NAME: Carlo Angelo Jonathan H.

Templa GRADE & SECTION: XI-Service

3RD PERIODICAL EXAM: CLAIMS IN THE TEXT DECEMBER 19, 2019

THE SUBTLE ART OF NOT GIVING A F*CK

By Mark Manson

“Self-improvement and success often occur together. But that doesn’t

necessarily mean they are the same thing.”
Par. 5; P. 6
1
The author gave a quote from the story of Charles Bukowski. “Fame and
success didn’t make him a better person. Nor was it by becoming a better
person that he became famous and successful”. Self-improvement and
success are the same thing. Success is defined as the accomplishment of
an aim or purpose and Self-improvement is define as the improvement of
one's knowledge, status, or character by one's own efforts. Self-provident
and success are focus on achieving improvement.

“Our culture today is obsessively focused on unrealistically positive

expectations.”
Par. 6; P. 6
2
The evidence of the author is that society keeps on telling us to be happier,
be smarter, be faster, be richer, be sexier, and be better than the rest. It is
not unrealistically positive expectations, the expectations are realistic. The
problem with culture today is that they are obsess with realistic positive
expectations without putting effort towards it. Seeking only the result
without the struggles in achieving the result.

“Conventional life advice- all the positive and happy self-help stuff we
hear all the time- is actually fixating on what you lack.”
Par. 1; P. 7
3
Mark Manson states that its lasers in on what you perceive your personal
shortcomings and failures to already be, and then emphasizes them for
you. The claim uses a fallacy known as nastry generalization. Assuming that
every people who uses conventional life advice and self-help guid is
fixating on what someone lacks. But in reality, conventional life advice and
self-help guide are useful for certain type of people because positivity
works on them.
 “You learn about the best ways to make money because you feel you
don’t need have enough money already.”
Par. 1; P. 7
4
The reason behind the claim, is that fixation on the positive on what’s better,
what’s superior only serves to remind us over and over again of what we
are not, of what we lack, of what we should have been but failed to be.
Being extremely desperate and driven by great reason is the best way to
make money, because you are willing to be a criminal in this situation. Take
this for example, Walter from Breaking Bad was announced to have cancer
and he fears for his family to be financially burden if his gone. So Walter did
the unexpected, he cook and sold methamphetamine in order to get fast
money to be given to his family. Selling drugs was the fastest way for him to
earn money and it was through desperation and great reason that he
found the best way to make money.

“You stand in front of the mirror and repeat affirmation saying that you’re
beautiful because you feel as though you’re not beautiful enough.”
Par. 1; P. 7
5
Mark Manson gave a comparison that no happy person feels the need to
stand in front of a mirror and recite that she’s happy. She just is. It is not
because you don’t feel you are beautiful enough. But rather, it is a way to
talk about yourself in order to feel confident. The key to being confident, is
the ability to talk about yourself and agree.

“A confident man doesn’t feel a need to prove that he is confident.”

Par. 3; P. 7
6
Mark Manson explains that either you are or you are not, somehow it is not
something to be proven. Confident is being comfortable towards failure.
Proving you are confident is not about being confident, it is about being
more comfortable towards a situation. A confident person will always to try
to be more comfortable by trying to prove that he or she is confident.

“The problem is that giving too many fucks is bad for your mental health.”
Par. 6; P. 7
7
In Mark Manson’s quote. “It causes you to become overly attached to the
superficial and fake, to dedicate your life to chasing a mirage of happiness
and satisfaction.” Giving too many fucks is somehow good. Giving too
many fucks is good for you for a short while. Giving fucks about something
lets you see a whole new perspective about something and it can make
you see good values from bad values, it can let you see important and
unimportant things in life to care about.
 “The key to a good life is not giving a fuck about more; it is giving a fuck
about less; giving a fuck about only what is true and immediate and
important.”
Par. 6; P. 7
8
The reason for the claim is that you need to care less, and that by caring
less, you only seek to care about what is important, helpful, and that is how
you achieve a great life. The claim is untrue. You need to give a fuck about
everything to learn what truly matters. It is applying the backward law, you
need to care about everything, in order to identify what is important,
immediate, and useful.

“The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience.”

Par. 2; P. 10
9
The idea from Alan Watts is that the more you pursue feeling better all the
time, the less satisfied you become, as pursuing something only reinforces
the fact that you lack it in the first place. The desire for more positive
experience can be a positive experience. Let define positive experience,
positive experience never estimates how much pain and struggle you were
subject to, it is how much you learn from that experience and applied it in
real life. By desiring for positive experience leads you to personal growth.

