Half Truths

This entry is part 2 of 3 in the series Insights into the Spiritual and Self-Help Industry

Paradoxical Industry

Suppose you have a fever, and you go to a doctor. The doctor gives you some medicine, and you come home. After a few days, you become healthy.  So the ultimate work of the doctor was to make you healthy so that you don’t have to go back to the doctor again. 

Another such example is dating apps. The goal of using a dating app is to find someone and stop using it.

Similarly, when you go to someone for help, and guidance in life, you hope to solve your problems. 

Ideally, when you seek help and guidance, it should make you self-sufficient so that you don’t have to ask anyone for help anymore. 

Today guidance giving has turned into an industry, the self-help industry. The industry is driven by money. When money is involved, there is a high chance of corruption. There was a reason in ancient Indian society, that spiritual saints (Guru), and doctors (vaidya) were given the highest place in society. They were trusted to be incorruptible. Corruption in any other industry is detrimental to humanity, yet it is ok. But as I see corruption in the medical, self-help and spirituality industry can break an individual totally. The self-help/spiritual industry is paradoxical, and like any industry, it is susceptible to corruption.

Half-Truths

Truth cannot be written or spoken. At best half-truths can be written or spoken. And half-truths are half-lies also. 

All pieces of advice are half-truths. There are always two sides to a piece of advice. Here are some examples to this

Example-1

I was just researching the best self-improvement advice on the internet.  I saw one, 

Always compete with yourself. Never with others. 

The advice sounds great. It makes sense not to compete with others, but to improve yourself.  So one person reads this, and from next day he starts to take it seriously. What happens when you really take it seriously is that: 

  • You are always trying to compete with yourself. It is like you are pushing your boundaries, challenging yourself, putting yourself in uncomfortable places and learning new things. 
  • Slowly you will be too hard on yourself. You are always trying to be a better version of yourself from yesterday.
  • After a while, it becomes a self-harming idea. You push yourself too hard, or else you feel like less of a person.  In this process, you start to harm yourself.
Example-2

Suppose you want to have better conversations with people. So you went on the internet to search for how to improve my conversational skills with people in general. Of all the advice you came across, one resonated with you: 

Listen to people more. What they are saying, how they are saying. Pay attention to their ideas. People love to be understood and listened to. 

And you realize that I tend to listen less. So next time you went out, or to meet a friend or on a date, you thought ok I will try to listen more now.  So you are in the middle of a conversation, and you start to implement your newfound idea. What really happens is, you force yourself to listen to another person. And eventually, it becomes like you are concentrating on another person. Slowly it will feel awkward to you and the other person as well. After trying this out for few times you will think, ok this does not really work. 

The idea sounded very good, but it does not really work when you seriously implement it.

Example-3

Someone who is an over-thinker always gets this advice from everyone that 

“Don’t overthink, just do it.”

If you have been an over-thinker, and let’s say you start to take this advice seriously one day. Slowly if you have a bit of self-awareness you will realize that by taking this idea seriously you are making rash decisions, you are making decisions without thinking at all. 

So a piece of advice like “Don’t overthink, just do it.” seems like a great idea for an over-thinker, but it does not really work in real life. 

Whenever we are faced with such a problem that I described in previous examples in life, we immediately shrug off saying

I should be more balanced. That is why these ideas/advice didn’t work for me.

Now what has happened is that, we have given ourselves a new piece of advice.

But I guarantee you that if you apply the above sentence and try to balance yourself, you will realize that also doesn’t work. I can’t give a specific example, but you have to try it to see it.


You can take any advice from any self-help/spiritual scriptures, it does not matter if it is said by an enlightened person. You will find that if you really start applying it very very seriously, and rigorously, it will not work after a while. 

If you read a sentence or listen to a piece of advice, and think that “Ah! I got it. This is the right thing for me, I know what to do now.” Always remember that 

Your awareness has not reached a point where you see the stupidity of that idea as well. 

What it really means is that an idea/advice is only true and helpful at one moment and something completely opposite of that idea may be helpful at the very next moment. A single idea can’t fit every moment in life, as every moment is unique and new.

Series Navigation<< Spirituality, Self-Help Industry and SeekerMost self-help/spiritual contents are fear-driven >>
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