Self Help - Path to Success or Giant Scam?
April 26th, 2006 by Matt InglotScientific American recently posted an article by Michael Shermer on the “Self Help and Actualization Movement (SHAM)”, painting self-help as a scam industry. It’s an interesting piece and well-worth a look at, although based on my own experiences I have to disagree with Shermer.
The core of Shermer’s view is quoted below:
SHAM takes advantage by cleverly marketing the dualism of victimization and empowerment. Like a religion that defines people as inherently sinful so that they require forgiveness (provided exclusively by that religion), SHAM gurus insist that we are all victims of our demonic “inner children” who are produced by traumatic pasts that create negative “tapes” that replay over and over in our minds. Redemption comes through empowering yourself with new “life scripts,” supplied by the masters themselves, for prices that range from $500 one-day workshops to Robbins’s $5,995 “Date with Destiny” seminar.
That’s pretty scary, and the worst part is that it’s not entirely false. There are people out there addicted to the stuff and shelling out an amazing amount of money without corresponding results. There are also plenty of self-help “gurus” out there more than happy to provide high-priced products and like with any other industry, not every product is worth buying.
I Have Received Great Results from Self-help Without Spending a Fortune
I have only been reading material that would fall under the category of self-help for three or four years. I don’t read it often and I am picky about what I do choose to read. To me every book is a significant investment in time and mental power, so I pay close attention to reviews and try to be objective about what I can expect to gain from reading. The results have been absolutely phenomenal.
The single greatest thing that self-help has taught me hasn’t been optimizing my sleeping patterns, eating better, thinking positively, or exercising regularly. It has taught, or to be more accurate, infused in me the notion that the average is highly below standard. This isn’t about crazy elitist egotism, although humility is a skill to be learned in itself, it’s about realizing that surpassing the average is really easy. That’s a complete 180 degree reverse on how most of us are brought up, and certainly how western society as a whole is shaped. As a society we put people who make significant accomplishments on a pedestal. They are out of the ordinary, blessed with exceptional talents, mental abilities, or bodies. An elite super people, a portion of which we follow on the TV with hungry eyes wishing we could be like them, but knowing that these are just silly dreams and that it won’t happen.
These super people really aren’t that better, they just did certain things and had certain attitudes that most of society does not. Attitudes that most of society has learned to fear and dismiss in order to revalidate their viewpoint that what they have is all they can get out of life.
Most self-help gurus, regardless of the quality of their individual advice, realize this fundamental problem and the need for an attitude shift. They preach this information in the ways that they can, and thanks to supply and demand the ones with some business savvy make a lot of money. They attract some people who take this advice to heart and use it to change their thinking and ultimately their lives. Then there are the people who are looking for a quick fix and in best case will read the book, feel “motivated”, run around in circles, and eventually fall back into their old patterns. Then they buy more stuff and create a ghastly scam image.
and Here’s Why I Disagree With Shermer…
Shermer points out a statistic that the biggest self-help customers on a topic are those who have bought a product on that topic before. Shermer then suggests that if the previous book on the topic should have helped you, then you shouldn’t need to buy another one. That’s only a valid argument if you are one of those people that reads a lot but learns nothing, or if you buy into the fallacy that self-help admittedly loves to paint - everything is a quick-fix. Books and lectures aren’t magic. They can be empowering, motivational, and educational, but ultimately it’s still up to you to get up, take the book’s advice, and then apply it for 30 years, not 30 days. Concepts tackled by self-help are deep subjects just like engineering, architecture, and philosophy. A single $19.95 paperback won’t educate you about everything there is to know on the subject and with so much left to discover in these areas what you end up reading is only one method or viewpoint of a single author.
Take charge of your life and be responsible for your actions and faults. If a book promises you results and you don’t achieve them, the solution isn’t to buy a $500 audiotape or attend a $6000 seminar. Go look at what went wrong. Is the advice the author preaches reasonable for you to implement? Are you actually doing what the book tells you? Did you give up after 30 days?
So how much have I spent on self-help? Not a whole lot. Depending on which books in my collection you classify as self-help, that number is as low as $200 or as high as $300, over the course of several years. To put things in perspective I spend about $60 a month on coffee, an unnecessary and unhealthy habit. A university course costs $500 a pop in Canada. If you aren’t attending $6000 seminars then self-help is some of the best value out there. Every book provides nuggets of useful information and even one “Eureka” moment per book can have life altering results.