“The more you desperately want to be happy and loved, the lonelier and
more afraid you become, regardless of those who surround you.”
Par. 3; P. 10
10
From the philosopher Albert Camus’s quote. “You will never be happy if you
continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you
are looking for the meaning of life.” Being desperate at achieving
something, might not give you the desire outcome. But it will let you know
what it truly is, you might not experience it, but you know what it is. Take
happiness for example in using drugs, the desire for happiness turned into
searching for pleasure. Then resulted to feeling more unhappiness due to
the addiction cause by the drug, but knowing what it feels like to be happy
in a given point of time.

“When you stop giving a fuck, everything seems to fall into piece.”
Par. 1; P. 11
11
Mark Manson believe that sometimes when you care less about something,
you do better at it. The claim is fallacy known as dicto simpliciter, in which
a general rule or observation is treated as universally true regardless of the
circumstances or the individuals concerned. One of my situations of not
giving a fuck about my project, well, it did not go very well.

“The person who is least invested in the success of something that actually
ends up achieving it.”
Par. 1; P. 11
12
From the backward law, if pursuing the positive is a negative, then pursuing
the negative generates the positive. Quite the contrary, the person who is
invested through time, effort, and energy is always the one who achieves
it. Take Elon Musk for example, the person who invested on studying
engineering for 5 years, economic for 4 years, and physics for 6 years.
Achieve business success, possibility for space travel, and he is one of the
most iconic technology entrepreneur, investor, and engineer. It is through
effort, investment in learning, and perseverance that he achieved much
success.

“Suffering through your fears and anxieties is what allows you to build
courage and perseverance.”
Par. 3; P. 11
13
From the book’s quote. “Everything worthwhile in life is won through
surmounting the associated negative experience. Any attempt to escape
the negative, to avoid it or quash it or silence it, only backfires.” Suffering
itself is not the factor which builds courage and perseverance. It is, what
you learn from suffering, which builds courage and perseverance. Suffering
from your fear and anxieties and learning how to deal with it, allows you to
be courageous and perseverance despite the negative aspects in life.

“To try to avoid pain is to give too many fucks about pain.”
Par. 4; P. 11
14
In his life, he had given a fuck about many things. he had also not given a
fuck about many things. And like the road not taken, it was the fucks not
given that made all the difference. Trying to avoid pain is the best way to
not to give a fuck about something. Avoiding things which is unpleasant
but unnecessary is important to show maturity. Avoiding pain is sometimes
the best way to don’t give a fuck about something.

“To not give a fuck is to stare down life’s most terrifying and difficult
challenges and still take action.”
Par. 2; P. 12
15
In what Mark Manson means can be quoted from frozen 2. “Into the
unknown.” If we don’t care about what happens when we quit our
deadbeat job, when you dump your dumb girlfriend/boyfriend is to go to
the unknown. To not give a fuck is not to stare down life’s most terrifying
and difficult challenges, it is to put yourself in a dangerous situation that you
could have avoided. Sometimes not giving a fuck can backfire and can
put you in a situation that is unnecessary to face, a situation which is
extremely hard and could have been avoided if you just care about an
unimportant matter.

“You can’t be an important and life-changing presence for some people

without also being a joke and an embarrassment to others.”
Par. 4; P. 14
16
The old saying goes that no matter where you go, there you are. Well, the
same is true for adversity and failure. No matter where you go, there’s a
five-hundred-pound load of shit waiting for you. And that’s perfectly fine.
The point isn’t to get away from the shit. The point is to find the shit you enjoy
dealing with. The claim itself is a dicto simpliciter, some people became
important and life-changing when he/she experience a great problem
conjuring his old belief. It was not through embarrassment and being a joke,
but rather, through great pain and suffering that he/she knows the value of
something more important.

“When a person has no problems, the mind automatically finds a way to

invent some.”
Par. 5; P. 15
17
What Mark Manson means that life problems are really just side effects of
not having anything more important to worry about. It is impossible for
someone to have no problem. If a person thinks he or she has no problem,
the problem that your mind created is a problem you tried to ignore. The
mind does not automatically finds a problem, there is just a problem in your
life that you did not face.

