Is Self-Help Selfish?
Critics often put down personal growth practices on the ground that they're selfish, or at least self-absorbed. The time people spend meditating, saying affirmations, taking workshops, and so on, according to the critics, could be better spent helping others.
"The question is why one should be so inwardly preoccupied at all," writes Barbara Ehrenreich in Bright-Sided. "Why spend so much time working on one’s self when there’s so much real work to be done?" Similarly, in The Last Self-Help Book You'll Ever Need, Paul Pearsall writes, in questioning the value of much self-help literature, that "most of the problems we think we have stem from too much self-focus rather than too little." The phrase "selfish help" has also become popular on blogs that are critical of personal development.
This criticism may have some appeal on the surface. After all, when I meditate, I'm the only one who gains calm and clarity. My meditation practice doesn't cause food to appear on the tables of impoverished people. Similarly, if I see a therapist, that can only help resolve my mental health concerns -- it does nothing for catatonic people in psychiatric hospitals.
But if we look a little deeper, I think it becomes clear that this critique has some flaws, and I'm going to discuss them in this post.
Does Self-Help Mean No "Other-Help"?
I think the most obvious problem with this argument is that it assumes that a person can't do both personal growth work and charitable work, or at least that people involved in personal development are less interested in helping others.
Clearly, the first of these is not true. It's surely possible for me to lead a life that includes both, say, meditation and volunteering at a homeless shelter.
I suppose one could argue that the time I spend doing personal growth activities detracts from the time I could spend being generous to others. But if we take that argument seriously, most of what we do in life -- apart from, I guess, eating and sleeping -- becomes "selfish" and unacceptable.
After all, every minute we spend hanging out with friends, watching a movie, hiking, and so on is one less minute we could spend serving others' needs (whatever that may mean to you). This argument holds people to an impossible moral standard that I doubt even the most generous critic of personal development could meet.
Nor have I seen any evidence that people who do self-development work are less inclined to help others. I've yet to see a study suggesting that, say, people who have read The Secret are less likely to give to charity.
Emotions Influence Actions
More importantly, I think the claim that "self-help is selfish" misses the deeper point that our emotional state affects how we act. If my personal growth practices put me in a happier or more peaceful state, that's likely to change -- for the better -- the way I relate to others.
It may be that, while I'm in the process of meditating, I'm the only one gaining peace and clarity. But when I'm done meditating, I take that peace and clarity out into the world. Doesn't it stand to reason that, if I'm feeling more peaceful, I'll behave more peacefully toward other people?
This idea is more than just common sense -- there's substantial research supporting it. You may remember that, in an earlier post, I pointed to several psychological studies suggesting that happiness actually causes people to be more giving toward others. I've also discussed the evidence showing that people who believe they're responsible for their life circumstances -- a belief often promoted in personal development -- behave more generously.
However, there is also research bearing more directly on the relationship between self-development practices and qualities like kindness and compassion. One study, "Mindfulness-Based Relationship Enhancement," found that couples who meditated reported more satisfaction with their relationships. Another found that Buddhist metta meditation "increased feelings of social connection and positivity toward novel individuals" in study participants.
On a subtler level, the way we feel affects those around us, even when we aren't doing or saying anything. Daniel Goleman's Social Intelligence, for instance, describes how our bodies instinctively detect and mimic the emotions of people we're with. Goleman, for example, points to studies of couples showing that one partner's anger or sadness induced the same emotions in the other person.
In other words, because humans are empathic creatures, it makes sense that the emotional benefits we get from personal growth would "rub off" on others. This is why, I think, one of my mentors says that "the greatest gift you can give to others is to work on yourself."
So, I think it's important to look not only at how a personal growth practice benefits its immediate "user," but also how it affects their actions toward others and the way they show up in the world.
The Promise of "Stealth Transformation"
I can imagine a critic of personal growth responding that I'm painting an unrealistic picture of self-help methods and the reasons people use them. People don't get involved in personal growth to cultivate compassion for others, they might say. They do it because they want more money, better relationships, improved health, and so on.
I think this actually points to one of the great social benefits of personal development -- what's sometimes called "stealth transformation." Yes, some people may meditate because they want to be calmer in business meetings; some may do yoga because they want a more attractive body; and so forth. However, no matter what their intentions are, the peace and happiness they gain from their practices can positively affect their behavior toward others.
In other words, even if people go into self-development practices for purely "self-interested" reasons, they may find their relationship with the world changing in ways they didn't expect or intend. I know this happened in my own meditation and yoga practices. I didn't begin them with serving others in mind, but the composure I got from those practices has helped people feel more relaxed and open around me.
Other Posts In This Series:
Growth As An Opiate, Part 3: The Hard Work Of Happiness
Last time, we discussed the argument that some personal growth techniques put people at risk of being, basically, too happy. Practices like meditation and yoga, in this view, generate "artificial happiness" that can blind people to genuine problems in their lives or with their society.
