i read "atomic habits" and hated it. here's why
Summary
TLDRThe video discusses why the creator disliked 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear, despite its popularity and positive reviews. It highlights both positive aspects, like its readability and useful summaries, and major drawbacks, including its repetitive writing, triggering content for those with body dysmorphia or eating disorders, and poorly cited studies. The creator suggests the book would be better as a TED talk or podcast, criticizes its heavy self-promotion, and feels it caters more to a neurotypical, business-oriented audience. The video invites viewers to share their thoughts on the book.
Takeaways
- 📚 *Atomic Habits* is a highly recommended and popular productivity and self-help book.
- 💼 The book is praised for being easy to read and providing concise summaries at the end of each chapter.
- 🕒 Its structure makes it convenient for busy individuals to read and revisit important sections easily.
- 🔍 A useful concept discussed is reducing friction, making desired habits easier and undesired habits harder.
- 💡 Key idea: 'You do not rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems.'
- 📝 Despite its merits, the book's writing is criticized for being robotic, repetitive, and unenjoyable.
- 🤖 The writing style feels like stitched-together blog posts, making it less engaging as a book.
- 🍫 The book's frequent references to food, weight loss, and restrictive habits can be triggering for those with eating disorders or body dysmorphia.
- 📊 Some cited studies, like Dr. Ann Thorndike's, lack control groups and broader study sites, making them seem cherry-picked.
- 🌐 The book's heavy self-promotion for additional content on its website feels excessive and repetitive.
- 💻 Overall, the book seems better suited as a TED Talk or podcast episode than as a traditional book.
- ⚠️ The content may not be useful for everyone, especially those from lower-income backgrounds or with chronic illnesses.
Q & A
What is the main reason the reviewer hated 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear?
-The reviewer found the writing to be robotic and repetitive, making it difficult to sift through the content to find useful information. They also found the frequent mentions of weight loss and food restriction to be triggering and felt the book could have been better as a TED talk or podcast.
What are some positive aspects of 'Atomic Habits' mentioned by the reviewer?
-The reviewer appreciated that the book is easy to read, with concise summaries at the end of each chapter, making it convenient for busy people to pick up and put down. They also found the concept of reducing friction to make desired habits easier to practice particularly useful.
Why does the reviewer believe 'Atomic Habits' is not suitable for everyone?
-The reviewer feels the book is targeted towards middle to upper-class neurotypical people who want to stay slim and rich. They believe it is not useful for first-generation low-income students, people with chronic illnesses, or those with a history of eating disorders.
What does the reviewer mean by 'reducing friction' in habit formation?
-Reducing friction involves making it easier to perform desired habits and harder to perform undesired ones. For example, placing pens and paper in easy reach to encourage sketching or writing.
How does the reviewer suggest the book could be better presented?
-The reviewer suggests that 'Atomic Habits' could have been more effective as a TED talk, podcast, or YouTube video, rather than a book, due to its repetitive and clunky writing style.
What study did the reviewer find flawed in 'Atomic Habits,' and why?
-The reviewer found the study by Dr. Ann Thorndike on reducing obesity flawed because it lacked a control group and only used one study site, a hospital cafeteria, which may have had a biased sample due to heightened awareness of health and wellness.
What specific content in 'Atomic Habits' did the reviewer find triggering?
-The reviewer found the frequent mentions of food restriction, calorie counting, and weight loss to be triggering, particularly as someone with a history of body dysmorphia and eating disorders.
What does the reviewer suggest readers do if they decide to read 'Atomic Habits'?
-The reviewer suggests reading the concise summaries at the end of each chapter and then closing the book, as they believe these summaries contain all the essential information without the repetitive content.
What is the core message of 'Atomic Habits' according to the reviewer?
-The core message of the book is that you do not rise to the level of your goals, but fall to the level of your systems. This means that your habits and the systems you create to support them are crucial for achieving your goals.
How does the reviewer feel about the self-promotion in 'Atomic Habits'?
-The reviewer finds the constant self-promotion in the book annoying and repetitive. They are frustrated by the frequent reminders to visit the Atomic Habits website for additional resources, feeling it detracts from the reading experience.
