Self-help is selfish.

I've been at the self-help game a long time. I read the book "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie when I was 11 years old. I remember listening to Tony Robbins tapes not long after. I've always had a borderline insane drive to improve myself. I thought self-help was the path to success. If you work on yourself, your career, your relationships, your everything would go great.

The fruits of working on oneself are indeed tangible. From a stronger physical body and higher energy to happier relationships and sharpened skills, improving oneself can help us gain traction in our lives. I know that reading books like "The Art of Gathering" or "How to Win Friends and Influence People" shaped how I think about social interactions, hosting, and getting to know people. Psychology books like "Attached" and "Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors" have given me powerful models to relate to and regulate myself. A meditation practice has brought me deep awareness of my body and my thoughts. "Know Thyself" is some of the most ancient and true wisdom after all (though to be fair, that is distinct from "Improve Thyself").

There is a shadow to self-help though. It is easy to make a career out of it, to make it one's obsession, one's raison d'être. One can spend inordinate amounts of time and mental energy improving oneself. This is not inherently bad or wrong, but I've been reflecting on where self-improvement fits in the balance of our lives.

As an OG self-help junkie, I now find myself questioning its purpose. I'm admitting myself to the ward here. I've recently found myself thinking, "I'm done with all this self-help stuff." This doesn't mean that I will stop improving myself, but I keep asking what it's all for. What is all this self-help for? Who is it for? Myself? Yikes. Only me?

Tony Robbins has intense daily rituals around regulating his energy. A 3-minute cryo chamber in the morning to energize (formerly a 3-5 minute cold plunge first thing in the morning), breathing exercises to change mental states, gratitude practices, exercise regimens, supplements of all sorts, you name it. He seems to do it all.

Here's the difference between Tony and me. Tony actually needs all that self-work to perform at a high level for his work. His schedule is exhausting with the number of high-energy seminars he puts on. The man is a beast, and his work demands a level of performance that his self-help regimens support.

Myself, on the other hand? There are certainly demands on my schedule, and I do keep busy between two careers, but the key difference isn't just the amount of work. It's the purpose. Tony has a deep drive to serve others on a massive scale. His self-help is not selfish. His self-help is in service to people -- to his career and his audience.

I have come to believe that self-help is best when in service to others. I think more and more about what legacy I want to leave, how helping and improving myself can translate to helping others. I'll be honest, I don't have a great answer yet. But the seed is planted.

So I invite us to ask: who is our self-help for?