You Already Know What You Have To Do. Don’t You?

No one is telling you anything different.

Look, you can sit here reading Medium articles all day.

You can listen to the audiobooks read the physical-copy classic self-help books.

You can listen to all the podcasts you want.

You can repeat the affirmations all you want.

You can wake up as early as you want and meditate for as long as you want.

You can listen to all the motivational videos as people cut and edit the wonderful advice of people like Les Brown, David Goggins, Tony Robbins, Gary V, Denzel Washington, Simon Sinek, Jay Shetty, etc.

You can get yourself as “pumped up” as you want.

But none of this means anything if you’re not willing to…

Let me guess, you already knew where I was going with this. Didn’t you?

That’s because you already know what you have to do. Don’t you?

I figured as much. So why do you sit there absorbing all of this wonderful information and getting temporarily motivated and inspired? Is that all you want out of life?

Or do you actually want to do the things you say you want to do?

You realize all of this material you read and listen to don’t do anything if you aren’t willing to do anything yourself right?

There’s a reason why I’m not really saying exactly what I mean because we both already know what I’m talking about. Don’t we?

I sure hope so. Because at this point in the article I’m not sure I want to or need to tell you anything.

It’s not just you, though. I was like this, just a self-improvement sponge, soaking up anything and everything self-help hoping that one of the damn things actually moves me to…

Oops! I almost said what we both know I was going to say. That was a close one.

Sorry, I get carried away writing these things sometimes.

I realized along my self-help material absorbing journey that I would either be stuck there in a loop, listening to the same things said differently over and over again…or, I would actually “you know what”.

It became clear to me that this is anyone who gets into this stuff.

Don’t get me wrong, I think taking in all the info and constantly feeding your brain with this is important and better than most of cruel, old life.

That’s why I write these articles after all. It’s good for the soul!

It lets you know that a better life for yourself exists out there if you are willing to…well, you know.

But, self-help, my bad… “self-improvement” (ooo, fancy), can trap you.

It can make you forget that life is cruel and it isn’t magic. It can make you forget that sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do to do the things you want to do. It can make you forget about others and focus too much on yourself. Most importantly, it can trap you and simply keep you there.

Self-help will make you forget what it really takes. You have to be aware of these things and combat it, and then self-help can work wonders for you.

I’m not pooping on it at all. Hell, I write self-help material and absorb it every day!

The great self-help advice is real. It tells it like it is and doesn’t butter things up. It may work out, or it might not. That can be depressing for some people. It was for me at first. But then I realized that it’s simply people that aren’t going to lie to you.

If anything. This “real-help” was only fuel for me to realize that life is much harder than the other material I was absorbing was making it out to be. This meant that I had to do much more than taking everything in, sitting and dreaming about the future or dwelling in the past.

You’re hardly consuming anything new at this point. I don’t think that’s a bad thing, though. I simply think that means you can spend less time consuming this stuff and more time actually…

The great self-help advice makes you realize that nothing will come your way, and to have even the hope of something coming your way you have to stop just consuming info and take…

But you already know this, don’t you?

Want “Real-Help”?

Any one of these amazing writers on Medium will do, they tell it like it is and don’t sugarcoat things for you: Ayodeji Awosika (check out his new book on “Real Help” here), Kris Gage, John Gorman, Jessica Wildfire, Nicolas Cole, Brianna Wiest, Niklas Göke, and Crystal Jackson.