written by JOHN MARK MINES | DECISION-MAKING, SELF-HELP, OWNERSHIP
The advice I would give to someone is to not take anyone’s advice.
Eddie Murphy
The Cure for Cancer
“Have you heard this story,” Steven Pressfield asks in the opening to his book, The War of Art. “Woman learns she has cancer, six months to live,” he continues. Immediately, she quits her job and rekindles her passion for writing Tex-Mex music. Her friends think she’s crazy, but that doesn’t matter. According to Pressfield, she’s never been happier.
But that’s not all. Pressfield concludes his ambiguous anecdote by telling us that the “woman’s cancer goes into remission.” Apparently, she’s found more than happiness: she’s found the cure for cancer.
Wait, what?
Self-Help, or Self-Hurt?
If you have a problem, self-help has a solution for you. For one easy payment of $29.95, self-help can teach you How to Win Friends and Influence People, How to Live Life and Love it, and How to be Happy. You can Think and Grow Rich while you Eat and Grow Thin. For any area of life, there’s a self-help book for that.
self-help /ˌselfˈhelp/
noun: designed to assist people in achieving things for themselves.
Self-help tends to be more sales than substance. Pressfield is Exhibit A. According to him, if people simply pursued their passions, the world would no longer need prisons, alcohol, or junk food. Therapists would be unemployed. The medical profession would “collapse” from “top to bottom.” Clearly, the audacity of self-help knows no bounds.
In true self-help fashion, Pressfield provides no evidence for these claims. His assertions are given freely, spaghetti thrown against the wall to see what sticks.
But these proclamations are paradoxical. Over half a million Americans die of cancer each year. If he had the power to save thousands of lives, is a generic parable of a nondescript woman really the best he could do?
This contradiction makes self-help authors look like salespeople who don’t buy their own product. They’re saviors who don’t believe in their own gospel. Jesus died for his teaching – would Pressfield?
Your Mileage May Vary
In serious situations, we want real help, not self-help. We want something trustworthy, reliable, and safe. In short, we want science.
sci·ence /ˈsīəns/
noun : the systematic study through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained.
Science is the antithesis of self-help. It’s structured, tested, and refined. It’s replicable and rigorous. And, most importantly, it’s universal. Physical law applies to all of us equally. When it comes to science, we’re all in this together.
Science is so trustworthy we take it for granted. Science is why the ceiling doesn’t fall on your head and why your brakes slow your car to a stop. It’s the reason your alarm goes off in the morning while you’re soundly asleep. It’s the reason you haven’t died to tuberculosis, smallpox, or plague.
Like gravity, science is invisible. We don’t see how air conditioners work or how acetaminophen reduces fevers. They just do, as if some silent authority has ordained it so. This mysterious authority gives self-help an opportunity.
Self-help authors feign authority derived from divine right or rigorous research. Their generic claims are not tested for replicability or nuance. They are prone to extrapolation error. What worked for them may not work for you and me.
Science, on the other hand, is precise. Along with millions of my best friends, I put my life on pause to watch the solar eclipse in 2017. Amazingly, we knew, down to the minute, when the eclipse would start and stop. We knew exactly how much of the sun would be covered. And, when we were right, no one was surprised.
Self-help lacks this precision and replication. Writing Tex-Mex songs may not do for you what it did for Ms. Mystery. So, when taking self-help advice, beware: your mileage may vary.
Live at Your Own Risk
Pressfield is a successful author. He would not, however, make a good doctor. Imagine asking him about cancer treatment options like chemotherapy, radiation, or surgery.
“Nonsense,” Dr. Pressfield responds, waving his hand dismissively. “But tell me: what do you know about Tex-Mex music?”
For this guidance, Pressfield could be sued for medical malpractice. As a self-help author, though, he suffers no such consequence. He provides all the advice without any of the responsibility. Doctors are liable; Pressfield isn’t.
li·a·bil·i·ty /ˌlīəˈbilədē/
noun : the state of being responsible for something, especially by law.
Unlike doctors, lawyers, and financial advisors, self-help authors are not legally liable for their advice. Under the First Amendment, they are free to opine to whomever will listen. Legally, they aren’t leaders; they’re bloggers. That’s not a book you’re reading; it’s a collection of YouTube comments.
Liability necessitates substantiation. Pharmaceutical drugs require a decade and hundreds of millions of dollars of development before they are released to the public. They are carefully studied and tested across thousands of patients. This rigor is the basis of accountability and trust.
So, if self-help has no basis for trust, authority, or liability, why does it exist in the first place?
Take My Advice
While Samuel Smiles’ 1859 book Self-Help is typically credited with sparking the self-help revolution, the advice tradition is much, much older.
Before Smiles there was Benjamin Franklin, who desired to write his own lifestyle manual that blurred the lines between philosophy and practicality. He would have called it The Art of Virtue. Then Pressfield could have named his work The War of Art of Virtue. But I digress.
Franklin’s title was an ode to Confucious’ The Art of Being Virtuous. Even older are Aesop’s fables and Solomon’s proverbs. Sumerian parables are about four thousand years old. The advice tradition appears to be as old as language itself. As soon as we could write, we’ve been telling each other what to do.
In her book The Self-Help Compulsion, Harvard Associate Professor Beth Blum characterizes advice-giving as a compulsion. Apparently, self-help exists because we just can’t help ourselves.
com·pul·sion /kəmˈpəlSH(ə)n/
noun : an irresistible urge to behave in a certain way, especially against one’s conscious wishes.
For Blum, self-help is more than just “narcissistic self-indulgence.” Many literary authors who initially mocked self-help soon found themselves spreading unsolicited advice. “In traversing the joke of self-help,” Blum writes, they shifted from “satirists to accomplices in the quest for a meaningful existence.”
Like bacteria, self-help is everywhere. To Mohsin Hamid, author of How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, even works of fiction are a form of self-help. He wonders why his readers enjoy exploring new worlds and ideas. “What is this impulse of yours,” he asks, “if not a desire for self-help?”
Religion, too, intertwines advice with narrative. In fact, religious texts could represent the original self-help literature. They blend instruction, storytelling, and even poetry to help their readers find a better path.
In other words, self-help exists because we want help. Like the crowds that followed Jesus, Muhammed, and Confucious, we crave guidance. From this view, the power of religion may not draw from its divine authority, but rather our desperate desire for direction.
But self-help buyers beware. History has a short list of miracle workers, and Pressfield isn’t one of them. For serious matters, take my unsolicited advice: stick with the professionals.
