Self-Help: My Recommended Reading Materials

Please remember that someone could read all the personal development literature in the world but not get anywhere because they don't actually practice what they've learned. Even at your absolute healthiest, it's hard to build new habits, so don't beat yourself up if it doesn't come easily to you.

Also, you cannot do this alone. Self-help puts a lot of emphasis on the "self," and while it's important to reclaim perseonal agency by focusing on your own actions and efforts, everyone needs love, support, and assistance from others. And that's just at the best of times! If you're suffering deeply, you absolutely must find people who can help you. No matter who dug them, some holes are too deep to climb out of on your own.

Top Recommendations

Byron Katie's The Work
Why Does He Do That? by Lundy Bancroft
Glenn R. Schiraldi's Self-Esteem Workbook
Jasmin Lee Cori's Healing From Trauma
Overcoming Unwanted Intrusive Thoughts by Doctors Sally M. Winston and Martin N. Seif
Focusing by Eugene T. Gendlin

Soft Parenting

Materials that are warm, kind, and gentle while confronting painful truths.

Inner Bonding with Margaret Paul
Healing Your Aloneness by Margaret Paul and Erika Copich
The Assertiveness Guide for Women by Julie De Alvarez Hanks
Love Me, Don't Leave Me by Michelle Skeen
The Emotionally Absent Mother by Jasmin Lee Cori
The Tao of Fully Feeling by Pete Walker
Losing Your Pounds of Pain by Doreen Virtue

Hard Parenting

For those who like love tough and without sugar-coating. Personally, I haven't finished any of these books, only articles by the authors or about the concepts therein. They seem a good alternative, though, for people who might feel "talked down to" by the gentler materials that I prefer.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck by Mark Manson
75 Hard by Andy Frisella
Wherever You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat Zinn

Self-Help Genre Speed-run

101 Essays That Will Change The Way You Think by Brianna Wiest

This book is great for newcomers to the genre and people who like to read in short bursts. If you've read a lot of self-help, though, you'll find that Wiest is saying things you've already read in other books. Thankfully, she always says it well! I appreciate her ability to summarise transformative concepts into these short essays.

Raise Yourself Like a Child

I'm what people call "a child at heart," so when looking for ways to help myself, I gravitate towards materials for children and parents. Dr. Paul's Inner Bonding doesn't endorse this explicitly, but I think the general concept of self-parenting validates the approach. Anyways, here are my favourite articles!