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Given that he's been writing self-help books along the lines of "how to win at life" since he was in high school, should I take Newport more seriously for this one or is it more of the same kind of dreck?
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Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World,
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Lizzie
It's abundantly clear that you can't take him seriously in this book. He preaches against social media, saying that solitude isn't such a bad thing, and for that point, he discusses... a bunch of historical figures like Thoreau, Lincoln, etc. who didn't even have the option of getting distracted by so much as a lightbulb. And he goes ON AND ON about things like Walden... he *completely* loses the plot multiple times. There were several times during these rambling, irrelevant tangents that I wanted to snap in the author's face and say "EYES. ON. THE. BALL." It's very obvious that he's so genuinely committed to the "solitude" life that he doesn't even seek or accept any feedback or constructive criticism on his writing because I just cannot fathom that this wasn't self-published - it had absolutely no business getting past an editor.
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