The Self Help Hamster Wheel?

[Philipp]

I don't know about you guys, but I came into contact with self help material (Pick up advice at the start) at a young age, and I don't think it did me any favours. I honestly just got addicted to those videos and lost touch with being. Have you ever felt like all this Self Help Theory is worthless? It sounds good but at the end of your day you stay the same. It is basicly just another distraction and all you need to know, you will learn it by yourself. I am curious if anyone also feels this way! Let me know!

[Truth]

1 hour ago, Philipp said:

I don't know about you guys, but I came into contact with self help material (Pick up advice at the start) at a young age, and I don't think it did me any favours. I honestly just got addicted to those videos and lost touch with being. Have you ever felt like all this Self Help Theory is worthless? It sounds good but at the end of your day you stay the same. It is basicly just another distraction and all you need to know, you will learn it by yourself. I am curious if anyone also feels this way! Let me know!

Yep, I call this the mental masturbation stage. pretty sure most people go through it. it happens because you're in the comfort of your own home doing your mental masturbation when the self help material is telling you to get out of your own home! this is how it perpetuates itself.

If you were living out in the wilderness you wouldn't need someone to tell you to go get food. You would just do it!

No one is gonna come into your house and put a gun to your head and tell you to change your life. That's something you have to do.  

Edited January 17, 2018 by Truth

[Joseph Maynor]

No.  Just the opposite.  I feel like now I know so much I can actually clean my life up and get it running very authentically, which I have been doing.  If you feel that way, you likely have some blocks you still need to work out.

[Vipassana]

I've been in that loop for about a year now, im only 18 and haven't yet constructed a tangible purpose for myself. I am and have been half ass aware of this deception for about a month and now I finally took some action and bought the life purpose course. Now 3/4 through the course definitely have a lot insights on what I want to be doing on this planet but I act like a victim when it comes to family pressure. However I live in a city of infinite opportunities so going to get growth for a few more years using all the tool I can regardless of my ego being stroked. I meditate everyday but thats about it. All the times I watched leo over the last year I was so unconscious whilst the video was playing, I can now watch any video and gain shit ton of insights loool.  But yeah the purpose of this comment was shit always changing dawg. Everything changes. Stay woke. 

[SOUL]

You say self help is worthless and that all you need to know is you will learn it your self so it's no wonder you don't change but you aren't even aware of it because you are distracted by your addiction.......

 

 

Edited January 17, 2018 by SOUL

[RawJudah]

4 hours ago, Philipp said:

I don't know about you guys, but I came into contact with self help material (Pick up advice at the start) at a young age, and I don't think it did me any favours. I honestly just got addicted to those videos and lost touch with being. Have you ever felt like all this Self Help Theory is worthless? It sounds good but at the end of your day you stay the same. It is basicly just another distraction and all you need to know, you will learn it by yourself. I am curious if anyone also feels this way! Let me know!

You’re absolutely right. Most self help books are just someone else’s opinion, or perhaps what has worked for them might not work for us, whereas we find out what works for ourselves through seeing and believing and living in the real world. I honestly think that almost all of the self help material out there is just entertaining for us. And makes us think better for a slight fraction of our time. And only some of the self help material out there helps us in the long term. 

[Philipp]

@SOUL I know that it has to do with my behaviour. All I wanted is to state that this is a real problem for me, and one problem that is not fixed with more self help. Instead I think the solution is to distance one self with self help material and only focus on practical aspects for a while. 

[SOUL]

@Philipp Well, other than the contradiction in your words it just doesn't seem like you were doing self help anyway, it appears you were listening to others talk about their own experience. Yet, I will agree it is common that people talk quite a bit about abstract ideas that are complicated and are hard to apply to one's own life.

Although, watching videos or reading about other people's experiences and ideas isn't actually doing your own inner work, if you had done any you would have at least some change noticeable even if it may not be a huge transformation just yet. So, sure, stop watching videos and reading if you are stagnating on that but actually start doing inner work, that will have an effect.

Besides, even if you don't do any personal work that doesn't mean you aren't changing, we always change, it only means the change that is happening is molded largely by others input randomly and your own influence in those changes is little to non-existent.

[student]

@Philipp Just like buddha said, man cannot live without a spiritual life. You can do personal development, but you also need to preoccupy yourself with spirituality. If your life doesn't include spirituality, then you will feel the superficiality and the limits of personal dev., you will remain in the "dark".