How to Live

How to Live offers 27 vastly differing but always entertaining and insightful answers to the question of how we should live our lives, showing us that life is not black and white, that it’s okay to change, and that there’s a perfect life philosophy for each season, just none that lasts forever.

“All misery comes from dependency,” Sivers opens the first chapter. It’s called “Be independent.” Break all ties, learn to survive alone in the woods, and don’t ever get married. Each chapter instructs you this confidently, acting like an authoritative guru. The next one, “Commit,” makes the opposite point: Pick a lane, and stay in it — for your career, for your friends, even for where you live and who you’ll marry. “When a decision is irreversible, you feel better about it.”

Presenting you with contradicting ideas is Sivers’ great self-help stunt: Instead of serving you a convenient but insufficient answer on a silver platter, he shows you the truth: When it comes to how we should live, there is no right answer. Only an infinite sea of ideas we can choose from — and what we pick will keep changing.

Life is not black and white, but it’s important that we see and feel life’s grayness in our own lives on a daily basis. Only then can we have empathy and understanding for others.

Want an easy way to do this? Consider a question you ask every day: “What do I want to eat?” Your answer to this question will vary from this morning to tonight, from today to tomorrow, and with each week, month, and year. Even your spouse won’t always understand your food preferences, but that’s being human, isn’t it?

We constantly contradict ourselves and hope the world will forgive us — and that’s why we should be forgiving to others as well.

As I was reading the book, I realized that while no individual chapter had all the answers, all of them could be grouped into 3 distinct themes: focus, freedom, and curiosity. This translates to 3 overarching approaches for living your life: Live a small, slow, focused life. Live an open, moderate, independent life. Live a big, fast, immersed life. The chapters “Master something,” “Think super-long-term,” and “Value only what has endured” fit the first category. Plenty of happiness to find in even the tiniest village. Stay humble, and find joy in the little things. “Balance everything.” “Do whatever you want now.” “Reinvent yourself regularly.” These chapters have freedom and independence as their highest value. Go with the flow, keep an open mind, and follow the universe wherever it wants to lead you. Finally, chapters like “Make a million mistakes,” “Chase the future,” and…