A review by amateur_bookworm
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life by Mark Manson

informative reflective medium-paced

3.5

My summary: This personal development self-help book explains that there is a subtle art to not giving a f*ck. Central themes include the idea of choosing what you decide is important to care about, taking responsibility for your current situation in life and taking ownership of your feelings about it, determining your own set of values and framing your view of the world in light of those values, accepting both failure and rejection as tools to improve, and an overall contemplation of your own mortality and how your ideas about it should influence your choices in life. The entirety of the book is told very frankly and with f*cking excessive use of the word f*ck. 
My thoughts: This was …. fine. Nothing earth shattering. Nothing particularly life changing. A few points got me thinking, but I couldn’t relate to or didn’t agree with a lot of his points. I found it hard to care about many of his stories and examples of real people and some of them seemed, frankly, out of context with whatever concept he was expounding upon. Also, I swear a lot, but this book swears A LOT. Especially the first chapter. I could see how a lot of people could stop listening before getting through just the first part, particularly when listening to the audiobook version as opposed to reading it. Disappointment Panda made me think of Ted and that made me laugh in my own little world over here. The narrator was good and it’s a relatively short audiobook. Overall, I did have a couple of “aha!” moments while listening, particularly in regard to my feelings at work, so I did gain a bit of insight into myself by listening to it. If you’re looking for a self-help or personal development book that is very frank with zero coddling and no empty placating fillers, and you don’t mind an overuse of the work f*ck, then this book or audiobook is worth checking out. 
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