“The Man Who Wanted to Be Happy” written by Laurent Gounelle is a story about the limits, those ones that we impose to ourselves, a novel that although short will force you to think.Main character Julian is currently in Bali, enjoying the last days of vacation. He will decide to visit the renowned healer and master Samtyang, not knowing how much this encounter will radically change his life views... Julian is a teacher who lives an average life, considering himself the average, not very attractive man. He thinks that it's smarter to do the job that does not really satisfy him than to dare trying to fulfill a lifelong dream...Always convinced that he is simply out of luck, for Julian is hard to accept the fact that everything he experienced in his life is result of his beliefs or disbeliefs. Master Samtyang will impress him with his teachings based on the Hindu and Christian philosophy, he will teach him that renunciation is necessary step towards happiness, warning him about the importance of the spiritual, but also about the dangers that material things brings. After each visit, Julian will get a couple of tasks to be fulfilled, and when he will visit his teacher for the last time, only a letter will be wait for him...A novel “The Man Who Wanted to Be Happy” was not without reason became the world's bestseller. The author powerfully and directly spoke through Samtyang to all the people who reasons for their uncertainty, weaknesses and inertia are seeking in others, attributing own failures to the unlucky stars while allowing others to determine the boundaries of their lives.An interesting fact is that the author didn’t go too deep into the characterization of main protagonists, due to his insisting on the importance of issues that these two major characters are discussing. However, some readers might consider this as a novel flaw and also could be a bit disappointed with not so large number of novel pages, as opposed to important issues that novel brought.So, will you read this novel or not, the decision is entirely up to you, but even without reading everyone should remember that the only limitations that exist are those we impose to ourselves... The Man Who Wanted to be Happy is a self-help book built around a story. The story is that of Julian who is a school teacher on holiday in Bali. He hears of a healer and goes for a check-up. Whilst there the healer, Samtyang, diagnoses Julian's problem - he is unhappy.From there Julian is taken on a journey with the healer/wiseman where many things are revealed to him. And Julian laps it up across several visits on several days of his holiday.Samtyang reiterates ideas that are already widely known, e.g. you are what you believe, and to achieve your goals you need to set out in detail the steps needed to get there. But there is other stuff in there you might not know.For me the two best bits were one part where Julian is tasked with getting five people to say no to his requests. He struggles to do it though because each person he approaches refuses to give an outright no and instead try to help with his request, no matter how absurd. The other best bit was where Julian talked about how he was bad at something because he had done it once and it had not gone well. Samtyang talked about a baby taking his first steps as he learned to walk, and how he would fail time and time again, but his parents encouraged him and the baby becomes an expert walker.Lastly to get the most from this book you need to read it slowly to digest it, and do it at the same time, e.g. Julian has to write out some lists along the way, and that was something I couldn't do at the time on the train with all the other commuters giving me the beady eye (although Samtyang would probably have some words of wisdom about that ...).The book reminded me a bit of The Richest Man in Babylon which was a book with some simple stories with messages to do with money management, except not as good in my eyes (and on a different topic) but it's short and easy to read along with.
Do You like book Mutlu Olmak İsteyen Adam (2008)?
"Nous sommes ce que nous pensons. Avec nos pensees, nous batissons notre monde"
—Madi
I found this book terrible. The story is boring and the writing shocking.
—madam_red1234
sympa à lire, leger.. et pourtant profond. un zest déconcertant !
—waveshaker
