You Read Too Much Self-Help

Something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately is how there is a class of people (including me) who seem to spend a lot of time reading the latest self-help books and articles but who, for one reason or another, seem consistently to fail in getting the outcomes we’re looking for.

If you’re not one of these people, you’ve certainly met them. They include the budding entrepreneur who’s hellbent on making his first startup a $100M venture-backed unicorn, the new mother who is determined to be the best mother she can be and has a bookshelf full of parenting books from the library to prove it, and the slightly-overweight-to-obese friend who has watched every YouTube video on dieting in history but still can’t keep the weight off.

There are some categories of self-help for which I only bought a handful of books, found what I needed, and let the rest go. Minimalism is a great example; after reading ten or fifteen books on minimalism, I concluded they all said basically the same thing and that I’d read all I needed to. For weightlifting and exercise, I’ve got a few books by a personal trainer I love and that’s it. For dealing with my panic disorder, it only took one book for me to put an end to panic attacks. I read the self-help I needed, I helped myself, and that was the end of that.

For some other categories, I can’t seem to consume enough. My bookshelves, both digital and physical, are filled with listings about the mindsets of the wealthy, theological and spiritual tomes on what makes a meaningful life, and books about making a living doing what you love. I’ve read so many things on these topics that I’m often able to tell you not only what was popular now, but everything that’s been popular between now and the 70’s. Yet still, I struggle with these. What gives?

I often say the solution to every problem always lies somewhere in a book— and it does — but sometimes I keep reading books even after I’ve found the solution for my problem because I hope an easier solution will miraculously show up.

This isn’t just wishful thinking on my part. I feel that way because sometimes, it has shown up. A new perspective, additional background information, or informative research has sometimes made it easier to do what I already knew needed to be done. But that only happens for new challenges. When it comes to things I’m thoroughly educated on by this point, such as small business ownership and the grit required to be successful, I can read 15 books all in a row and learn nothing but fluff.

Reading self-help and trying to find the tactic that will finally solve all your problems is a great way to avoid doing the sometimes brutal work of just solving your own problems.

It’s time for me to stop reading and time to start doing. But I don’t. Instead, I loaf around and stoke a feeling of being stressed. I wouldn’t be stressed if I did what I needed to. But still, I don’t.

Even writing this article, a thoughtful discussion on why anyone avoids doing things they know they need to do, is a stand-in as well. I want to publish more thoughtful articles, but I need to write some Kindle books. It’s a classic case of doing work to avoid doing work. After all, who among us has not cleaned the entire house top to bottom to avoid doing work?

This entire article was inspired by an Alan Watts essay. His point may not make sense for those who don’t understand the underpinnings of Buddhism, but for those who do, he makes a brilliant point:

“For I am inclined to feel that for most Westerners, (Asian meditation techniques) are not aids but obstacles to concentration. (True concentration is supposed to be natural, but) it is not unaffected and natural for us to assume the lotus posture and go through all sorts of spiritual gymnastics. So many Westerners who do this kind of thing are so self-conscious about it, so preoccupied with the idea of doing it that they never really do it at all… If, however, you can really do the thing itself — that is, if you can learn to wake up and concentrate at the drop of a hat — you can take or leave the trimmings as you will.”

The Finger And The Moon, from Become What You Are by Alan Watts

Reading this passage, it became immediately clear to me this was true not only of the Asian schools of Buddhism, but of self-help as well. The point of reading self-help is to learn how to do a particular kind of thing; if you can do the thing itself, the particulars of how it gets done are irrelevant. If you can’t, then they are irrelevant as well.

This whole article may read like an injunction to “just do it.” It’s not. I’ve never liked when people tell me to “just do things“ because when I refuse to do something, there’s always a reason, even if I’m not consciously aware of it at the time.

“Just doing it,” otherwise known as mindlessly crashing through resistance, may make me feel macho, but it also sets up deep psychological tension that comes up decades later in the form of a mid-life crisis.

Instead, I’m thinking more about the idea of mindful productivity. Instead of crashing through my resistance, I’d like to mindfully attend to my own actions. When I make a futile effort to read yet another self-help book, I gently remind myself the true path to my goals at this point lies in creative action, and that for me, anything else is a distraction.

If I’m just distracting myself, I usually add, I might as well go play video games.

At some point, you’ve got to stop reading self-help and just help yourself.

I can’t tell you how to do this because, as this whole article is saying, there is eventually a point where we need to stop searching for a clever answer and just sit down and do the work. You already know whatever you’re hoping to read at this point, so pretend you just read that, and then put down this article and get back to real life. I will too.

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