The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck - Mark Manson

In a existential, mid-life crisis I found myself questioning my career choices.  I signed up for therapy, and reached out to other veterinarians.  I was giving too many f*cks about too many trivial matters.  I was taking the f*cks of others too seriously.   Other vets recommended the book The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson.   I ask for your tolerance in advance for the language of this post, but the use of the F-bomb seems appropriate in the face of this book.  If you can't tolerate the use of that particular 4-letter word, this book is definitely not for you.   Just to keep my blog more consistent with my usual, I'm going to use the word flip instead.

So what is this book all about?  Basically if you asked Deadpool to rewrite a combination of Boundaries by Townsend and Cloud and other self help books, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck would be the result.  It's fun to read with numerous anecdotes...and the profanity is significantly reduced in the second half.

We all are human beings...finite creatures with limited energy, time, and resources.  We will all have problems, but Manson encourages the reader to choose your problems wisely.  Choose what problems are worth the struggle!  We have a limited amount of flips to give so give them out wisely! Instead of focusing our life on outward values, inward values will bring greater content.  For example, if your goal is to be more successful than Bob, you won't appreciate your personal success as long as Bob is more successful than you.   Values like integrity, doing your personal best, work/life balance etc...will define your personal contentment.   Another theme of this book that provoked great thought was the concept that suffering leads to self improvement.   Suffering is expected and a normal part of life.  It's what propels us into becoming better people, better workers, better spouses...and better-ness in general.

Overall this was a fun summer read, but you can find the information presented more eloquent (more PC way) in other books.   There will be certain people that I recommend this book for, but not all!