Other Viewpoints
- “Self Help and Actualization Movement (SHAM)” by Michael Shermer
- WHY read self-development books? by Paul Piotrowski
- Is Self-Help a Scam? by Steve Pavlina
- Analysis of Robert T. Kiyosaki’s book Rich Dad, Poor Dad by John T. Reed
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April 26th, 2006 at 1:58 pm
Very nice article. It seems silly to imply that just because people buy multiple books or attend multiple seminars on the same topic means they aren’t getting any results. If a topic interests you, of course you’ll want to keep learning about it. If a doctor buys a new medical book, would we ask why he didn’t learn medicine from the first one?
If I walked into someone’s home and saw 20 time management books on the shelf, I’d be more inclined to assume this person was excellent at time management as opposed to incompetent.
April 26th, 2006 at 6:12 pm
Attitudes that most of society has learned to fear and dismiss in order to revalidate their viewpoint that what they have is all they can get out of life.
Absolutely! It’s much easier to never try because then you never fail, which has to be one of the saddest things people ever do. I get this all the time with drawing, a skill I’ve put countless years into practicing at, people simply don’t believe me when I tell them they can draw too if they’re willing to practice, they much prefer to just go with “oh no, I could never do that, you’re talented.” Bah, rubbish, they go with the easy answer and justify it to themselves, as you said.
Then there are the people who are looking for a quick fix and in best case will read the book, feel “motivated”, run around in circles, and eventually fall back into their old patterns. Then they buy more stuff and create a ghastly scam image.
Exactly, and to me that can be explained by the absence of something very simple that very few people actually seem to do - reinforcement. I remember something Dale Carnegie wrote about humans being very forgetful creatures, and it’s absolutely true, especially these days with information overload to contend with. The only way I ever continue to reap the benefits from something I’ve read is to write up the key points and stick them by my desk, or on my bookmark, and read them at least once a week; otherwise, like most people, I just forget about them and my inspiration is sometimes forgotten with them.
ultimately it’s still up to you to get up, take the book’s advice, and then apply it for 30 years, not 30 days.
So very true! It’s so disheartening that the majority of people are now conditioned to believe in quick fixes and instant gratitude (largely thanks to advertising imo). It’s really taken the soul out of humanity and I think on the whole our current society is producing less great people than previous societies where effort was valued more and people knew that great things were not achieved overnight. One of my favourite quotes is “Inches make champions” by Vince Lombardi, and “No great thing is created suddenly” by Epictetus.
A very good article, I really enjoy reading your blog Matt, keep these great posts coming
April 29th, 2006 at 11:55 pm
Is the Self-Help Industry a Scam?…
I’d like to offer my personal opinion on a topic that I feel pretty strongly about….
June 8th, 2006 at 8:38 pm
I didn’t realise much has been written about this already! I have written a slightly different article which can hopefully put the SELF back into SELF-help.
March 21st, 2007 at 12:37 am
[…] I’d like to offer my personal opinion on a topic that I feel pretty strongly about. A few blogs have written about this topic, following an article recently posted in the Scientific American written by Michael Shermer titled “Self Help and Actualization Movement (SHAM)” which painted self-help as a scam industry.You can have a read through the article yourself, but my favorite quote is “Do these programs work? No one knows. According to Salerno, no scientific evidence indicates that any of the countless SHAM techniques–from fire walking to 12-stepping–works better than doing something else or even doing nothing.” Ok, first of all, of course there is no scientific evidence to prove that self-help techniques work. There is no scientific evidence that they don’t work either. 99.999999% of the things we do in life are based on “truths” and assumptions that have not yet been “proven” by science. It doesn’t mean they don’t work.If I recommended a really good movie I saw the other day, would you turn around and say “There is no scientific evidence to prove that I will enjoy the movie you enjoyed yesterday, so I am not going to spend $$ to go see it.” ??? No, if you trusted my judgement and I liked the movie, and we both like similar movies you’d probably trust my judgement and at least take the information into account when deciding what movie to see.You can’t go through life “dis-proving” things simply by saying “There is no scientific evidence to prove it true.” I mean you can, but I don’t think it’s a very useful way of thinking and I think people will probably find you annoying. Of course I can’t be sure, because there is no scientific evidence to prove that.Personally, I don’t know if self-help books and seminars help everyone. All I know is that they’ve helped me. I also know that quite often nowadays people come to me for advice on different topics since I’ve read all these books and they want to know what I would recommend doing, and I just give them advice based on what I’ve learned over the last 12 years mostly from reading books and self-learning in the real world applying the things I’ve learned. Last week alone I had two people thank me for the advice I