointless. Rather than worrying about things that are still unwritten, we owe it to ourselves to take control of the narrative📖.
As someone who can be tightly wound😅 I found The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck to be a nice reminder of how imperfect life can be, as well as how important it is to find a balance between letting things go and taking action⚖️.