How to Be Fine

Listening to podcasts is one of my great pleasures in life, and By the Book is one of the ones I listen to regularly. It's a lot of fun, and the concept is great: the two hosts, Jolenta Greenberg and Kristen Meinzer, spend two weeks following the directions in a self-help book to the letter and tell us about their experience.

We all agree that the advice we can get from such books is not always going to be very brilliant. So it's fun to listen to them intensively cleaning their house with Marie Kondo's method, trying to reconnect with their previous incarnation, etc., and comment on it. So I was pretty excited to get this book for Christmas. They lived by the rules of 50 books, who else can say that?

Summary

The book is divided into three parts: what worked for them, what didn't work for them, and what they wish the books had recommended more. Jolenta and Kristen take turns speaking and explaining their choices. For example, Jolenta enjoyed talking to herself in a positive way but didn't like getting up early, and Kristen enjoyed living below her means but didn't like meditating. Each short chapter is followed by a question from a reader, which they answer.

Impressions

I did a lot of thinking after finishing this book, because I have to admit that I was a little confused.

I really like the podcast: I find the hosts highly friendly and I really like the fact that they don't take themselves very seriously. It's designed to be fun: nobody is an expert here.

This book, however, changes the tone. After gaining popularity and following the guidelines of a well-rounded number of books, they come out with a new one to answer the countless requests from fans who ask them what they have learned. They are somehow considered as experts who can, in turn, publish a personal development book. They have formed strong opinions and are able to defend them. Often, one cannot but agree with them, because their conclusions are full of common sense.

And then I came across the chapter "Admit you're a liar". In it, Jolenta raged against the idea of taking responsibility for her thoughts and emotions. She especially abhorred the term "lies" that the book Girl, Wash Your Face gave to some destructive thoughts like "I'm not smart enough" and "I don't deserve love until I have the right size body". Jolenta said that lies were deliberate, so to say that these thoughts instilled in our brains by society against our will were lies was to blame the victim.

She also mentions The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, that I read and really loved, in which Mark Manson argues that we cannot control external circumstances, but we can choose how we interpret and respond to them. The more we take responsibility for our emotions, the more power we have over our lives. She said, and I quote, "Fuuuuuuck this notion. Not only is blaming yourself for the actions and beliefs of others superdepressing, but Kristen and I have also found it to be quite self-destructive.”

To my surprise, I was really angry. It seems to me that it is absolutely essential to identify our thoughts and to admit that we are the ones who think them. It doesn't ask us to beat ourselves up at all, on the contrary: it asks us to observe our thoughts with compassion and to realize that it is within our power to change them if we don't like them. In my opinion, it is a gross misunderstanding on the part of Jolenta and Kristen to say that this is blaming the victim.

I also disagreed with their view of forgiveness: they were very attached to their resentment and just wouldn't forgive. That's okay, but again, I think they're missing something important. Forgiveness is not for the other person, but for yourself. And they just dismissed that out of hand. Same thing with meditation: they tried it, didn't get it, and said they didn't need it. I have some sympathy for that idea, because I find it hard to meditate too, but there's so much evidence that it's beneficial that it's important to talk about it, and to talk about its alternatives too.

Then I realized that I was angry like that because I had believed that they were "experts". But when you think about it, two weeks to understand and apply concepts is sometimes more than enough, and sometimes not enough. The books they read are not necessarily the best on the market and cover all sorts of different topics. It gave them a good overview, but not necessarily superior wisdom.

I still recommend the book if you listen to the podcast, because it's a very enjoyable read and contains many beautiful thoughts. But you have to see it for what it is: the book of two people like you and me who give their opinion on how, or not, to live our lives. Like all other self-help books, you have to take some and leave some. And accept to not always agree with the authors.