Why Self-Help Books are Overrated

thank you [Music] okay look I know what you're saying you're saying you don't understand Mark you don't get it this book changed my life hell your [ __ ] book changed my life look I've got books I love too okay now sure self-help books can help but I think people mistake what they're actually doing so let's start with a point that is kind of obvious to self-help critics but not so obvious to those of us who are into these types of books and that's this that there is nothing new really being said in any of them sorry maybe you should have you know put a big trigger warning on that but let's be real there's nothing new in self-help and I'll prove it here's a question what was self-help called before it was self-help give up religion philosophy most of the advice that we're all consuming when we buy these books whether it's on how to be more compassionate less anxious more humble and grounded more productive more honest and vulnerable these things had been covered for thousands of [ __ ] years from Buddha and Jesus to Plato and Seneca to Adam Smith and Benjamin [ __ ] Franklin tinichi and Freud pretty much nothing you find on a self-help shelf is new and that's fine because what does change and what does matter is the packaging that might sound a little bit disparaging but packaging it turns out is incredibly important that's because humans are weird with advice let me ask you this how many times in your life have your parents told you to do something and you completely ignored them and in like three months later your friend tells you to do the exact same thing and you're like oh my God that's [ __ ] brilliant see our receptivity to ideas and advice largely has to do with the context in which we receive it who is giving the advice how we're feeling when we receive the advice and yes how the advice is framed and explained some people want to feel like they're receiving advice from an authority like a doctor or Professor or preacher some people want to feel like they're receiving advice from a friend another person who's just as [ __ ] up as they are but has lived through it to tell about it you know like this guy some people want to feel like they're receiving advice from some ancient wisdom whether it's an old dead Greek guy or some shamanic lore passed down through the ages or a guru spend his whole life meditating in the Himalayas some people want to feel like they're receiving it from the future some people want to feel like they're receiving it from the past some people want to feel like they're receiving it from someone famous some people want to feel like they're receiving it from God self-help exists not because this information isn't already out there it just hasn't been evenly distributed by repackaging Timeless wisdom and basic human knowledge these ideas can get distributed to more people than ever before now here's the most important point and if you get anything from this video it should be this self-help ideas are what I call simple but difficult I.E they are easy to understand but really [ __ ] difficult to actually go do now this is the complete opposite of most other hard things in life studying for a biology exam is not simple it's actually very complex but the physical act of sitting down and opening a book is quite easy figuring out how to cook a gourmet meal is not simple it's very complicated has a lot of different steps but the physical act of actually doing it is not that hard it's easy self-help is inverted in this way breaking up with your partner is actually really really simple you literally just say I don't want to be with you anymore but holy [ __ ] [ __ ] is it difficult who knew eight words could be so impossible similarly dealing with a panic attack is technically be quite simple you just breathe but for whatever reason in that moment it is unbelievably difficult to actually do it or let's take the mother of all self-improvement goals losing weight it's not [ __ ] rocket science you eat some vegetables you lift the weight you go for a run yet pretty much none of us do it regularly this is because self-help problems are not intellectual problems like studying for an exam or physical problems like figuring out how to cook food they are emotional problems and emotional problems tend to appear extremely simple on the outside like just eat a [ __ ] vegetable but on the inside it feels like we're climbing Mount Everest this is where the packaging of self-help comes in the way ideas are packaged can do a lot to alleviate the emotional difficulty of these problems in the short run take Victor Frankel's book man search for meaning maybe my favorite self-help book of all time if you're being objective it doesn't really say anything new the entire book can basically be boiled down to the famous Nietzsche quote a man who has a why can bear almost any how nichi's quip is similarly just a regurgitation of Aristotle's beliefs around eudaimonia that happiness can only be achieved when we're serving some higher purpose that's an idea that goes back 2500 years and is one of the foundational ideas of the nicomachian ethics a book that is so boring about as fun as eating a plate of glass but Franco oh sure he's saying the same thing but this dude lived through the [ __ ] Holocaust his whole family died and he came out the other end and still thrived that is nuts that is some crazy powerful packaging you read that book and you start thinking oh my God what excuse do I have and that's great that's some really really really good stuff for a while because here's the thing that ability to lean into emotionally difficult things to push your comfort zone it's a skill we have to develop it over time and while a book can give you a burst of motivation to lean into that difficulty in the short term it can't do it for you in the long term you can't magically get that skill from a book or a seminar or hell even a video like this you have to go and do it yourself so that first great self-help book is amazing it's wonderful it's life-changing give you the courage to to go do X Y and Z and blah blah blah and great your Life's Been Changed forever then life gets tough again and you need to learn something else that's simple but difficult so you read another book and it helps a little for a bit so maybe you need to go back and read your favorite book again and that helps just a little but not as much as you'd like it to not as much as the first time so then you get on YouTube and you watch some [ __ ] videos about book recommendations and buy a dozen more books and this is where self-help books can actually start to suck and the reason is learning can feel like progress even when it's not progress and I say that again for everybody sitting in the back learning can feel like progress even when it's not progress like I can read a dozen books about nutrition and feel like I'm focusing on improving my health while eating a pizza and drinking a beer this is what I see time and time again with people in the self-help space they begin to use learning as a replacement for doing they keep thinking well maybe the next book will make this simple but difficult thing feel less difficult and it doesn't so they try another book and another and another and on and on it goes Market Research in this industry finds that on average a person who buys one self-help book will end up buying seven more and that's on average if self-help books worked you wouldn't need a dozen [ __ ] books you just need the one so while self-help starts out as a solution it can quickly become another part of the problem another way to avoid our struggles instead of actually dealing with them by the way this is why I built a bunch of courses based on practical real world exercises instead of just me yammering and yammering for dozens of hours and this is why most people would rather read a book than actually do those exercises this is also why I'd like to eventually move this channel into more Activity real world based videos rather than just just simply talking to you because while talking is great and sharing ideas is great it doesn't necessarily help you do anything or if it does it can only help for so long so that is going to be my goal for 2023 to reinvent the personal development genre on YouTube a bit to challenge you guys and challenge myself to do more to actually get out and do [ __ ] so stick around things are going to get a little bit spicy around here but that's where the best breakthroughs happen right foreign [Music]

Channel: Mark Manson

Views: 1,244,545

Keywords: mark manson, markmanson, self help books, self help, self improvement, clark kegley, book recommendations, life changing books, books that will change your life, self help books are a waste of time, self help books summary, best self improvement books, self-help books, best books, why self help books are useless, best self development books, self help books to read, self help videos, self help books audio, best self help books of all time, self help motivation

Id: hQB3viVFhPA

Length: 9min 7sec (547 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 28 2023