# Self-help Books?



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Do you enjoy reading Self-Help Books? Do you act on what you've read? Or do you think they're just harmless fun - or maybe, 'pernicious nonsense'? 

Which ones have you read? Are there any that you'd recommend? Or any that you'd like to warn others against?

Just interested...


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I love getting Self-Help Books out of the library, and I have benefited from reading books about mindfulness & happiness - unfortunately I can't remember the titles, as my mind went awol a short time afterwards. I read that 'Men are from Mars' book too, and quite enjoyed it.

I will go on reading these books because they're always enticing - but what I generally find, particularly with the American ones (sorry, sorry), is that they have a good idea and it's really readable for the first third of the book, but after that it becomes padded and repetitious. And I never do the Exercises that they set (too much like hard work), though the quizzes are quite entertaining.

It has almost never seemed worth my while to buy any of these books, though I do have a copy of the Old Age guide for carers, 'Now Where Did I Put My Glasses?' - a satirical cry that now goes up several times a day in the Taggart Household.

Here's an article on Self-Help Books which has piqued my interest - I shall get my Research Assistant to track down the titles at our local library. 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/health/how-to-navigate-the-world-of-self-help-books/


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

In the words of Roger Ebert:


> An honest bookstore would post the following sign above its 'self-help' section: 'For true self-help, please visit our philosophy, literature, history and science sections, find yourself a good book, read it, and think about it.'


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Good money-makers - I'm thinking of writing one.:tiphat:


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## Belowpar (Jan 14, 2015)

I have read several over the years and they all seem to come down to If you are more ambitious than you’ve shown so far in your life, and get a lot more focussed you should do more of the things you know you should anyway.

My interest has been on specific areas I feel I need help with. Not sure if these are entirely ‘self-help’ books but I would recommend the following and have even given a few out to our staff if I think it will help them with a specific problem. Only one has come back to indicate they’d read it. The books do overlap a bit as I seem to have developed most interest in one area. 

Dale Carnegie How to make friends and influence people. 
You do want to get on with people better don’t you? I’ll save you time. LISTEN, really LISTEN before you speak. Its’s that easy and I must start doing it. (Seriously there’s a reason why it’s never out of print)


I’m OK, You’re OK. Explains how we interact and how we always seem to get into the same way of communicating with the same people. I.E. it’s not just you.
This is the one where someone I’d given a copy to, came back to me. I persuaded him that if he stopped calling me Sir, we would be on a more equal footing and the benefit to him was that I’d likely listen better to what he had to say. It was all explained in the book. He read (bits of) it and we talked about his Military Father who completely dominated him (CP in the lingo) growing up. He still has difficulty seeing that he becomes overly (AC) deferential to anyone he sees as having any authority. Of course he very politely and effusively thanks me for giving him the book. One positive result: he no longer calls me Sir. Only the sarcastic ones do now.



The Chimp Paradox by Steve Peters. I heard about him from athletes he’s helped excel. Chris Hoy, Padraig Harrington etc. and as I said in a recent post I overheard two student for the Royal College of Music saying they’d had lectures on it.
The question I have often asked myself is why I hold myself back? Why don’t I achieve more of the things I’m capable of? Peters has produced an easy to understand (layman’s) model of how one’s brain works. The conflicting thigs that we want at the same time. To understand where the competition for short term thinking and more important objectives fight to control us. I make it sound dull but it’s not. If you buy just one book….

I also read an excellent book on Willpower. Like mood this is about choices we make. Can look it up if anyone’s interested.

I’m not really looking for more at the moment and hope to return to these to learn the lessons better.
All four have helped me at least understand what I’m not very good at. As a minimum I would say I’m less ready to offer my opinion unless I’m asked for it, but of course reading my posts on here you must wonder about that….

Enjoy.


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## Cosmos (Jun 28, 2013)

I don't read many. But I did discover one, taking a class that focused on the American cultural idea of "self-making"

Malcolm Gladwell - David and Goliath

This book is about breaking down [what he believes is] the misconception of "underdogs". He uses a lot of case studies where the "underdog" win and deconstructs the scenarios to show that they had the advantage all along. He mentions:
- David and Goliath, where David was a skilled stone thrower, and versus a hulking giant that only fights close range, of course he would win,
- The Impressionists, how Monet, Manet, Cezanne, Degas couldn't get their works in the big uppity Paris conservatory, so they opened their own smaller scale art shows [even though the conservatory was so big, the chances of getting discovered there were extraordinarily slim]
- A girl's basketball team who could barely dribble, but they played a strong defense and won time and time again with small scores

The main message was to look at situations from different angles, and recognize that it is possible that the difficult task in front of you can be beaten if you know your strengths


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

I suspect these may be like diet books in that (a) if you're a complete mess, then practically any advice/diet plan will cause improvement, and (b) some people fall in love with a new plan every few years (what happened to the old one?).


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Great money makers. I'd write one called _Self-Help: How to live with yourself_ to do with coming to terms with the fact you _can't _help yourself. :tiphat:


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

I have not read many at all. I recall having read parts of some books. I find it interesting to read but I tend not to act on them. They do make a good read however.


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## Gaspard de la Nuit (Oct 20, 2014)

My favorite books in that regard are Serge Kahili King's.......Urban Shaman, Mastering Your Hidden Self and Imagineering for Health have helped get me through the last few years.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I am interested in Caroline Arnold's *Small Move, Big Chang*e as it appeals to me to achieve small behavioural changes (_microresolutions_) - which I want to do not so that I become an orderly person, but so that I have more time to do worthwhile things, instead of just drifting.

