It's Not All Your Fault

I have a weird relationship with self help books. My critically minded brain finds them to read more like biographies disguised as how to manuals with a survivors bias. Yet I will find myself picking them up when I am deliberating something new or something I am struggling with because I am a constant reader. Sometimes I have found books that are helpful for me, like Carol Dweck's Mindset and Brene Browns books. However more often than not, I will come away with criticisms like someone who left a 6 figure job for a more fulfilling career really is in a financially aspirational place and doesn't understand my own tension between a creative drive and a need for a stable paycheck. Or I will find that the research done for a book is sloppy and/or has unsubstantiated claims.

That's why I really loved listening to every episode of the podcast By the Book because I could let Kristen and Jolenta give me cliff note versions of the books with smart and comedic commentary. However in spite of my objections, I still occasionally wanted to dig a little deeper on my own. This is how I found Sharon Podobik's Go Love Yourself box which also provided items to help me on whatever journey I tried to partake. When I found out that Sharon closed the business and was writing a book that was revealing her own struggles with the self help industry, I did not think twice about backing her kickstarter.

I would say that I not only enjoyed reading her book It's Not All Your Fault, it EXCEEDED my expectations. Sharing her own experiences made the book very engaging and her research was extensive. This is full of solid evidence that self help tends to propose individualized answers to systematic issues, which I've often struggled with.  It was also eye opening to me that the idealized versions of how a person should be comes from the perspective of a white person in power and that the self help industry WANTS me to feel bad about myself to keep me purchasing books. It's Not All Your Fault is a very important read, not only for people who are in an emotional place to question self help books they've read, but also for anyone who wants to understand the cultural influence of self help books.

I am also posting a modified version of this review on Goodreads and on Amazon.