“We believe that it is not okay for things to suck sometimes, then we
unconsciously start blaming ourselves.”
Par. 3; P. 16
18
The idea is that, we start to feel as though something is inherently wrong
with us, which drives us to all sorts of overcompensation. We believe that it
is not okay for things to be okay majority of the time, then we start to create
problems. I think it’s quite the opposite. It is okay for sometimes to suck, but
it is rare to experience no problem for a period of time. Then we start to
create problems or think of problems that we overthink about.
 “The problem with the self-esteem movement is that it measured self-
esteem by how positively people felt about themselves.”
Par. 3; P. 31
19
In Mark Manson’s idea, a person so fixated on feeling good about
themselves that they manage to delude themselves into believing that they
are accomplishing great things even when they’re not. They believe
they’re the brilliant presenter on stage when actually they’re making a fool
of themselves. The problem with the self-esteem movement is, it forces
people to feel positive even though they do not have a good reason to
feel good about themselves. Forcing people to feel good about
themselves make them more delusional and entitled.

“The true measurement of self-worth is not how a person feels about her
positive experiences, but rather how she feels about her negative
experiences.”
Par. 4; P. 32
20
Mark Manson’s idea of self-worth is a person who actually has a high self-
worth is able to look at the negative parts of his character. A true
measurement of self-worth is how a person feels on positive and negative
experience. A person who has high self-worth can both gain in positive
experience and negative experience.

“The more exposed we are to opposing viewpoints, the more we seem to

get upset that those other viewpoints exist.”
Par. 4; P. 38
21
The same idea is that, the more freedom we’re given to express ourselves,
the more we want to be free of having to deal with anyone who may
disagree with us or upset us. It is quite the opposite. The more we are
exposed to opposing viewpoints, the more we understand why those two
perceptions exist. In the perspective between a vegan and a meat eater.
I understand that vegans cannot stand the idea of killing animals for food.
But from the perspective of a meat eater meat is important in our diet and
it is natural. I don’t get upset that those opposing viewpoints exist, but
rather, understand the meaning why there are opposing viewpoints.

“To become truly great at something, you have to dedicate shit-tons of

time and energy to it.”
Par. 1; P. 39
22
In Mark Manson’s idea most of us are pretty average at most things we do.
Even if you’re exceptional at one thing, chances are you’re average or
below average at most other things. That’s just the nature of life. The word
skill means the ability to carry out a task with determined results often within
a given amount of time, energy, or both. A talent (or gift, or aptitude) is the
skill that someone has to do something very well that people usually like
and that is difficult. You can become truly great at something without
putting shit-ton of effort and time because you have the natural talent.
That’s why talent beats skills, because no matter how passionate you are
at something someone, there is a talented person who is capable enough
to beat you without putting so much effort.

“A lot of people are afraid to accept mediocrity because they believe

that if they accept it, they’ll never achieve anything, never improve, and
that their life won’t matter.”
Par. 3; P. 41
23
In Mark Manson perception of today’s culture is that, they tend to think that
being average is a failure and somehow being successful and
extraordinary is a standard form of expectation. A lot of people including
me are afraid to accept mediocrity not because it means not achieving
anything. But rather, life is precious and having to achieve nothing means
the fear of without creating meaning. The idea that you can only live in a
long moment and die, gives you the idea that, doing something
meaningful and extraordinary is extremely important.

“We all have emotional blind spots.”

Par. 8; P. 47
24
Mark Manson states, there are emotions that we were taught were
inappropriate growing up. It takes years of practice and effort to get good
at identifying blind spots in ourselves and then expressing the affected
emotions appropriately. He is committing a fallacy known as dicto
simpliciter, in which a general rule or observation is treated as universally
true regardless of the circumstances or the individuals concerned. Majority
or even almost everyone has emotional blind spots, it generally does not
mean that everyone has emotional blind spots.

“Growth is an endlessly iterative process.”

Par. 4; P. 76
25
The idea is that, when we learn something new, we don’t go from “wrong”
to “right.” Rather, we go from wrong to slightly less wrong. And when we
learn something additional, we go from slightly less wrong to slightly less
wrong than that, and then to even less wrong than that, and so on. Growth
is not an endless iterative process; it is a process that needs time to develop.
The guide for growth is to master cognitive, psychological, spiritual,
behavioral, and social dimension. Each has its own unique purposes and
from wrong to less wrong can become wrong to right.
 “Being wrong brings the opportunity for growth.”
Par. 6; P. 77
26
To what Mark Manson believe that looking to be right all the time, we should
be looking for how we’re wrong all the time. Because we are. It is not being
wrong itself, but rather, learning from being wrong. Growth is somehow
associated with personal development. It is a transformational process, in
which improvements are made in your physical, emotional, intellectual,
spiritual, social, and/or financial state. Learning from being wrong and
applying it your life, is the basis of personal development.

“we don’t actually know what a positive or negative experience is.”

