Comment by jmyc8 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jmyc8 | Hacker News Reader

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Agree with comments re: books are invaluable sources for one to experience, learn and empathize etc.

But it's so true that the entire trend amongst my peers (and the greater North American) attitude towards "life hacking" and "self optimization" is becoming overkill. This is an article I recently read that articulates really well on this whole cultural focus of "how to succeed" books:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/15/improving-ours...

Some quotes: "In our current era of non-stop technological innovation, fuzzy wishful thinking has yielded to the hard doctrine of personal optimization. Self-help gurus need not be charlatans peddling snake oil. Many are psychologists with impressive academic pedigrees and a commitment to scientific methodologies, or tech entrepreneurs with enviable records of success in life and business. What they’re selling is metrics. It’s no longer enough to imagine our way to a better state of body or mind."

"There is a great deal of money to be made by those who diagnose and treat our fears of inadequacy; Cederström and Spicer estimate that the self-improvement industry takes in ten billion dollars a year."

>"There is a great deal of money to be made by those who diagnose and treat our fears of inadequacy; Cederström and Spicer estimate that the self-improvement industry takes in ten billion dollars a year."

That seemed a strange sentence, so I read the article; still seemed as strange. Not sure what you'd have to believe to be able to write that. If I write—

"There is a great deal of money to be made by those who diagnose and treat our fears of inadequacy; the medical industry takes in ten billion dollars a year."

—hopefully the incoherence is more obvious. It seems the original was ridicule dressed up as science.

I guess I could perceive that because I bought quite a few self-help-type books of various kinds, and got a lot from them; they helped me immeasurably. I'm not really a course/group kind of guy, but I did one 2-week course that was amazing. I don't think any of it was due to my "fears of inadequacy". It was more my wanting to learn about myself/humans, to overcome problems I had from childhood, to be happier, to have better relationships; stuff like that. And I think I've achieved all that. :-D (Well, it's a neverending journey..)

Thank you for sharing that article, quite thought-provoking!

I think the problem we're facing is not in itself the desire to improve ourselves. Rather, it's doing it with the wrong focus and for the wrong reasons.

I found this quote from the article illuminating: "Spicer reflects that he has spent the year focusing on himself to the exclusion of everything, and everyone, else in his life." There is nothing inherently bad about improving your diet, working on your physical fitness or boosting your self-discipline. Becoming healthier and more productive can be worthy goals, but if they cause you to forget the people around you, they are the wrong goals. Self-improvement that is limited to the self is nothing but glorified egocentrism. We can become better athletes, better workers, better anything; but if we don't become better friends/neighbours/partners while we're at it, it won't make us better people.

Secondly, the reasons why we wish to improve ourselves. This is something I cannot talk about without reference to my Christian faith, because the two are deeply intertwined. For my faith tells me that I am not perfect and never can be on this earth, but that that is all right, because God loves me just as I am. At the same time it tells me that God loves me too much to let me stay the way I am, that He has given me an incredible potential that I can develop and that I can work on my imperfections knowing that He will help me. Therefore, when I read books or form habits to improve myself, I am not doing so because I need to, but because I can. I don't have to prove anything to anybody, but I can joyfully grow and develop in areas in which God has given me a greater potential than I have currently reached.

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