I've been listening to her lecture on the internet, and it is compelling - she is very 'simpatica'. 
http://www.goodreads.com/videos/92507-caroline-l-arnold-at-microsoft-headquarters

Of course, one of the small changes might be *not starting silly threads on TC*! :lol:

However, she isn't right in saying that it's pointless making grand New Year's Resolutions. Making a NYR was the way that Taggart managed to stop smoking in 1984. :tiphat:


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

Stranded in a musical wilderness for 24 hours a few years back I picked up the singer Sheila Chandra's book 'Banish clutter forever: how the toothbrush principle will change your life.' I was fascinated by it, and consumed it in a single sitting.

I loved the bossy tone of the book, and the permission to throw out things that you may need in future and have to repurchase up to a value of 10% of the disposed items. I wondered about how she got the figure of 10%, why wasn't it 15% or 5%, surely that should merit some discussion.

It must have made an impression on me, because I still remember the main principle of the book; if you haven't used something for a while you _must_ chuck it out unless you have a firm plan to use it in the very near future.

I live my life in utter defiance of Sheila Chandra's dictum, although I would imagine if she was to come to my house one day I'd be instructed to throw out the vast majority of my possessions and it would be very hard to resist her stern and overbearing persona.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Wood said:


> Stranded in a musical wilderness for 24 hours a few years back I picked up the singer Sheila Chandra's book 'Banish clutter forever: how the toothbrush principle will change your life.' I was fascinated by it, and consumed it in a single sitting.
> 
> I loved the bossy tone of the book, and the permission to throw out things that you may need in future and have to repurchase up to a value of 10% of the disposed items. I wondered about how she got the figure of 10%, why wasn't it 15% or 5%, surely that should merit some discussion.
> 
> ...


My motto to, without reading the book :tiphat:


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Wood said:


> Stranded in a musical wilderness for 24 hours a few years back I picked up the singer Sheila Chandra's book 'Banish clutter forever: how the toothbrush principle will change your life.' I was fascinated by it, and consumed it in a single sitting.
> 
> I loved the bossy tone of the book, and the permission to throw out things that you may need in future and have to repurchase up to a value of 10% of the disposed items. I wondered about how she got the figure of 10%, why wasn't it 15% or 5%, surely that should merit some discussion.
> 
> ...


I've found that the best way to find a use for something that's been sitting around unused for a long time is to throw it away a week earlier.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Nereffid said:


> I've found that the best way to find a use for something that's been sitting around unused for a long time is to throw it away a week earlier.


Brilliant! :tiphat:

My fiddle teacher says that his top self-help book is 'Families and how to survive them' by Robin Skynner and John Cleese.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Families_and_How_to_Survive_Them

I like John Cleese as a comic actor, but not as a commentator on life. So I can't say that I fancy this book much.

But has anyone on TC read it? I may be wrong - convince me to try it!


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## TresPicos (Mar 21, 2009)

I used to enjoy self-help books, until I realized that I never incorporate all that good advice into my daily life. Until I find ways to do that, reading more books feels like a waste of time.


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

Ingélou said:


> Brilliant! :tiphat:
> 
> My fiddle teacher says that his top self-help book is 'Families and how to survive them' by Robin Skynner and John Cleese.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Families_and_How_to_Survive_Them
> ...


I'm afraid I haven't read it, though from the link it seems to be rather 'straight' and serious, quite unlike the sub-genre of self help books written by comedians that I expected it to belong to, as well as having been written a decade or so earlier. I have a few American self help books by comedians who have the kind of cynical, streetwise wit which makes advice so much more palatable than the scolding tone of 'Men are from Mars, don't let them near Uranus' (sorry!), or of Wood's decluttering book. One is 'Why Men Love Bitches' by Sherry Argov and its sequel 'Why Men Marry Bitches'. (Apparently 'bitches'- healthy women with high self esteem- are just as fixated on the conventional status symbol of marriage as their 'good girl', i.e. stupid doormat, sisters. ) It's not unlike its humour-free predecessor 'The Rules' in that it aims to show women how to behave with more dignity and self respect in dating and relationship scenarios, thus encouraging men to treat us well or else leave us alone. Unlike the infamous Rules, Argov's books are written by an apparently well adjusted and liberated author who thankfully leaves out the misogyny and the exhortations to play passive aggressive mind games. It worked for me on Green Mamba's principle that if a person is clueless enough, any advice is probably better than none: I didn't actually use it inpractical situations, but rather to help work through and explain some of the mistakes I had made in the past, so that I could put them behind me and focus on other, more rewarding aspects of life. (According to Amazon I placed my order in early 2007, suggesting that anxiety around turning 30 was fuelling my self help binge.)










The second 'comic' self help book is probably the most acerbic, explicit book on mistakes women make in romantic relationships with men, written by Sex and the City script writer Greg Behrendt. It reads pretty much how that show would have done if they had left out the product placement, sexual exhibitionism and the compulsory Disneyish optimism needed to make TV palatable to prime time audiences, which is to say that it's witty, true to life, and (with the exception of some awkwardly grafted on motivational bits) rather bleak. It's among the most honest and practical books I've read. These books by comic writers appeal because they don't have the pious, smugly victim blaming tone of some relationship self help books written by shrinks, such as 'Women Who Love Too Much' (gah!) or anything by Byron Katie, though I don't remember whether the latter is actually a psychotherapist or a purely self-taught charlatan. Anyway, I would encourage anyone who's interested to give He's Just Not That Into You a try, and not to be put off by the spin off movie, which is perfectly nice and features the lovely Bradley Cooper, but has no particular connection with the book.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

Could be me!


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