Self Help Books

February’s book write up is still in the works so until that’s ready, I figured I’d share some thoughts. I noticed lately that I have been reading a lot more of what people call, “self help” books. For the majority of my life, I preferred fictional books because reading started as something I did for fun, something that played a movie in my head. However, I keep getting non fiction recommendations and while I can’t say that one genre is better than the other, they each certainly have their own appeals. The non fiction books I’ve been reading are just so eye opening! They’re still very much enjoyable but combining that with the benefit of learning made them that much more entertaining. You can of course gain plenty from just about any genre but I wanted to touch more on self help books specifically.

I consider myself a decently outgoing person. In general, I get a lot of weird looks for it. For the most part, I don’t mind because I’m not too easily embarrassed. I’m not a shy person and I’m in a lot of ways unapologetically myself. So when I found myself reading self help books in public and wanting to hide the covers or titles, I suddenly felt unauthentic and I was forced to ask myself, why am I doing this? I came to the conclusion that it was because of the negative stigma around self help books. In general, our society has an issue with mental health and emotional issues. It’s a bit taboo to admit you’re not okay because it makes people uncomfortable in the sense that they aren’t sure how to react, because we don’t give self care enough attention. So when I told people about the book I was reading and I’d describe it to them, I usually got hit with, “oh, um is that like one of those self help things?” and I would briefly be overwhelmed with insecurity and I’d later have to kick myself for allowing negative connotations to make me so uncomfortable. I just want to address the fact that reading a self help book does not mean there’s anything wrong with you but even if you’re struggling emotionally, mentally or simply going through the motions of life, there should absolutely be no shame in wanting to better yourself. In my mind, there’s something “wrong” with everyone and by that I simply mean that no one’s perfect. Everyone has an area in their life that they want to improve and as humans I think it’s our job to be constantly and actively bettering ourselves. I never want to be content with staying wherever I am, I refuse to settle or get too comfortable. The funny part is, I can say all these things as much as I want and as loud as I want but to believe them with absolute certainty is a completely different challenge altogether.

Is that why I still get embarrassed when people refer to certain books as self help books?

My point in this rant is that I want to embrace the label. Yes, I read self help books. No, I’m not reading it as a requirement for any class. Yes, I’m doing well and even if I’m not, it’s okay not to be okay. I just want to grow as a person. I want to learn as much as I can while I still can. This is my way of keeping myself in check.

As always, thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts!