Now I guess for my personal reasons why I don't like this book.
I've picked up this book because I seriously enjoyed Marie Kondo's books. Marie Kondo basically wrote about the how-to's on keeping your life clutter free and stuff, and how it could affect your psyche, so it's not just a physical thing, y'kno? Of course, lots of it is based off her life experience and also growing up in Japan and stuff. Are the things she taught back by science? Absolutely not, in fact it's just backed by her experiences. It's like me telling you to "not eat that because I had stomach aches the last time I ate that" kind of thing. Although not explicit, I'm sure she had her own version of "Ikigai".
So Ikigai is supposed to be those way of living kind of philosophy, like the Scandinavian's "Lagom (Sweden)", "Hygge (Denmark)", "Päntsdrunk, the Finnish Art of of Drinking at Home. Alone. In your Underwear (I forgot which country this is)", or "agak-agak/tidak apa (Malaysia)". These books are really popular here in Canada (The Scandinavian living books, not the Malaysian one, if any). So Ikigai is basically the Japanese version of these philosophies. So basically, what I feel is that all these philosophies are a very personal thing, something you grow up with and it sticks with you, and most importantly: no two "ikigais (or lagom or hygge or drinking in your underpants)" is the same. Your "ikigai" and your neighbour's "ikigai" are probably different.
If you have trouble imagining what I'm trying to say, try changing the word: Your Bhuddism and your neighbour's Buddhism are probably practiced differently, as in not 100% different, sure there are similarities, but there will be some parts which will be different (I'm doing this explanation when my parents eventually read this). It's like raising kids I guess: There's no one ultimate way to raise one, it all depends on your personal preference. That's what I feel what books like this is about: based on the author's personal experience and stuff.
Now, here comes my problem with this book: the author made it sound like this is the ultimate way of living, and tried to back it up with some half-assed references.
So what did this author did? First off, the author is of Spanish nationality. One day, he was like: Man, I wanna live longer. How do I do it? So what he did was basically looked up which area has the most average old people. That's where he found this place called Okinawa that is located in Japan. This place apparently have like loads of 100+ year old folks. He decided to personally visit that place and checked around, interview the old folks and what not. Because this village is so out in the countryside, you can't really drive a car there, and gotta go through some super secret passage or something and found the El Dorado of old people. And then he was like: TELL ME OLD PEOPLE, WHAT IS YOUR SECRET TO LONG LIFE? And then the old folks are like: "You gotta find your ikigai and stick with it" And then he wrote a book.
So technically, this book shouldn't be called Ikigai, that's misleading. It should be: The Ikigai of these old people in Okinawa. So what does this old people do all day in this little village? Well you can imagine: They wake up early, do some light exercises, drink green tea (cause it's Japan), do some gardening because there's literally nothing to do in the village, and your choices are limited when you're 116 years old, eat some vegetables that they grew in the backyard, then go to other old people's house and gossip or something, I dunno, I think that's what old people do. Definitely what my mom would do (and she doesn't have to be 116 to do that). Then they say buh-bye and go to sleep at like 8pm and repeat. No clubbing, no video gaming, no going to work in some office building from 8am to 7pm because you were expected to stay till it's late, and no eating some pre-cooked meal because you don't have time to cook because you have to prepare to go to work the next day. So this is the life of your standard Okinawan old person (with the occasional visits from their children and grandchildren from the city).
So what did the author did? He wrote it in a way that this is the ultimate way of living. Just quit your job and start your own garden, go to some village that doesn't have wi-fi, and do all these shit. Also, don't forget, you absolutely have to drink loads and loads of green tea, because correlation = causation. But wait! I have proof! Green tea is filled with antioxidants! Many scientists have proved it, therefore green tea is the ultimate drink! Also gardening! We have proof that all these works, because I've interviewed living proofs!
I got super frustrated while reading this book. It's so superficial. Not just that, from a statistical standpoint, there are some huge ass biases here. Of course you got the data you want, you literally only sampled people who fits your model (biased sampling). You couldn't interview those Okinawans who probably passed away at the age of 90, because well, they're dead. There's probably a lot of people who didn't hit the 100 year old mark at all. Not just that, he specifically interviewed people in that village. Ikigai, is a practice and philosophy that are probably practiced by more people, and not just 100 year olds in a hidden leaf village. Whatabout the folks who are currently working as an office worker? Or those McDonalds wait staff? Or a housewife? Or a school teacher? Heck, what about the school students? These folks are way more relatable and much more of a better representation of the every man.
There's literally lots of problem with this book. And citing history's great people such as Miyazaki or Murakami doesn't make it legit. Jeez. And guess what, of all person he decides to reference, he references Steve Jobs. This book was first published in 2016, while Steve Jobs passed away at 2011, while he was age 56. I get it that he was an excellent innovator, but using such a high profile person as your reference to "long living" probably ain't very good.
I could probably bitch about this book more but I'll stop here. You can read it yourself if you want.
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| 3.5/5! 91% LIKED THIS BOOK! |
So this book got me thinking on a meta level. Why would anyone want to read this book? What kind of person would actually love this book? And then I realised something:
I don't know about you guys, but growing up in an Asian society, my Facebook feed would be literally filled with more Asian-related stuff. And by Asian-related stuff, I meant culturally. And one of the things that appear lots of the time on my feed are things like: How to be successful (as told by a CEO!). Usually these CEOs are people like Richard Branson (Virgin), Jack Ma (Alibaba), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Elon Musk (Tesla), and all those things. They are usually like 5 minute videos, where they kind of taken bits and pieces from their book or their interviews, and then make videos like:
THE 5 THINGS JEFF BEZOS DID TO BECOME SUCCESSFUL
or
WHAT JACK MA, FOUNDER AND CEO OF A MULTI BILLION DOLLAR COMPANY DOES EVERY MORNING
(Business Insider loves making videos like this, and my friends can't stop sharing it on Facebook)
So for like the Jeff Bezos example I gave, it's usually some vague shit like:
DO NOT GIVE UP!
And then its followed with "Amazon was almost bankrupt back in it's early days, but Jeff Bezos didn't give up, and look at him now!"
or
TRUST PEOPLE THAT YOU TRUST!
No shit Sherlock.
And then you'll notice that you could just replace Jeff Bezos name with literally anyone elses and it would still work.
There's some serious biased sampling over here if you guys noticed.
And then there's the other videos, such as "xxx's, CEO of xyz company, morning routine"
And then it's like
#1 Make your bed
#2 Read the newspaper
#3 Eat a balanced breakfast
#4 Go for a 30 minute jog
etc etc
You see my issue with this? It's as though doing all 4 of these would suddenly make you a CEO or something.
Anyway, that's when I realised, this book is probably for these kind of people who loves all these easy to digest, get successful quick secrets or something. Ikigai isn't a very thick book. The contents are also broken down very nicely (almost as though as it is a bullet list), and then rather than tapping into your own personal power, it references successful people, because then "you can be successful too!".
I know I sound like an ass, and that I'm berating people who watches all these kind of thing, but not really. At the end of the day, do what that makes you happy. I am aware that sometimes when things seem down, some people finds inspiration on other's success, while some find the will from within (myself the latter). I'm just skeptical towards all these, and I personally find all these kind of predatory, but I know sometimes it truly works for some people, so good for them, do what that makes you want to wake up every morning.
But yeah, I hate the book.
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