Help Me!: One Woman's Quest to Find Out If Self-Help Really Can Change Your Life

by Marianne Power

Susan’s basic premise is that if we sit around waiting for the day that we feel brave enough to do the things we want to do, we’ll never do anything. The secret of happy and successful people is not that they are any less scared, she says, but that, you guessed it, they ‘feel the fear and do it anyway’. In fact, according to Susan, we should be scared every day because that’s a sign that we’re pushing ourselves and moving forwards. If you are not feeling any fear you are not growing.

Susan says there are three ‘levels’ to every fear. The first level is the ‘surface story’ – in this case the fact that I hate parking. Underneath this fear is the ‘Level 2 fear’ – which is the deeper ‘ego’ fear of looking like an idiot. Susan writes: ‘Level 2 fears have to do with the inner state of mind, rather than exterior situations. They reflect your sense of self and your ability to handle this world.’ But underneath this fear is the deepest fear of all, the fear which Susan says is underneath all fears – a fear that you won’t be able to handle the feeling of being an idiot who can’t park. Susan has one answer to this: ‘YOU’LL HANDLE IT.’

Susan says that avoiding small things can have a big effect. Putting off driving on motorways, opening bank statements or picking up the phone adds to the belief that the world is scary and that we can’t cope. Every time we avoid doing something it makes us feel weaker, while facing a fear, even if it’s a small one, makes us feel strong, empowered and in control.

I wondered how many other things I might actually be quite good at that I’d always been too scared to try? Maybe if I faced my fears instead of running away from them, I could be a whole different person. Maybe if I could get over my fear of looking like an idiot in front of other people, I could actually live life instead of always watching from the sidelines. And maybe if I didn’t always have my guard up, waiting for people to judge me, I might realize that they are there to support and help … because deep down we’re all as scared as each other.

As I lay in the bath, the madness of the last month flashed through my mind like a video montage of a soap opera’s best bits. The icy dip, the karaoke, the nudity … I’d done more crazy things in January than I’d done in a lifetime. But had any of it helped me? Changed me? Well, yes. I’d once read that our fear is not that life is short, it’s that we don’t feel alive when we live it. But during my fear-fighting, I felt alive. Exhaustingly alive. Every day felt like a day when something could and would happen. I’d learned a lot too. By jumping in the pond, I saw that life begins the moment you decide to switch off the telly and get off your arse. With public speaking and the stand-up I learned that I was capable of way more than I’d realized. From karaoke I’d learned that life is much more fun if you just lighten up. And with the everyday things like parking, motorway driving and phone answering, I was surprised what a rush of confidence you can get just from doing the little things that you normally avoid. It was the opposite sensation to the energy-sapping worry and stagnation I normally lived with.

The next day I felt calmer – the kind of calm that only comes when you no longer have the energy to feel sorry for yourself.

Why did I always think that happiness had to be somewhere else, with me being someone else?

Maybe that’s what this book’s secret really is; it gives us permission to daydream about our futures in a way most of us don’t do after the age of five, when we would announce with no self-consciousness that we wanted to be astronauts or ballerinas or ambulance drivers. It stops us from making excuses and hiding behind so-called ‘reality’, something we start to do as soon as we hit our first teenage disappointments. It was actually scary to dream big because it meant opening yourself up to disappointment when/if your dreams didn’t become reality. But it felt good to become much clearer on what I really did want. I had thought it was the car and big house stuff, but really what I wanted was peace of mind and friends and travel. Although, let’s be honest, I wanted the pots of cash too. My cheque for £100,000 was also pinned on my board. And the more I looked at it, the less ludicrous this dream life (even the cheque) seemed.

That’s the thing with rejection – it can hurt more than the event justifies because it confirms all our worst thoughts about ourselves.

At the start of May, I’d come across this quote from JK Rowling: ‘It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously you might not have lived at all. In which case you have failed by default.’

the moment we say ‘F**k It’ we stop obsessing about things which are not important. ‘F**k It’ is an expression that says that – ultimately – nothing matters that much. Which, of course, it doesn’t. I knew this, intellectually, but in my day-to-day life everything mattered a lot. What people thought of me, how I was doing at work, how fat I was, how bad my hair was, my overdrafts and credit cards, my future, my love life, or lack of … it all swam around in my head in a giant soup of self-created misery.

Most of us have been brought up with the message that we have to work hard, push ourselves and never give up. No pain, no gain. We wear the exhaustion of our twelve-hour days in the office like a badge of honour. But why does life have to be so hard? Really, why? Should life be punishing? Or should it be enjoyed? And why did the thought of enjoying life feel so naughty? So bold? John believes, ‘If we find the courage to loosen up our hold on things … to stop wanting so much … to stop working and striving so much … something magical happens … we naturally start getting what we originally wanted but without the effort …’

‘Any form of desire and striving involves some form of tension. When you let go of the desire, the tension goes. And the relaxation that replaces it tends to attract good things to your life.’ I have no idea why that is true – but it is, isn’t it? It’s why the guys you don’t like like you – because you are relaxed and being yourself. It’s why people fall pregnant after years of trying just when they give up. It’s why when you decide to quit your job you actually start enjoying it. You just take the tension out of everything and it goes much better.

One of the arguments against self-help is that if any self-help book worked we’d buy one and that would be it – we’d be cured! I’d downloaded five in the last week. The more self-help I read the more I wanted to read. I kept thinking that the secret to happiness lay in the next book, the next book, the next book. It no longer occurred to me to figure anything out myself.

