I really enjoy reading self-help books, in fact, I think it's an overload already.
When I feel down, my first intuition is go go to a book store and get stuck into the 'Self-Help' section. Then all of a sudden I feel good again. Slowly, I began to notice this is a cycle...
I feel depressed --> reading self-help books --> anxious looking for answers for my confusions and questions --> expect to find THE answer --> some times feel good temporarily as I am doing some positive to myself OR feel even more confused because after all I could not find the answers I want...
I see more of this as a vicious cycle than anything else. Because it is not helping, or at least, it does not help my real issue.
When we look for self-help information, we tend to feel good and driven in the pursuing stage. Somehow we feel very motivated for this act, but I've came to realise that all those books (or at least most of them) are basically talking about the same agendas, same theories, same action points etc, to which, I already knew. Then why do we keep reading the same things? because it is a temporary relief to us, that we're doing the right thing AT THE TIME for us.
But the real problem is that we never ACTED after reading all those motivational words, affirmations, theories. We read through them, understood them, connected to them, and then we're back to where we were without doing any actions. So it's basically that we take a step forward, we felt good about that, then we stood there, and finally we took that step back. If you are one of these people like myself, PLEASE STOP WASTING YOUR MONEY AND TIME IN READING THESE SELF-HELP BOOKS! because it is not helping.
Yes our intentions are always good, we want to learn, we want to change. However, change is in actions, not through knowledge. We can know all we want, but without translating them to actions, it is meaningless.
We like shortcuts, we like finding out the essence from knowledgeable source, but some times, there is no shortcut in life. We can only learn by experiencing, especially with our mental state.
SO, I'll suggest to myself and everyone who is like me to pause a minute from pursuing and start putting actions to all those things you already know/read about.
This would be a good starting point.
When you act, you feel a sense of accomplishment, and this is your REAL drive!