Outlines
📚 Introduction and Book Overview
The speaker introduces themselves and shares their opinion on 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear. Despite its popularity and positive reviews, they express their dislike for the book. They explain that they felt compelled to read it due to its reputation and relevance to their content on academia, studying, and productivity. The video will cover what they liked, what they hated, and what they believe could have been improved in the book. They note that spoilers are not a concern due to the widespread discussion of the book's ideas.
👍 Positive Aspects of the Book
The speaker highlights the book's strengths, noting its easy-to-read language and structured format with concise chapter summaries. This makes it convenient for busy readers to pick up and continue reading without losing track. They appreciate the practical advice, particularly the concept of reducing friction to make desired habits easier and unwanted habits harder to perform. This principle has been beneficial in their own life, and they acknowledge the book's usefulness in providing a system for habit formation.
👎 Criticisms of the Book
The speaker criticizes the book's writing style, describing it as robotic, repetitive, and unenjoyable to read. They feel that the book lacks flow and coherence, comparing it unfavorably to a series of blog posts stitched together. Despite the simplicity of the language, they find the content tedious to sift through. They suggest that the material would be better suited to a TED talk or podcast rather than a book.
⚠️ Triggering Content and Fatphobia
The speaker addresses the potentially triggering content related to body image and eating disorders. They highlight the book's frequent references to weight loss and food restriction, which they find problematic and potentially harmful for readers with a history of eating disorders or body dysmorphia. They provide specific examples and quotes from the book to illustrate this issue and express their frustration with the author's focus on weight as a measure of success.
🔍 Questionable Anecdotes and Studies
The speaker questions the validity of some studies and anecdotes cited in the book, particularly those related to choice architecture. They mention a specific study by Dr. Ann Thorndike that lacked a control group and used a single study site, making its findings less reliable. The speaker criticizes the book for relying on such flawed studies to support its points, suggesting that the author may have cherry-picked data to fit his narrative.
📢 Excessive Self-Promotion
The speaker points out the excessive self-promotion throughout the book, with frequent prompts to visit the author's website for additional resources. They find this repetitive and annoying, especially given the already repetitive writing style of the book. The constant marketing detracts from the overall reading experience.
🏢 Target Audience and Final Thoughts
The speaker concludes that 'Atomic Habits' seems tailored for a specific audience—middle to upper-class, neurotypical individuals in business or tech fields. They feel the book is not useful for them personally, as a first-generation, low-income student with chronic illness and a history of eating disorders. While acknowledging that some tips can be helpful, they believe the book would be more effective in a different format, such as a podcast or TED talk. They caution potential readers to manage their expectations and take the content with a grain of salt.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Atomic Habits
💡Productivity
💡Habit Formation
💡Concise Summaries
💡Reducing Friction
💡Body Dysmorphia
💡Repetitive Writing
💡Choice Architecture
💡Self-Promotion
💡Neurotypical
Highlights
Atomic Habits is a New York Times best-seller, highly recommended and praised, especially within the study community.
The author felt compelled to read Atomic Habits due to its reputation and relevance to their content on academia, studying, and productivity.
The book's language is simple, making it easy to read without needing advanced critical thinking or reading skills.
Concise summaries at the end of each chapter allow readers to pause and resume reading easily, making it suitable for busy people.
The concept of reducing friction is highlighted as a valuable tip from the book, suggesting making desired habits easier and unwanted habits harder.
The book emphasizes that habits and systems are more crucial than goals, summed up by the quote: 'You do not rise to the level of your goals; you fall to the level of your systems.'
The writing style is criticized as robotic and repetitive, making the book difficult to read despite its simplicity.
The book's frequent use of weight loss and food restriction examples is seen as potentially triggering for individuals with body dysmorphia or eating disorders.
Some studies cited in the book are deemed flawed, such as the choice architecture study lacking a control group and using only one study site.
There is excessive self-promotion within the book, directing readers to the Atomic Habits website repeatedly.
The book is perceived as targeted towards middle to upper class, neurotypical individuals seeking productivity and self-improvement.
The author believes the content could have been more effectively presented as a TED talk, podcast, or YouTube video rather than a book.
