How to Avoid the Self-Help Guru

Self-improvement is a must and there is good guidance out there, but we need “balanced action with accurate intention” to create meaningful change in our lives.

- Dr. Bryan Hawley

Have you ever heard of The Self-Help Guru Trap? It’s not something that too many are talking about, but it does exist—and it is affecting millions of people without them even knowing it.

Now before any Wayne Dyer, Tony Robbins or Eckhart Tolle fans start passing judgement on me, let me explain a little more. I would not be where I am today if I did not hear the late Dr. Wayne Dyer speak at a conference many years ago. It really felt like he was putting the show on just for me. It felt like he plucked me out of the audience and was talking directly to me. He understood my problems, and I was lost. I felt the itch to do something meaningful and be something bigger, and I am sure I was not the only one in the room who felt that way.

Many conferences and half a forest worth of books later, I can say that I have become a Self-Help Guru junkie. I mean I love the stuff, and I am always working on myself. Maybe it is the dopamine surge I get when I read an inspiring chapter or finally finish a book…

Now, thanks to technology, we can listen to any guru we want, whenever we want. It has become so easy to consume large amounts of information in short periods of time thanks to the Internet. But is this gluttonous consumption good for us? Is there something missing?