My Not So Helpful, Self-Help Addiction
And The Three Shortcomings of Self-Help
The Self-Help section at the bookstore used to be my refuge. A place where I traveled to keep myself afloat from a downward mental health spiral. Mesmerized by their clever titles and harsh language, the books told me to “hang tight, read first, I can solve my own issues.”
My life was going through a series of rapid changes that brought on anxiety and sadness. My motivation in certain activities dimmed, and I lost a sense of belonging. There was a dragging weight in my step, and I needed something to take negative emotions away. I turned to the world of Self-Help, buying books, following Instagram accounts, and listening to motivational speakers online. Unexpectedly I fell to a new spiral that failed at fulfilling the one thing it promised me.
The words were what I needed to hear. It felt nice to find a quote that exemplified what I was going through, and suddenly I didn’t feel so alone in my problem. Self-Help had a beneficial way of reframing my issues in a broad sense. I shared quotes that resonated, wrote all over my books, and sat through youtube videos preaching similar ideas. It felt nice, and it sounded nice, but it was transient, whereas my negative emotions felt endless.
The next day, my troubling thoughts and feelings would return, and I found myself repeating my Self-Help search. Further entrapping myself in this strange cycle, the phrase “self-help” lost its meaning. Looking back on it today, I see the shortcomings of Self-Help that kept me from finding an answer to my problems.
Sympathy vs. Empathy
I should let you know now that this story ends with me entering therapy, but that has mostly to do with the distinction between sympathy and empathy. The Self-Help material I went through did a great job of agreeing with my pain, but what I needed was for it to understand my pain.
Understanding and agreeing tend to be differentiated by listening. In essence, the material became like my friends, directing me to go out to the bars after a breakup when what I needed was for them to sit with me during the pain.
And of course, no books, quotes, or videos can do that because they can’t hear me. Self-Help made vast generalizations about what I could be going through without really hitting the mark. Unfortunately, this lack of connection prevented me from ever feeling understood. It led me to continually search for more within the depths of Self-Help, hoping that someone somewhere recognized my suffering.
Advice, Advice, Advice!
I ended up falling through a rabbit hole of contradictory advice. For example, I could spend a week reading about how I need to replace negative feelings with positive ones. A few readings would explain that my pain was not all that bad in retrospect to others who have more issues. And thus, by discrediting my own suffering with this newfound worldview on pain, I should feel better. No surprise that didn’t work and the next material I would move to would say to experience negative emotions, not push them out. Essentially making my previous attempt feel like a waste of time.
Frustrated and exhausted, I lost hope in countless articles and books, trying to tell me what to do. I know now that I did stumble across good advice, but the process of getting to that pot of gold devalued the help. Without any guide, finding useful information in the world of Self-Help is like maneuvering through an intricate maze.
Empty Platitudes
By definition, a platitude means, “a flat, dull, or trite remark, especially one uttered as if it were fresh or profound.” And my god, Self-Help, is FILLED with platitudes. Phrases that are similar to the ones pictured above, there seems to be a belief within the Self-Help community that they work.
I began to follow accounts on Instagram that prioritized mental health and wellness, hoping to find useful information. Eventually, my entire feed began to fill up with all sorts of common sayings. People would tie stories of recovery to these sayings and turn the platitudes into reasons for their success.
And yes, there were days in my journey of mental health recovery where these sayings were pleasant to hear. But what continued to confuse me was seeing material that used platitudes as the base of their recipe for improvement. “Difficult roads lead to beautiful destinations” sounds great when all is well, but when times were distressing, a one-liner couldn’t pull me out of my pain.
When Self-Help Became Helpful
Self-Help sold me on the idea that I could fix myself. So inevitably, if I didn’t feel fixed after one book, I thought, “I just need to buy another one.” The idea of “self-help” placed pressure to treat myself, and every failed attempt led to feelings of shame on top of my issues. With every new book in my hand, what I was unable to realize was that if I could fix myself, I wouldn’t need someone else’s words to do so.
After all the difficulty I had trying to cure myself, I finally decided to see a therapist for my issues. Through the process of recovery, we turned my frustrations with the genre of Self-Help into a useful tool that aided treatment. I found that with the guide of a therapist, the Self-Help material served as a great compliment to the work we did and motivated me to accomplish my goals. The words felt less empty because I had a relationship with a therapist who could empathize with me in a way that the books alone couldn’t do. We were able to sort through the barrage of advice and point out what actually would work for me. And as for the platitudes, my opinion of them never changed. And my therapist seemed to agree; they acted as the cherry on top to a good day, not my savior on a bad day.