Despite some useful tips, the book is not seen as particularly helpful for the author's personal circumstances and audience.
The author regrets purchasing the e-book but acknowledges it was cheaper than the print copy.
The video invites viewers to share their thoughts on Atomic Habits and engage in a discussion about its content.
Transcripts
hello it's so and i read atomic habits
by james clear and i hated it here's why
atomic habits is a new york times best
seller it's such a highly recommended
and highly lauded productivity and
self-help book
all of the reviews of it are honestly
quite stellar there's a lot of people
who sing its praises it's frequently
recommended especially within the study
community and overall it's a book that
has such a good reputation that i felt
like i as a youtuber who talks a lot
about like academia studying and
productivity i felt like i had to read
it at least once so i did in this video
i'll be breaking down reasons why i like
the book reasons why i hated the book
and what i think the book could have
done better normally when i talk about
books i would normally put in a spoiler
alert however i feel like this book is a
little unique in that i feel like the
ideas discussed in this book are so
wildly discussed already within the
productivity sphere that i feel like
it's not necessarily a spoiler so to
speak in the traditional sense we're not
talking about some sort of crazy twist
at the end of a fantasy novel we're
talking about a productivity book that
has had videos made about it for a long
long time so
i will be talking about direct quotes
and chapters in the book
so i guess if you consider that a
spoiler do be warned but i don't think
it's necessary to read the book before
watching this video hopefully that makes
a little bit of sense and of course i
will leave timestamps down in the
description below if you just want to
get to a specific point in the video
without having to listen to me ramble
about it which i typically do tend to
ramble for quite a long time so hope you
enjoy let's dive right into the good
things about the book because i think
there are genuinely good aspects about
the book that i can appreciate for what
they are first off i find that the book
is very easy to read the language is not
very difficult you don't really need to
have a high degree of critical thinking
or critical reading skills in order to
comprehend the book it's easy to stop
the book halfway through because the
author provides concise summaries of
exactly what he's talked about at the
end of every single chapter so honestly
you could read the book chapter by
chapter put it down and then pick it up
another day
the reason why i specifically like this
aspect is because it means that busy
working people who might not have like a
ton of free time in their day can easily
pick this book up and read it you can
read it during your commute if you take
the train or something like that you can
like split through a few pages before
you start cooking dinner it's just a
book that i can see fitting easily into
working people's lives which is good
because this is a book designed to help
people improve their like productivity
in the workspace so in that regard it's
a good book i also like that he provides
a lot of concise summaries at the end
because then if you ever want to revisit
a certain section in order to
reintegrate some other tip or something
like that into your habits or into your
lifestyle all you have to do is just
flip to the end of that chapter read the
little summary box and then you can move
on with the rest of your day there's no
like intense digging you have to do in
order to obtain that information again
in terms of actual content that the book
provides i think my favorite section was
probably the part where he talks about
this idea of reducing friction
essentially you want to make habits that
you want to increase easier to do in
habits that you want to stop harder to
do so an example is if you want to like
practice writing or sketching more you
can put your pens and like paper and
pencils in easy reach and within sight
so every day when you wake up and like
sit down at your desk you can see oh
these are like my pens and pencils i
need to practice my sketching or i want
to practice my journaling or my writing
skills or something like that so this is
a tenet of habit making i suppose that i
integrate into my everyday life and i
find it to be really helpful so it was
nice to see that like content touched
upon and
to sort of see how it could fit in
within a broader system of habit
formation and i think this is a really
good example of a kernel of information
that the book has that is genuinely good
because it's not that i hate the book
completely or think that the book is
useless i do think there are important
pieces of information within the book
that are very helpful and at the end of
the day
the book does provide like a decent
overview of how someone can build habits
to generate compound growth together
like as a system because that's the
point of the whole book like i think a
quote from the book that sums up the
premise really well is this quote where
he says you do not rise to the level of
your goals you fall to the level of your
systems essentially meaning that at the
end of the day it's the habits that you
produce and form and maintain throughout
your life that essentially contribute to
