Is self help culture becoming toxic?
And especially in the last decade or so, I took kind of a hard look in the mirror about it and asked myself, is it all one way or the other? Obviously, I'm a person who loves balance and trying to see different perspectives around an issue. But I looked a little deeper and I started looking around at the self help culture and there are a few pitfalls that I think we all need to be at least just aware of and see if they crop up in our own talking
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 3:12
It only gets toxic when it has people who are abusive as people just have nothing to do with them being in the self help world. They're just not good people. They're conniving and they're looking for a quick way in, quick way out. I think toxicity is only from evil intention, but the culture is created by the people, so no one's innocent in this. People create gurus because that's a habit
And I think that that's incredibly toxic and harmful to the cultures of which these traditions originate from and to the people from those cultures. So yeah, I think that would be two of my biggest concerns with the modern wellness community. You continue to see examples of this all over the place to this day while the pandemic is still happening. But even as we kind of get back to some sense of normalcy, these things. These aspects of Walnut's culture are still being perpetuated. So yeah
And I know that we all have different circumstances and different upbringings and different places in which we start life. And it's far too simplistic and reductionist to say, I did it. Why can't you? I made a million dollars in five weeks. Why can't you? You just have to manifest it. You just have to raise your vibration. And I think that's horribly toxic
Prabha Iyer
@PSPV · 3:43
It is easy to say that we have to be practical but sometimes we get carried away by the emotions because they are born and brought up in such atmospheres few people can take it really for good. And I feel that self help, just to an extent it has become very toxic status for people like me. I have to do it myself and have to get otherwise I'll get agitated sometimes. I keep saying yeah, you do it, you can do it, you do things for good
J.L. Beasley
@Her_Sisu · 4:57
I can see where they have lost themselves now, where it's the true intent, the true purpose, the true passion has now been altered or shifted in a way that isn't beneficial for their target audience, their ideal client avatar. It's different now. And how can these people stay maintain that? For lack of a better word, how can they maintain that?
J.L. Beasley
@Her_Sisu · 4:54
I believe people who are jumping into the culture, the industry, however people want to term it, that they should hold themselves accountable to not just say, I have a million followers, and I have financial resources and business connections where I can really take this and blast it and go far and gain an even more wildly successful stream of income. And I need to educate myself on this topic as well
jordan hedgecock
@kularahsd · 1:36
I think that there's a change, or not a change, but a practice that's very similar to how people have been approaching dieting and weight loss where there's these sort of almost like a list of instructions that people follow and it's like rote memorization. These things do these things and you'll either succeed or become better or obtain these great whatevers, but it doesn't provide for a lasting betterment of self and betterment of quality of life overall
Hello. This is your favorite Laquita replying to your podcast. It's self help becoming more Toxic. Alright, so this is a very interesting topic and a very interesting idea to present. I would say that in response to this question, the way that I can see self help becoming toxic is number one, I think that there are a lot of people who are offering self help services who are not skilled in the practice of delivering mental health awareness or teaching or training
Andrea Potvin
@GoodEnough · 2:33
And also just the amount of words and labels and attachment styles and diagnosis of trauma and all the labels that come with having mental health issues, whether it's OCD, PTSD, not making light of any of that, because I do deal with some myself
It's unhealthy and it's probably not true. Probably not true. Unless, of course, you're telling me I'm going to be drinking something like I had to drink when I had a cold. Nasty, but I don't want to talk about that. But, yeah, you have to be careful of what self help books, videos or audio that you get into. I always like to read reviews, and I mean real reviews
Swell Team
@Swell · 0:15
. .
@blknoname · 2:19
So creators are making content more generalized because they're trying to do a one size fits all. If that doesn't work I also believe that because the discussion of mental wellness has become less taboo, especially over the pandemic, people have begun to have these epiphanies about themselves and human beings are egotistical by nature
