Self Help Books that Really Help
Thanks to Jolenta Greenberg and Kristen Meinzen for their book How to be Fine. Listening to How to be Fine (especially on 1.5 speed) was like self help on steroids. Kristen and Jolenta host the podcast called By the Book where put self help books to the test. They have read 50 books in the last 3 years so wanted to share the main lessons they had learned in the book. I can resonate with that! I have read 150 in the last 3 years and want to share what I have learned.
To be honest, when I first listened to the podcast it was not my cup of tea. I didn’t know the full back story, and it just seemed like two funny women trying to prove self help books were a waste of time. As a self help addict, and behavior change specialist, I was somewhat offended by this self defeating approach. Once I listened to the book How To be Fine, the introduction gave me a better sense of their background and I particularly respected the work Kristen had done with therapists to overcome her childhood traumas. I appreciated their humor, and their perseverance in trying out new behavior changes, every 2 weeks!
In the first part they review the helpful lessons they recommend, in the second part they describe what advice to avoid, and in the third part they focus on what they wished had been talked about more. Their approach to positive self talk was interesting, as even if they didn’t believe in the mantras they had chosen, they believed simply being awash in the message (in the same way we are exposed to other social messages constantly) had an impact, at least on Jolenta’s confidence to ask for what she needed. I have worked really hard on positive self talk as I have a loud, mean inner critic. While my inner critic doesn’t go to the depths of Jolenta’s (sending a drink back would ruin the bartender's day), she is relentlessly cruel. The only way I have been able to adopt positive self talk is to really believe what I am saying. For example, my witch would tell me I was fat and ugly and I could not disagree. But I could add, ‘yes, and I am fit and strong’. Which I believed and was true. Using the ‘yes and’ is a technique from Improv comedy where you don’t fight with the other person’s position, but rather build upon it. This is important to quieten a mean voice. The more you fight, the worse it gets.
Positive self talk for me also extended to positive affirmations which I learned was my love language. Kristen and Jolenta also appreciated what they learned from ‘Love Languages’. I hate compliments so learning that my love language was positive affirmations was strange to me. But I realized what I needed was recognition for the things I did, which is not the same as compliments about my appearance, for example. My second language was acts of service, which totally made sense. I like to do things for others and appreciate when someone steps in to help me. My husband's languages were physical touch and quality time. I have tried to give him a lot more hugs, and will just sit with him on the sofa. Something I would have considered a waste of time before!
I also liked their attitude to gratitude. Although the science really supports gratitude journaling, I struggled with this because I ended up feeling stupid for all the things that bothered me in a day, and felt like I wasn’t grateful enough. But like the authors, I have really benefited from writing thank you letters. Not just to people in my life, but to myself and my husband. After listening to the book, I started saying thank you to the staff who manage the parent pick up traffic at my kids’ school. It feels good to be grateful in these small ways.
I also really appreciated their focus on apologizing. ‘I am just joking’ is not an apology. I know how important it is to model owning your mistakes, so I apologize to the kids if I have lost my patience with them. I really liked the idea of asking your partner if there was anything unresolved to apologize for. I built up the courage to ask my husband. He said I was very caring and had nothing to apologize for and he asked if he did. No, he was good. But what an important thing to communicate about.
Like both Jolenta and Kristen, I also have benefited greatly from seeing a therapist. They said this was not recommended often enough in the books they had read. I loved two books by therapists. Maybe You Should Talk to Somebody, and This Too Shall Pass. Both discuss patient cases and how the therapist approached them. I love this insight into the therapist's world as I consider it a very challenging job. But even cases that had no immediate relevance to my life, taught me something universal about life that I could appreciate. I recommend them both.
I think the only place where I may disagree with Jolenta and Kristen, is that saving the world makes you feel better. I get the premise, thinking beyond yourself is very healthy. But as coined by the Nagoski sisters in Burnout, ‘human giver syndrome’, can be very destructive. I am a human giver and I have always wanted to do something impactful to make the world a better place. But this ambition hasn’t necessarily brought me peace and happiness. Sometimes I wish I could be satisfied with a smaller life. I went into public health to make a difference and burned out. And I know many non-profit CEOs burn out. I hope I can find a way to operate that does not leave me drained.
I noticed many of the books featured on the podcast relate to home improvement based self help. These have not been in my repertoire. The authors focused on many of the benefits of decluttering. Interestingly, my group parenting coach recently encouraged us to focus on the home and assigned us homework to create a comfortable Hygge place. It was the first homework I had not done. I am not really a good homemaker. I love cooking, but would rather spend my time outside. I have done the minimum to decorate the house, but I do have all the kids' art on the wall. This made me think back to the times I felt so free when my only possessions were a bean bag and a stereo. I could live anywhere. I was mortified when my coach said: what if I designed this Hygge work just for you… What? We talked about why I had such resistance to honoring myself with a comfortable spot in my house, just for me. Well, I didn’t deserve it… I didn’t need it. I had grown up in boarding school with no possessions, no ability to make my mark on a space. So there was some history here that was increasing my resistance. A few weeks late on my homework, I realized where the dog bed was in our bedroom was a perfect morning meditation spot, in the early sunlight. I moved the dog bed and put a lazyboy chair in there and enjoy the morning sun, sometimes even with the dog on my lap.
The coach also took us through a guided exercise where we went through our house and work out which room we loved and which we disliked the most. I loved the kitchen where I could show my love to the family by cooking. I disliked our entryway which was vast and meant to be impressive but the space was overwhelming and the expectation of something grand was intimidating to me. My entryway represented my fear of being myself, of stepping into my power. Who knew a house could tell you what you needed to work on in life!
Other advice that totally resonated with me was to try new things (I had done improv and stand up comedy, and joining facebook to promote my business), to go outside (my favorite place anyway, if I am around trees I literally feel my body calm), to give up dieting (I learned to love food again), and that Girl Wash Your Face was not worth reading at all (it made me feel bad about myself and was totally unmemorable).