what you do in your everyday life if
that makes sense a little bit the
content
is there you just have to dig there to
get it you don't have to be particularly
good at reading to get the content you
just have to work a little bit
honestly i think the best way to consume
this book is to read the concise
summaries at the end of each chapter
read those close the book and you can
call it a day you have obtained all you
have gotten from the book at that point
which is a really great segue into
reasons why i hated the book so much
mostly because
reading this book is honestly
quite terrible like i know i said that
it was a book that's easy to read but
just because a book is written in simple
language does not mean it's a book
that's enjoyable to read i think the
main difficulty about this book is that
the writing is so robotic and so
repetitive that it makes it so difficult
to sift through the words that this
author is writing in order to find those
good kernels of information that can
actually help you with your productivity
in
total complete honesty this book reads
like several different blog posts
stitched together without any sort of
editing to help improve the flow between
some of the blog posts
like
it it is genuinely so terrible to read
there's no flow
it's very repetitive
and sometimes there are really weird
anecdotes that he puts in about some
random study or another that doesn't
really make
sense until like later you finally
figure out what main point he's trying
to make and then it like kind of clicks
together but like oh this is why you
mentioned this anecdote about this lady
but
yeah the writing
although it is simplistic and easy to
understand it is quite clunky it is
quite robotic and it is quite repetitive
honestly i think this book would have
made a better ted talk or a better
podcast episode or even a better youtube
video than it does being a book it feels
like i'm watching another like ali
abdull or some sort of like minimalism
self-help study video
but in
literate
tangible paper form
there's no
redeeming quality about this writing
that makes it entertaining to read on
paper i genuinely feel like this guy
would have a better time making a ted
talk and he does make ted talks james
clear is so much better of a
motivational speaker than he is a
motivational writer so that's my main
issue
it's just bad writing
my second issue with the book is that i
feel like some of the sections can be
incredibly triggering for people with
body dysmorphia or with eating disorders
or some sort of previous history with
eating disorders he weirdly uses food
and losing weight as examples in every
single chapter without fail as
something to restrict as something to
achieve and as something that's
inherently desirable he overemphasizes
restriction of certain foods elimination
of certain foods and weight loss in
order to be smaller rather than to be
healthier in every single chapter and it
just gives off
this
inherent fat phobic vibe throughout the
book it's impossible to ignore
especially as someone who has a history
with body dysmorphia and eating
disorders i actually wrote down some of
the quotes in the book that i noticed
while i was reading
i'll include the page numbers as well
but i read the ebook version of this
book so the page numbers might not be
perfectly accurate with what the actual
print book says so on page 104 he says
if you eat a chocolate bar every morning
acknowledge it almost as if you were
watching someone else oh how interesting
that they would do such a thing if you
binge eat simply notice that you are
eating more calories than you should
or on page 145 he says bad habits are
auto catalytic the process feeds itself
they foster the feelings they try to
numb you feel bad till you eat junk food
because you eat junk food you feel bad
or he on page 165 he uses this example
of a man named ronan byrne who
eliminates obesity one netflix binge at
a time
and
throughout the book as examples he
recommends hiding good food and good
drinks in order to eat and drink them
less which is a very disordered form of
eating and can foster
really bad eating habits as someone who
used to continually hide
foods and drinks that i enjoyed in order
to be smaller like
these frequent mentions and frequent
examples of restriction of calorie
counting of like binge eating and like
the focus
of weight loss in order to have a more
ideal body in the eyes of society like
that was very triggering for me to read
and i just feel like it's so
it's so bad it's so triggering
like the day after i finished reading
this book i caught myself tracking
calories again
and restricting calories again and i was
like oh my god
this is not a good look for me this is
not a good sign
just the way he talks about food and the
way he talks about weight gives off this
air that it's bad to be fat it's bad to
eat foods that you enjoy it's bad to be
big
which are all
inherently false thoughts there's
nothing wrong with being fat there's
nothing wrong with being big there's
nothing wrong about eating things that
you enjoy
eating
you know what i mean
like
it's just so
frustrating and difficult to read as
someone who has spent years
trying to unlearn these kinds of like
disordered eating habits and these
disordered ways of looking at bodies the
next thing i want to talk about are some
of the anecdotes and studies that he
cites the formula of these chapters
basically goes like this he puts in some
anecdote about some study or about some
person
and then connects it to the habit
forming tit that he wants to talk about
and then ends it with another anecdote
so it's like very like sandwich like
anecdote tip anecdote
and
some of them just feel very out of place
and so i was like okay
let's try to track down these original
studies that he's referencing in these
anecdotes so in chapter six he begins
with this anecdote about a study done by
dr ann thorndike a physician who's
trying to reduce obesity and james clear
says that by adding in a healthy option
such as bottled water next to a bunch of
sodas people start drinking more water
and less soda and this is supposed to be
an anecdote that's along the lines of
like oh don't put tempting things next
to the things that you want to do you
got to focus on the habits that you
actually want to nurture and cultivate
yadda yadda yadda first off
a lot of studies centered around this
kind of choice architecture are
inherently flawed in the way that they
run statistics maintenance phase is a
podcast series that actually does a lot
of really great work into debunking some
of these obesity studies and they
specifically did an episode where they
talk a lot about like choice
architecture and i'll link it down below
it's a really interesting lesson and i
highly recommend that you listen to it
but
i went and read the original study by dr
thorndyke and the original study
lacked a control group
and it only uses one study site they
don't do this kind of experiment in
multiple different locations they just
pick this one hospital cafeteria
where people already have a heightened
awareness of health wellness and this
notion of obesity that our society has
built around connecting health and
wellness together
from a scientific point of view this
study is kind of flawed like you don't
even have a control you only use one
study site and the study site that
you're using is kind of flawed to begin
with so it feels like you're using
a cherry pick study site to prove
something that you just wanted to
confirm you know what i mean like it's
not actually a very objective study but
james clare uses it to support like an
entire chapter's worth of like habit
forming systems and finally this is a
really nitpicky thing and it might just
be my ebook version
but
there's so
much self promo in this book at the end
of every chapter next to each concise
summary he always has like the oh go to
atomichabits.com to download a printable
version of this summary sheet or oh go
to atomichabits.com to download a cheat
sheet for establishing your habits
and i'm like
why would i want to go to your website
when i
bought the actual book and have the
ebook in my hands
and
and i just got so annoyed by seeing the
little oh visit atomichabits.com for
more visit atomichabits.com for more
visit atomichabits.com for more over and
over and over again it just gets very
repetitive and he already uses a lot of
repetitive writing
those are my thoughts on the book to me
this feels like
catnip for people in business school or
silicon valley i don't know if that
makes sense but it really just does feel
like that this is a self-help book
targeted towards middle to upper class
neurotypical people who want to stay
slim and who want to stay rich i could
honestly see like a corporate manager
recommending this to their employees in
order to be like oh you should benefit
the company and increase your
productivity and increase your output so
read this book it's really good for you
this is not a book that feels useful to
me personally and i'm a first-gen
low-income student
and as someone with a chronic illness
who struggles with body dysmorphia and a
history of like eating problems like
this is not a useful book for me
of course there are like little tidbits
here and there that i can take out of
their context and apply it to my life in
order to generate or build some sort of
his system or habit but as a whole this
is not a book that is very helpful to me
and i feel like it wouldn't be helpful
to my audience i don't know man i just
think this could have been a better
podcast episode or a better ted talk
than it could be
a book
it honestly just could have benefited
from a different form of presentation
and i think if you do decide to read
this book i think you should go into it
with a grain of salt i think i went into
this book with a lot of high
expectations since it came so highly
recommended by so many different people
and because it's such a popularized book
within like this productivity study
community that we have here on youtube
those expectations were not met and i
had a really terrible time reading this
i honestly regret buying the ebook but i
have it now and
at least the e-book was cheaper than
like the print copy of the book so
there's that let me know what you think
about this book if you've read it before
if you've heard of atomic habits and
james clear i would honestly love to
hear your thoughts on it like i am so
genuinely interested in it thank you so
much to my patrons for making content
creation possible for me if you'd like
to support me and my work then i'll
leave the link to my patreon down below
and again thank you so much for taking
the time to watch i really appreciate it
and i'll see you in the next video and
until then bye-bye
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