Today I wanted to discuss a few pitfalls of self-development study which I see people fall into all the time.  One which a lot of beginners fall into is what I like to call “Guru Worship”. Guru Worship happens when a self-development student picks up a book and starts reading it and falls in love with the book. Maybe it’s a book that really resonates with them in that part of their life and it offers a lot of answers in their life. All of this is wonderful, but the pitfall that some fall into at this point is to take the book or the author who wrote the book and to elevate them in their minds to an almost God-like status.
The danger of this is that the student will then very often throw away his or her intuitive intelligence and inner wisdom and listen to every single word, every single sentence the author says like it’s Gospel. From my 10+ years experience with self development studies and having read over 300+ self development books, I really advise people not to do this. The ideal I would encourage every student to pursue is to read books and take notice of everything that makes sense to them, that resonates with their intuition, and make notes on everything else. For example, a self-development author might have a book on 12 Success Secrets, but only nine of them resonate with you and make sense to you but the other three just don’t make sense to you yet. If this happens to you, I strongly suggest you follow the nine steps that do make sense to you and just make notes on the other three until a later date.
There is nothing to be gained by taking advice from anyone, even so called self-development guru’s if it goes against your intuition and common sense. The best thing to do is to simply take what makes sense, and take notes on the rest for another time. Perhaps you are not ready for those parts yet. Perhaps those parts are just not in line with your personality. Perhaps those parts will never make sense to you. It’s ok, you don’t have to implement 100% of everything an author advises to get the benefits they offer. In most cases implementing even 50% of what an author teaches will produce results, if for example the other 50% does not sit well with you.
Another pitfall I’d like to mention is what I call “Perfection Seeking”. Perfection Seeking is when people read a book by a self development author and they might like some of the advice, but they are constantly on the lookout for the one little flaw that will discredit everything the author teaches. For example, an author might write an amazing book on time management and a reader might find the ideas fascinating and might be very excited to begin implementing them until they get to the last chapter and they might read one sentence or one paragraph where the author says something that the reader doesn’t agree with, and the whole credibility is lost.
I would very strongly urge you not to fall into these two pitfalls. Guru worshippers will very often be seen implementing crazy techniques or ideas they read in a book and when asked why they are doing what they’re doing their only answer will be “Oh, Mr. _____ recommends it.” Or “ Dr. _________ says I have to do it.” If it doesn’t make sense to you, don’t do it! Take the advice the author teaches that DOES make sense to you and implement that first. Then go back to the parts that didn’t make sense and see if they now make sense to you. If not, continue to ignore them.

I have books that I read 10 years ago which didn’t make sense to me at the time and now make perfect sense. However, if I tried implementing them back then it would have been a disaster. Always listen to your intuitive gut feeling on this kind of stuff. Any author who tells you otherwise is not worth reading.
On the other hand, just because one part of a book doesn’t resonate with you, don’t discredit the whole thing. For example, I read a book called Unlimited Power by Anthony Robbins a long time ago and I loved the book, but there were a few parts in it that didn’t fully make sense to me at the time. All I did is I focused on implementing the parts that DID make sense and just didn’t worry about the other parts.

A few months later I read Tony’s second book titled “Awakening the Giant Within.” The books were written years apart and in the second book, Tony Robbins actually admits that he made one mistake in the first book specifically to do with the diet he recommends in the Unlimited Power book. He recommended in the first book that people eat fruit for breakfast, but in the second book he corrects himself based on his new research which he did and found out that fruit might not be the best thing to eat in the morning due to it’s high sugar content.

If I went against my intuition and ate fruit every morning just because “Tony Robbins said so!”, it wouldn’t have served me very well. What if I never read the second book and found out the mistake he made? Don’t expect anyone to be perfect. Self development teachers and coaches can make mistakes as they are only human.
What you don’t want to do either though is to dismiss everything someone says because of one belief or one sentence or idea that they believe in that doesn’t fit in with your beliefs. For example, you might really like an author and all his work might resonate with you but at the end of the book he might have a paragraph where he thanks God for all the wisdom he’s learned over the years, and that might not fit with your beliefs because perhaps you’re not Christian or don’t believe in God or something of that sort. So what?! Did the rest of the book make sense? If so, then you owe it to yourself to at least try some of the stuff out.

The only exception to this way of thinking I would make is when faced with self-proclaimed Gurus who for example want to teach you how to be healthy, but they are themselves overweight or sick. Or perhaps financial Gurus who are completely broke. These are not people I would listen to at all.  However, these kinds of books are rare and I have rarely bought one. 

What is the best way to get value from self-development books? Read a variety of books by different authors on a subject you’re studying so that you get all sides of the story and don’t end up getting stuck in one way of thinking.

For example when studying investments I read a book by an author who is convinced that it’s impossible to time the stock market and recommends Index Funds as the best way to make money in the market. His whole premise is that the market can not be timed. It’s a great book and I totally agreed with it.

I then went looking for a book on the opposite theory and I read a book by an author who is convinced that the market can totally be timed. I read the book and totally agreed with it as well. The point is that they are both right. I simply use my intuition to choose to listen to one of them in a particular situation. For example if I am investing my retirement money which I won’t need for a long time, I might listen to the first guy and employ Index Funds to generate good returns with a lower risk of losing my money. However, if I have a $1,000 I just won on a scratch and win and I want to try my luck at investing it in a risky stock and don’t care about losing the money as it’s totally separate from my retirement nest-egg I can then employ the strategies taught in the second book to see if I can multiply my money. If I lose the $1000, it’s not the end of the world.

The more perspectives you can get, the better off you’ll be. Once you start reading a lot of self-development books you’ll start to see patterns in what they are teaching. It is in these patters that you will discover the greatest secrets. It’s like two health books might totally disagree on what foods to eat to be healthy, but both will agree that drinking water is good for you. If that’s so, then focus on drinking water since they both agree and use your intuition to figure out who to listen to on the other topic or find other books to support one side or the other. Ultimately, your gut will tell you who’s right for you at this time in your life.

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