He kept telling me I was depressed. I kept saying, no thank you very much, I am not depressed. I thought it was normal to feel like the bottom of your world was falling out every day – I thought that was just how people felt. You just had to try harder, keep going, hope that one day it would get better. Also, being diagnosed as depressed was code for being a failure. For not being able to nail this life business.

Without realizing it, I was looking for freedom: freedom from the feeling that there was something wrong with me, freedom from the never-ending feeling that nothing I did was ever good enough, freedom from being constantly scared of everything and everyone … freedom to just be me. Or just be.

The first step is to be aware of what the voice in our head says. Tolle tells us not to judge the thoughts or get annoyed with yourself for having them, nor should you get carried away with them – just step back and observe them. He says that the more we observe our thoughts – rather than get caught up in them – the more they will lose their power. They’ll still pop up occasionally but they won’t take hold like they used to.

We all think that someone with a big ego is someone who thinks they are better than other people, but actually it can be the other way around too. ‘Every ego wants to be special,’ Tolle once explained to Oprah. ‘If it can’t be special by being superior to others, it’s also quite happy with being especially miserable. Someone will say, “I have a headache,” and another says, “I’ve had a headache for weeks.” People actually compete to see who is more miserable! The ego doing that is just as big as the one that thinks it’s superior to someone else.’

As I did my daily walk around the park, pondering these deep existential questions, it dawned on me that maybe this is why self-help books often don’t help in the long term. We think we want to change but we don’t really. We keep going back to our old ways, our old selves, our old stories because it’s too scary not to. Because to really change means to lose ourselves completely.

Eckhart Tolle would say that I had everything I needed right then. I was alive, I was breathing. I was safe. And yet I still wanted more. Was that wrong? Did that mean I was not in the Now? Because even though part of me wanted a nice future, every time I thought about my aims and goals, they stressed me out. The wanting stressed me out. I would start to panic and tell myself to try harder, do more, make things happen. Wanting is the opposite of being in the Now. Tolle describes stress as ‘being “here” but wanting to be “there”’. He says that it’s natural for all of us to plan things for the future but that we must never prioritize the future over today. You can set goals and work towards them but you must give the most attention to the step you are taking now, not the end destination. If you don’t do that, ‘your life is no longer an adventure, just an obsessive need to arrive, to attain, to “make it”. You no longer see or smell the flowers by the wayside, nor are you aware of the beauty or the miracle of life that unfolds around you.’ My life had been a never-ending attempt to ‘make it’ and ‘arrive’. I’d thought I’d be OK when I got more successful, when I was slimmer, or when I got money. I’d thought I’d feel better if I had a boyfriend – or became more improved. But none of it had worked because happiness lies not in striving but in sinking into each moment and taking it all in.

Brené writes a lot about friends. ‘I carry a small sheet of paper in my wallet that has written on it the names of people whose opinions of me matter. To be on that list, you have to love me for my strengths and struggles … You have to love and respect that I’m totally uncool.’

Love doesn’t have to be forever. It can just be meeting someone and having a connection and learning from each other. It can be for a day, a week, a year – it doesn’t matter. The important thing is that you give something a chance. Just let it be what it’s going to be. It doesn’t have to be anything more than it is.’

Brené Brown writes: ‘Joy comes to us in moments – ordinary moments. We risk missing out on joy when we get too busy chasing down the extraordinary.’

With every book my expectations of life increased. I didn’t just want a happy life, I wanted an outstanding one! The higher the bar was set, the more I felt like I was failing. The more I hunted down Perfect Me the more she eluded me. The more desperate I became to be happier, the less happy I became … But I see now that perfection does not exist and happiness comes not from getting what you think you want but from opening your eyes and recognizing that you have everything you could possibly need right now.

In this way the self-help did help – a lot. It, ironically, helped me get past myself. As I listen to Gemma and James sing ‘Old Macdonald Had a Farm’ in the room next door, I think about Brené Brown’s assertion that ‘connection is why we are here’. I think she is right. I have spent my life trying to go it alone, keeping the people who love me at a distance, but no more. As I think back on my year and a bit of self-improvement, the best bits were those moments of connection. It’s only with other people that magic happens – a magic that could be defined as love. Or God. Or beauty. Or spirit.

Be honest. Be kind. See the funny side. Exercise. Laugh. Lighten up. Have the difficult conversations and do the difficult jobs. Don’t run away. Speak your mind quietly, clearly and respectfully. People are not mind-readers. Spit it out. Work hard and enjoy it. Take pride and satisfaction in your abilities, they are greater than you think. Have confidence. Go for the big things – why not? What’s the worst that can happen? Failure won’t kill you. Say no. Say yes. See the good in people, don’t judge. Listen, understand, forgive. Have fun. Be patient. Nothing is forever. Cherish the day and cherish the people in your life – you are so lucky to have them. Be humble: you’re no better than anyone else and no worse either. We’re all trying our best, we’re all the same, really. Love with all your heart and learn from everything. When things are hard, know that it will pass and none of it matters that much anyway. You’re just a little dot passing through, so make the most of it. Sing, dance, look at the sky and be grateful. If in doubt, tidy up and make a plan – sometimes it helps to get out of your head and get practical. Most importantly, though, have a cup of tea (or glass of wine) and remember this: You’re doing great. You really are.