I’ve recently had to move back to my parents and— because I have this habit of buying more books than I read— I can’t fit all of my books on my new bookcase. So, I was tasked with picking about 100 books to have dotted around the place. Of the books I have in my room, there’s only one book you might consider to be self-help (Chatter by Ethan Kross).
Which is quite the contrast to when I first started reading regularly. 1 in every 2/3 books I read would be self-help. I was obsessed with becoming, self-actualizing, and feeding the perfectionist in me. But, I’ve come to understand that— speaking generally— the self-help industry is not the savior I once thought it to be.
I’ve read so many books that have given me vague instructions on how to live fully, how to respond to hardships and how to counter ill mental health, among other tasty promises, that I was left confused and in a cycle of self-blame when my mental health took another turn for the worse towards the end of last year.
You’d be confused too if you had been given tools to fix a problem, and then you found that the tools were actually made out of shit, and didn’t work as intended. You might also be inclined to blame yourself if you’d been told/promised that the tools and methods worked for so many other people.
It’s not a very nice place to be, and I know I’m not the only one to have read a bunch of self-help and felt like this.
So, just to update those I’ve dragged with me on the exhausting and never-ending road to self-actualization, I thought I’d write a quick list of a few ways I’ve become disillusioned with the self-help industry before I put together a longer-form podcast. Mainly because…
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1. I don’t want to be happiness-obsessed
As part of your deal of some time on earth, you get some suffering. You don’t get to choose the flavour, but you’ll get some— probably quite a bit! People have known this for years, but it seems around the early 2000s when the Positive psychology movement took off society had had enough—we’re just not content if we’re not happy.
We lean towards pathologizing functional human emotions as opposed to accepting them as part of the deal. And there are thousands of books out there claiming to help you become a happier, better version of yourself— an insulting concept when you think about it hard enough— and they are flying off the shelves.
Let’s take someone I’ve spoken to for A Need To Read, and look at what it says on the author of Solve for Happy, Mo Gawdat’s website— “Through his 12-year research on the topic of happiness, he created an algorithm and a repeatable well-engineered model to reach a state of uninterrupted happiness regardless of the circumstances of life.”
‘Uninterrupted happiness’, eh? I’ll go out on a limb and say that’s impossible. It cannot just be me that thinks that. Feeding people, the idea that it isn’t is— in my opinion— insensitive, inconsiderate, and shows either a lack of critical thinking or willful ignorance.
Sometimes, you will have the right to think your life is a bit shit. You do not need to feel shame about that, or believe there is a moral failing on your part because you can’t bring yourself to be happy.
2. I don’t want to be self-obsessed
The best way I can explain this is with a little game. So, let’s compare two completely made-up books and consider which one might sell more.
You Can Be Successful Like Me: 10 things you can do by yourself for you, to help you become a better you! By Iona Yacht
or
Don’t buy this book; go play with your friends! By Edwina Lot
Obviously, Iona Yacht’s book would sell more copies. Title aside, no one wants to hear that nurturing deeper— stronger—relationships with the people around you will do more for your mental health than any of the latest fads.
Sometimes I wonder if our obsession with doing something ourselves, working on, or making something of ourselves, is a way of avoiding having to admit that our reliance on others is not only there and very real, but quite necessary. It seems to me that self-help books miss this key part of being human, and tend to guide you towards focusing more on yourself as an individual, as opposed to your bonds with others.
Set some boundaries and focus on yourself, hun!
Self-help is sneaky, it nurtures self-obsession and ignores the benefits of the collective. And to be very specific, they are purposefully leaving out the plethora of data supporting how much your relationships impact your wellbeing. Which is kind of funny when you think about it. The help you need might not be self-help, it might require you to be a little more other-orientated.
To caveat this, I’m sure there are quite a lot of people out there who have diagnosed themselves as people-pleasers actively fighting that urge to please the people. But— if I was a gambling man— I’d bet they’re fewer in number than you think.
3. Self-help is an industry that needs repeat customers
Maybe you’ve noticed that self-help authors will often have a bolt-on-book— something they forgot to say! I know that authors don’t get a great deal of the RRP, but some people really have been taking the piss. Take Rhonda Byrne— the author of The Secret, for example, she’s released an additional 7 books since her first. Which begs the question, how big is this secret?
The Secret is obviously a cheap example of a blatantly pseudo-scientific book. But there are plenty of authors who just can’t stop themselves from missing out on key information in their apparently life-changing books, leaving scope for the next one.
It sounds awfully conspiratorial, but the self-help industry is set to sit at a valuation of around $14 billion by 2025. In a world that fetishizes profit we can expect this to keep getting worse and worse.
I have to say: I can’t rule out changing my mind on this again in the future, but as it stands I feel quite strongly about this, and the ideas will no doubt develop over time. Off the top of my head, there are at least 5 more reasons why I’m becoming disillusioned with the self-help industry, and I’m going to have to put them out in a podcast format. Because I’ve spent far too long avoiding writing this piece, I have to publish something, or I’ll never be able to write about the ideas I’ve had to put aside recently in the name of writing-but-not-actually-writing this.
It’s been a while since I’ve felt such resistance/writer’s block/whateveryouwannacallit, so, thanks for bearing with me. From now, I’ll be writing more regularly about topics you might be curious to know about.
I’d love to hear if you reached a similar stage with self-help, or if you disagree at all. Either start off a discussion in the comments or email me at: hello@aneedtoread.co.uk
love
you
bye
Ed x
P.s Siobhan O’Hagan came back on to the podcast for the third time recently. We chatted about the issues I now have with self-help and got her to take on it too. It’s a very different podcast to the first one we did— I think you’ll enjoy it.
Please leave a review if you like it, it takes 2 seconds and gives ‘big name’ (vom) guests the illusion that I’m a podcasting hero.
Also, these are some of the books that have helped change my mind on self-help, and the idea of self-actualization as a goal. I’ll speak at length about them all in the podcast.
The Antidote & Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman
Selfie by Will Storr
Manufacturing Happy Citizens by Edgar Cabanas & Eva Illouz
Sedated by James Davies
And this is a bit of a curve ball: I think everyone should read A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Seeing happiness as a self-evident good is a dangerous game, and A Brave New World highlights this really well.
"Sometimes I wonder if our obsession with doing something ourselves, working on, or making something of ourselves, is a way of avoiding having to admit that our reliance on others is not only there and very real, but quite necessary. It seems to me that self-help books miss this key part of being human, and tend to guide you towards focusing more on yourself as an individual, as opposed to your bonds with others." - nail on the head. The industry is saturated with narcissists bastardising spiritual practices to feed and justify self obsession while twisting aspects of ancient philosophies ("all experience is internal" / "it's not what happens to us but how we respond to it that determines our wellbeing") to excuse them of any hurt or harm they might cause others. I guess it should be no surprise that any industry with the word "self" in it would attract such characters...