Par. 7; P. 77
27
What Mark Manson means is that, the most stressful and most difficult
moment in our lives is also the most gratifying and motivating experience.
We know for certain what a positive experience and what a negative
experience is. Positive experience never estimates how much pain and
struggle you were subject to, it is how much you learn from that experience
and applied it in real life. Negative experience never estimates how much
pain, struggle or even success you were subject to, it is when you did not
learn from that experience.

“We’re all the world’s worst observers of ourselves.”

Par. 3; P. 91
28
The idea behind it is that, when we’re angry, or jealous, or upset, we’re
oftentimes the last ones to figure it out. You can be the greatest teacher of
yourselves, you just chose not to be. You can be the writer of your own story;
you just chose not to be. We can be the worst observer of ourselves and
we can also be the greatest observers of ourselves. What I am saying is that,
it is a matter of choice to either be the worst or the greatest.

“Forcing myself to do something, even the most menial of tasks, quickly

made the larger tasks seem much easier.”
Par. 1; P. 103
29
The idea of Tim Ferriss in the book is that, if he forced himself to write two
hundred crappy words, more often than not the act of writing would inspire
him; and before he knew it, he’d have thousands of words down on the
page. Forcing anybody to do anything will always make the task more
challenging. You can’t force someone to make a task which he/she does
not like and suddenly the task seems to be easier. It is true that “The journey
of a thousand miles begins with one step” by Lao Tzu. But the problem is
that, no matter how many times you can walk one step at a time, it does
not normally mean the task will be any easier.
 “Absolute freedom, by itself, means nothing.”
Par. 3; P. 106
30
The reason behind it is that, freedom grants the opportunity for greater
meaning, but by itself there is nothing necessarily meaningful about it.
Ultimately, the only way to achieve meaning and a sense of importance in
one’s life is through a rejection of alternatives, a narrowing of freedom, a
choice of commitment to one place, one belief, or (gulp) one person.
Absolute freedom is complete freedom of mental physical and emotions.
In a philosophical point of view, when you have total control of everything
in your life, then your life seems to be extremely empty and have no sense
of meaning. It is the state of being empty and meaningless, that you can
find the most meaningful and most fulfilling moment in your life.

“Travel is a fantastic self-development tool.”

Par. 4; P. 107
31
Mark Manson’s reason is that, it extricates you from the values of your
culture and shows you that another society can live with entirely different
values and still function and not hate themselves. Traveling can be the
worst way to have self-development. Majority of the time, traveling allows
you to see the worst perspective in seeing different people. It makes you
see the worst part of having to learn, the culture and the value of other
people. Resentment is always present in traveling places and it can
develop even stronger when the values you see is extremely unpleasant.

“We are actually often happier with less.”

Par. 3; P. 118
32
In Mark Manson’s idea, more is not always better. In fact, the opposite is
true. When we’re overloaded with opportunities and options, we suffer from
what psychologists refer to as the paradox of choice. From the quote of
Chuck Palahniuk. “The things you own end up owning you. It’s only after
you lose everything that you’re free to do anything.” Happiness is achieved
by losing everything in order to have one important matter. It is by having
less, that allows to appreciate the smaller things in life.

“There is a freedom and liberation in commitment.”

Par. 4; P. 119
33
In Mark Manson’s statement, commitment gives you freedom because
you’re no longer distracted by the unimportant and frivolous. Commitment
gives you freedom because it hones your attention and focus. Being
technical here, a denotative definition of freedom is the power or right to
act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint. While, the
denotative definition of commitment is an engagement or obligation that
restricts freedom of action. Thus, there is no freedom in commitment.
 “Confronting the reality of our own mortality is important because it
obliterates all the crappy, fragile, superficial values in life.”
Par. 3; P. 130
34
Through Mark Manson’s understanding most people whittle their days
chasing another buck, or a little bit more fame and attention, or a little bit
more assurance that they’re right or loved, death confronts all of us with a
far more painful and important question. It does not obliterate all the bad
values, but somehow, it makes you see values for what it truly is. The crappy,
fragile, superficial values you have in life does not go away. But replace by
values that is important for you to achieve, it is when you know your state
of mortality is declining, that you can change for the better.

“The only way to be comfortable with death is to understand and see

yourself as something bigger than yourself.”
Par. 6; P. 130
35
Mark Manson’s last claim in the book is that, death is somehow about
caring about something greater than yourself, believing that you are a
contributing component in some much larger entity, that your life is but a
mere side process of some great unintelligible production. It is not through
understanding that you become comfortable, but rather accepting death
itself. The state of being comfortable in death, can only be achieved if a
person can accept his/her death at any given point. Acceptance is the
key to being comfortable, knowing that death is inevitable means, it makes
your see a bigger picture in your actions and goals.