Life and How to Live It

Begin the Begin

In a city built on survival, one young boy learns the cost of staying alive—and what it takes to finally start living.

Philadelphia in the 1980s was no place for the soft-hearted. For Chaz Holesworth, childhood meant dodging gangs, addiction, and silence after slammed doors. His father’s world ran on heroin, his mother’s on holy fear.

Caught between two extremes, sin and salvation, Chaz learned early on how to disappear: keep your head down, don’t ask questions, and pray someone notices you anyway.

But everything changed the day he discovered music. In R.E.M., Tori Amos, and Nirvana, he hears something no sermon ever offered: truth, raw and imperfect. As his home life spiraled and his faith fractured, those lyrics became lifelines, every note pulling him closer to the one thing he never had: his own identity.

What happens when the noise outside becomes louder than the voice inside?

Or when loyalty to broken people starts to break you too?

Unflinching and darkly funny, Life and How to Live It: Volume One is more than a coming-of-age memoir: It’s a portrait of grit, grief, poverty, and the fragile beauty of hope born from chaos. Chaz Holesworth’s story captures the pulse of Philadelphia’s rough-edged streets and the soundtrack that kept him alive as he battled lost faith, family dysfunction, and his father’s addiction.

For anyone who’s ever grown up in the wreckage of someone else’s choices, Chaz’s story is proof that you can still build something beautiful from the debris.

Didnt know I'd love it this much!

At first, it seemed a boring listen, but all that changed as J got deeper into it. To give a gust of what the book's about, the title probably speaks for itself. The author likens life to a journey filled with unpredictable turns, a central metaphor that underpins the entire narrative. In my opinion, it’s more like an exploration of what it means to be alive, stitched with musings on identity, emotion, choices, and that are persistent, sometimes exhausting, quest for purpose. That entire framing stuck with me-just about observing life, being inside it, and actively shaping it while also surrendering to the unknowns. I enjoyed it mostly, hence the excellent rating, only that during longer reflections on choice and morality, I wished for something more grounded-a story, a scene, a face, just something to bring the ideas down to earth, even for a paragraph. Now that I think think of it, maybe that absence is part of the invitation. I’m not sure, but I got the sense the author wanted the reader to do some work. To think for themselves, which is thrilling in a way, Would I recommend it? Of course. I read the ebook too and can't resist another read/listen.