gave them as it had a big impact on their lives, so it’s apparently working for them as well.Have I read self-help books that didn’t really do much for me? Yes. There has been a few, but I’ve read hundreds of books so it’s hard not to come across one that just doesn’t resonate with you. Was I able to drastically change my entire life after reading just one book? Not exactly. There have been a few books which impacted me in a big way and really opened up my eyes to a new way of thinking, but the majority of the books I read produce incremental improvements in my thinking, but that’s OK. That is ALL I am looking for. It’s like playing sports. A coach isn’t going to change your jump-shot percentage from 2% to 89% in one session. He can take a look at your jump-shot and give you some pointers which might increase your jump-shop percentage from 75% to 77%, and that might be ALL you need to win the game!Let’s say that my way of thinking is only 10% different from “normal” people as a result of studying self-help books. You might think 10% is not that big of a difference. Think of it this way. Lets say that we both have $5,000 today. You go to the bank and get a savings account and they pay you 3% per year on your money. I go to a financial investing seminar that costs me $600 and I invest into a totally different set of investments that get me 13% per year on my $5,000.You might say, big deal, at the end of the year you have $5,015 and I have $5,050 ($5,650 - $600 for seminar). That’s only a 35 buck difference after a year and it only took you 5 minutes to get a savings account but I had to “waste” a weekend at a seminar learning about investing.Short term, very little difference. Long term, however, if you keep your money in your investment for 45 years and then go to withdraw your “savings” the day after your retirement party, you’ll have a whopping $18,907.98 saved up.How much will I have in my investment that averaged 13%? I’ll have approximately $1,223,000.00. That 10% makes a big difference, trust me.Now I know this is just an example, but in order to really understand the power of self-help books and courses you need to understand that small things done differently over a long period of time make a HUGE difference. If I have read 300 books and each one only improved my thinking ever so slightly by only 1%, then I’ve already improved myself by 300% and that’s not taking into account the compounding effect. Do you need to read 300 books? No. That’s just what I did, because I like reading them. Start by just reading one, even a 1% difference can make a big difference long term.One of the other things the article mentions is that the self-help industry doesn’t work as evident by the fact that most people who purchase self-help books buy multiple books. The logic being that if a self-help book worked in the first place, then there would be no need to buy any more books. That’s pretty lame logic if you ask me. You can just as easily argue, if the first book DIDN’T work, then people wouldn’t buy a second book, would they?I buy multiple books on a specific topic not because the first book didn’t work, but because I want to get multiple points of view on a topic, I want to master that topic and that might require the views of several experts. It’s like getting a second opinion from a doctor. Why wouldn’t you do this?Also, each author is an expert in his particular field. There is no one author (that I have found yet, anyway) that knows everything about everything. I wouldn’t take nutrition advice from an author who specializes in time management. That’s why there are multiple self-help books - because LIFE improvement is a HUGE topic which is pretty much impossible to cover in one single book.Anyway, my personal opinion of the self-help industry is that it is a fountain of wisdom available for anyone who’s not too lazy to read books. I’ve read many books and they worked for me. I have also never met anyone who has read dozens of self-help books and then complained “these don’t work at all”. I have met DOZEN’S of people who are skeptical of self-help books, yet they have not read a single one.Two other bloggers who have written on this topic are Steve Pavlina and Matt Inglot.-Paul […]
March 21st, 2007 at 11:40 pm
[…] Two other bloggers who have written on this topic are Steve Pavlina and Matt Inglot. […]
September 3rd, 2007 at 7:17 pm
[…] Two other bloggers who have written on this topic are Steve Pavlina and Matt Inglot. […]
November 19th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
You know, looking at these comments, i wish people will take the same interest they’ve placed in seeking human wisdom and apply it in seeking spiritual, God’s wisdom, which is found in the Holy Scriptures (the Bible). As Paul Piotrowski says, self-help industry is a wealth of wisdom available for people who are NOT lazy (like himself); so hey not-so-lazy people, get into the real deal–read all the Bibles available!!….after all, if it’s just wisdom (and not a quick fix) people are looking for, it can all be found in the Holy Bible.
Summarily, I’m beginning to think that it’s the American propensity for wanting more for nothing (or looking for the fastest answers in life) that’s heralding this wave of self-help trend in the country….this to me, is the only purpose of self-help (i.e. to offer quick fixes, so-called “the perfect panacea” to life)…I’m not yet convinced it contains just a “fountain of wisdom” for behold, the Bible has long been with us (in various translations and formats) to have provided this much sought-for wisdom–if indeed wisdom is the only thing people are looking for in self-help…