In this post, I'll turn to a similar argument often made against the "positive thinking" strain of personal growth -- i.e., the idea that thinking optimistically is a good way to deal with a seemingly bad situation. For some, positive thinking is a futile enterprise, because pushing negative thoughts or feelings away is impossible. For others, it's doable, but it takes a lot of work. And if it takes so much work to be happy, is it worth the effort?
In Bright-Sided, for instance, Barbara Ehrenreich derides positive thinking because it seems to require "a constant effort to repress or block out unpleasant possibilities and negative thoughts." In The Last Self-Help Book You'll Ever Need, psychologist Paul Pearsall writes that "striving to keep your hopes up at the worst times in your life can be exhausting."
I'll do something unusual for this blog and agree with this argument, at least partly. In my experience, some people seem to love deliberate positive thinking. To them, saying affirmations, visualizing success, and similar techniques don't feel like "work" at all. But to others -- myself included -- making an effort to think happy thoughts or generate positive emotion can feel draining.
However, I think critics of personal development go astray when they suggest that, because positive thinking feels draining or self-deceptive to some people, no one should practice it. Another common mistake is to equate all personal development with positive thinking, and then dismiss it all as "feel-good fluff," when in fact many personal growth techniques take a very different approach.
The "Art" Vs. "Drug" Models Of Personal Growth
Positive thinking may feel false and self-deceptive to some people, but that doesn't mean that, objectively, it is false and self-deceptive. It won't be controversial for me to say, I think, that different behaviors feel authentic (or false) for different people. For example, I would feel inauthentic speaking with a Portuguese accent, because I'm not from Portugal. However, a native of Portugal wouldn't feel that way.
Similarly, perhaps thinking optimistically in the face of adversity causes some people to feel better, but not others. But it doesn't follow that positive thinking "doesn't work" or is "fake." For instance, suppose I happen to enjoy looking at Monet paintings, but you don't. No one would claim that, simply because our opinions differ, the pleasure I feel when looking at Monet's work must be "false."
Yet, when attacking positive thinking, critics often make this kind of argument. They treat optimism as if it were a drug that we shouldn't take until clinical trials have proven it's safe and more than just a placebo. If some people react negatively to it, you shouldn't use it. But I don't think that analogy works, because -- unlike drugs with dangerous side effects -- people don't physically hurt themselves simply by thinking.
I think what I've said applies to many forms of personal growth. It makes more sense to think about these techniques as if they were pieces of art or music than to liken them to harmful drugs. Because everyone's mind and body is unique, it stands to reason that each technique "works" for some but not others, and each person must do their own exploration to find out what "works" for them.
The "Change" Vs. "Acceptance" Models
As I mentioned last month in a post on my other blog, when I talk with people about meditation, they often tell me they "can't meditate." This is because, they say, they can't seem to force their minds to empty, or compel themselves to feel peaceful.
It struck me recently that these people's understanding of meditation is completely different from mine. I don't see meditation as being about "forcing" anything to happen. To me, it's about allowing whatever thoughts and feelings arise to be there, without resistance.
I think this mirrors a distinction between two schools of thought in personal development. I'll call one of them the "Change" model. On this view, personal growth is about seeking positive experiences or emotions, and avoiding negative ones.
I think positive thinking, as it's usually understood, falls in this category -- as Norman Vincent Peale, the father of positive thinking, put it, "whenever a negative thought concerning your personal power comes to mind, deliberately voice a positive one to cancel it out.”
Let's call the other model "Acceptance." From this perspective, the purpose of personal development is not to seek the "right" kind of experience, but to drop our resistance to the experience we're having right now -- even if, in this moment, we're feeling sad or angry.
The end goal of the Acceptance approach is to find what Buddhists call "equanimity" -- when we learn to allow all of the experiences life has to throw at us, the distinction between "positive" and "negative" feelings disappears, and we are always at peace.
Why This Matters
This distinction is important to our discussion because critics of personal development often neglect it. In Artificial Happiness, for instance, Ronald W. Dworkin criticizes meditation by citing the example of a patient who "escapes her own consciousness through meditation, and keeps her unhappiness at bay," but thus "also postpones any serious analysis of her situation."
True, some people may use meditation from what I've called a "Change" perspective -- to repress or transform their grief, anger, and so on. But this certainly isn't the only way people use meditation (nor do I think it's the most helpful way). As I noted, many forms of Buddhist meditation have the goal of "Acceptance" -- that is, learning to simply allow the anger and grief to arise and pass away.
So, in a nutshell, even if you aren't a fan of the "never let a negative thought enter your mind" approach, I think personal development still has much to offer you.
Other Posts In This Series
E-Book: Why Growth Is Good
Most Popular Posts
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Thoughts on the Mankind Project Lawsuit
Personal Development Politics, Part 2: The Elections and Self-Responsibility
Regulating Self-Help, Part 2: What Is a Benefit?
Rainbow Right-Wingers, and Other Myths About Personal Development Politics
Authenticity Answers, Part 1: How Deep Is Your Want?
