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Think Different: Why Conventional Wisdom about Happiness, Confidence and Fulfillment Is Wrong and the Counterintuitive Methods That Work
Do you feel that your life lacks meaning and purpose? Have you lost the idea of who you truly are? Do you avoid the real problems in your life?
Fears and insecurities are completely normal, but how can we deal with them in a proactive and healthy manner? Think Different will answer this question.
We've been told that positive thinking, repeating affirmations and "faking it till you make it" were the key to a happy, fearless, confident living.
But do they lead to happiness?
Our smartest philosophers have been seeking the answer to this question for thousands of years. In the 20th century, the key to happiness seems to be having more, working less, having fun, being skinny, and taking fancy pictures for social media.
Somewhere between the improved living standards, positive thinking, and gigantic expectations we're choking on anti-depressants, alcohol, cheeseburgers, and our tears.
Learn how to turn the expectation ship around.
This book is a raw, honest, deeply personal, refreshingly transparent look at why and how we sabotage our own lives and what to do about it. It goes against the conventional be-happy-at-all-costs mindset.
Fears and insecurities are completely normal, but how can we deal with them in a proactive and healthy manner? Think Different will answer this question.
We've been told that positive thinking, repeating affirmations and "faking it till you make it" were the key to a happy, fearless, confident living.
But do they lead to happiness?
Our smartest philosophers have been seeking the answer to this question for thousands of years. In the 20th century, the key to happiness seems to be having more, working less, having fun, being skinny, and taking fancy pictures for social media.
Somewhere between the improved living standards, positive thinking, and gigantic expectations we're choking on anti-depressants, alcohol, cheeseburgers, and our tears.
Learn how to turn the expectation ship around.
This book is a raw, honest, deeply personal, refreshingly transparent look at why and how we sabotage our own lives and what to do about it. It goes against the conventional be-happy-at-all-costs mindset.
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Published September 14, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 18, 2020
Interesting view on self help
The author shows how to break away from the thinking that all self help books promise is not necessarily true. That we must have our own opinions and criteria for making decisions and living life.
The author shows how to break away from the thinking that all self help books promise is not necessarily true. That we must have our own opinions and criteria for making decisions and living life.
May 8, 2018
McKey mentions that she used to write self-help books but that she no longer believes in that genre. In this book, she exposes the flaws of self-help in general, but she doesn't isolate any specific flaws that she may see in her previous books. Then, she ends this book with a "More Books By Zoe" list. I have no way of knowing if she thinks her previous books still have enough merit to be read or if she has renounced them.
In one numbered section, self-help is said to give an “exhilarating feeling of saying your goal out loud,” but then you can lose motivation to actually follow through on that goal. In the very next section, she says that “talking about our problems with others — a therapist or specialist, for example — can relieve us of a lot of stress and give us a sense of accomplishment, if we succeed in defeating our fears…” It’s unclear if merely starting or thoroughly completing the therapy results in the relief of stress, and, either way, why the sense of accomplishment, rather than the actual accomplishment, would be important, given the previous section's takedown of feelings as a possible hindrance to goal completion.
A lot rests on the assumption that the reader is vulnerable to suppressing their true interests in the service of impressing others (meaning, these days, looking good on social media). The author says she personally suffered from that problem. She spent money on stuff she didn't want so she could look good online, finally realized she didn't need it, and threw it out. Fine, but not everyone goes through that phase and learning process. That part needed better introductory structure, like, Here is what we're going to discuss, and here's why some people are vulnerable to it, so if it doesn't describe the reader then the reader can treat it more academically.
These lessons — that announcing your goals and otherwise trying to look good to your circle of friends are dispensable because they're just efforts to make you feel good about yourself — are not always true, and I take them with a grain of salt. If I were to post online that I'm about to take a long walk to run errands, either I'm talking to myself to pat my own back or I'm requesting unmerited attention. No one needs to hear about that goal. I can walk my walk and errand my errand, or not; that success is up to me, and it's a private matter. But if I share online that I'd like people to attend my presentation, read my book, join my mailing list, volunteer for a cause, or if I am otherwise nurturing relationships, that's about networking and necessary promotion for the thing I want to do. Those kinds of goals I can only achieve with other people's help. In that situation, it's important that I feel comfortable and empowered to network and to ask for participation. Moreover, if I have these sorts of goals, and I have the general desire to look good online, that's part of "personal branding." It doesn't reflect immaturity or narcissism. It reflects an awareness that my public image ("professional" or otherwise) is tied to how well I perform in those respects in which I depend on other people's willingness to work with me.
Then there is a confusing section in which she says “I don’t even believe there is absolute right or wrong” with a caveat that this blanket acceptance excludes “Nazis.” For everyone except Nazis, no one’s attitudes are better or worse than anyone else’s...except, of course, that her whole book is making an argument for why she no longer believes something she used to believe, especially given what she identifies as the “insightful, science-backed” positions of certain other writers. I hear a message of: Do whatever you want, but here's what you should probably do, because of reasons that you don't have to accept.
In one numbered section, self-help is said to give an “exhilarating feeling of saying your goal out loud,” but then you can lose motivation to actually follow through on that goal. In the very next section, she says that “talking about our problems with others — a therapist or specialist, for example — can relieve us of a lot of stress and give us a sense of accomplishment, if we succeed in defeating our fears…” It’s unclear if merely starting or thoroughly completing the therapy results in the relief of stress, and, either way, why the sense of accomplishment, rather than the actual accomplishment, would be important, given the previous section's takedown of feelings as a possible hindrance to goal completion.
A lot rests on the assumption that the reader is vulnerable to suppressing their true interests in the service of impressing others (meaning, these days, looking good on social media). The author says she personally suffered from that problem. She spent money on stuff she didn't want so she could look good online, finally realized she didn't need it, and threw it out. Fine, but not everyone goes through that phase and learning process. That part needed better introductory structure, like, Here is what we're going to discuss, and here's why some people are vulnerable to it, so if it doesn't describe the reader then the reader can treat it more academically.
These lessons — that announcing your goals and otherwise trying to look good to your circle of friends are dispensable because they're just efforts to make you feel good about yourself — are not always true, and I take them with a grain of salt. If I were to post online that I'm about to take a long walk to run errands, either I'm talking to myself to pat my own back or I'm requesting unmerited attention. No one needs to hear about that goal. I can walk my walk and errand my errand, or not; that success is up to me, and it's a private matter. But if I share online that I'd like people to attend my presentation, read my book, join my mailing list, volunteer for a cause, or if I am otherwise nurturing relationships, that's about networking and necessary promotion for the thing I want to do. Those kinds of goals I can only achieve with other people's help. In that situation, it's important that I feel comfortable and empowered to network and to ask for participation. Moreover, if I have these sorts of goals, and I have the general desire to look good online, that's part of "personal branding." It doesn't reflect immaturity or narcissism. It reflects an awareness that my public image ("professional" or otherwise) is tied to how well I perform in those respects in which I depend on other people's willingness to work with me.
Then there is a confusing section in which she says “I don’t even believe there is absolute right or wrong” with a caveat that this blanket acceptance excludes “Nazis.” For everyone except Nazis, no one’s attitudes are better or worse than anyone else’s...except, of course, that her whole book is making an argument for why she no longer believes something she used to believe, especially given what she identifies as the “insightful, science-backed” positions of certain other writers. I hear a message of: Do whatever you want, but here's what you should probably do, because of reasons that you don't have to accept.
November 20, 2017
Interesting. She's thinking. Limited based on life experience.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews