A review by jsx27
The Courage to Be Disliked: How to Free Yourself, Change your Life and Achieve Real Happiness by Fumitake Koga, Ichiro Kishimi
2.0
There's so much in The Courage to be Disliked that one can take away for navigating their own life. In particular, I found the idea that procrastination is a form of fear particularly useful. There's much to agree on here. It seems likely that focusing on the present and on meaningful contributions can make life more harmonious, for example.
However, there are some aspects of the book that have a pretentious and at times offensive tone. As someone who had mental health issues in my younger years, I honestly found this paragraph disgraceful.
"All types of problem behaviour, from refusing to attend school, to wrist-cutting, are forms of the pursuit of easy superiority. And your shut-in friend, who you told me about at the beginning, is engaging in it, too. He wants to be a special being, and the form that attention takes doesn’t matter."
The dismissive atittude towards 'trauma' early in the book also is really alarming in how it generalises and simplifies people's experiences.
However, there are some aspects of the book that have a pretentious and at times offensive tone. As someone who had mental health issues in my younger years, I honestly found this paragraph disgraceful.
"All types of problem behaviour, from refusing to attend school, to wrist-cutting, are forms of the pursuit of easy superiority. And your shut-in friend, who you told me about at the beginning, is engaging in it, too. He wants to be a special being, and the form that attention takes doesn’t matter."
The dismissive atittude towards 'trauma' early in the book also is really alarming in how it generalises and simplifies people's experiences.