Why I keep reading self-help books
Last year I advocated an idea I called Dangerous Reading. In a nutshell, I suggested we read books outside our comfort zones in order to prevent our psychic lives from becoming stale. I still believe this is a valuable practice and now about 25% of the books I read are outside my normal pattern. Well, apparently that’s not enough because now my wife wants to know why I read so many self-help books. She pointed out that, after all, I’d once said that if you’ve read one self-help book, you’ve pretty much read them all. And yet I keep buying them. Keep reading them. And can’t get enough of them. Now, she wants to know why.
Well, not that it’s any of her business (please don’t tell her I said that), but here’s the reason:
Being exposed to powerful ideas isn’t enough to change our lives. Understanding powerful ideas isn’t enough to change our lives. Even applying powerful ideas isn’t enough to change our lives. In order to change our lives we must become - and remain - absolutely convinced of these ideas. And since it seems that everywhere else I turn I’m inundated with negative, doom and gloom pictures of life, I intentionally keep returning to the one source I know will keep me focused on what’s possible. And that’s self-help material.
So that’s why I keep reading these books. Not necessarily to learn new ideas, but to become more and more convinced that life can be more than what most people would have us believe.
It makes sense to me. Now I just have to run it by my wife - not that I owe her an explanation, mind you. But because that’s just the kind of guy I am.
Posted on Wednesday, January 04, 2006 at 01:19 PM
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(6) Reader Comments about Why I keep reading self-help books
John Lundholm says...
I love your comments on what it take change our lives. I’m a self-help book junkie as well and it is rare that I read a new idea. It’s not newness that changes us, it is the truth (the truth we create in our minds that is.)
J. Lundholm
http://hypnotic-realities.blogspot.com/Posted on 01/04/2006 at 04:15 PM
John Thomas says...
Someone once said, “Where you will be in five years is determined by the books you read, the tapes you listen to (or videos you watch) and the people you hang around with.”
I think they were right.
Posted on 01/04/2006 at 04:37 PM
Bob Collier says...
I’ve had that from MY wife for years! And my explanation is about the same - I have to have these people in my life constantly reminding me of what’s possible, because most of the people I meet every day don’t even know.
Thanks for the backup!
Posted on 01/04/2006 at 09:27 PM
Douglas Titchmarsh says...
Gotta go with the general consensus and say that I also buy a lot of self help books for the same reason as already stated. Affirmation, confirmation and purely to keep reminding me to think bigger, and better.
Posted on 01/05/2006 at 12:47 PM
Blair Warren says...
I think there’s a big difference between turning to these books for “answers” and turning to them for inspiration. When I was much younger, I expected them to give me the solutions to life’s problems. They rarely did. Now, I only ask that they remind me that there *are* solutions to life’s problems. And in that, they never fail me.
Posted on 01/05/2006 at 01:04 PM
Shreeram Balijepalli says...
Dear Blair,
I think what you say is true. I keep my house stacked with many self-help books from Napoleon Hill to Tao Te Ching.
Sometimes I do not get the time to read all but just the feeling of being surrounded by such self-help classics helps…
Infact the above idea was said in one self-help classic--The Success principle by Jack Canfield.
!!!!!!!!Shreeram
Posted on 01/07/2006 at 07:56 AM
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