I’m quite active over on Goodreads, and am experimenting with bringing some of my book review stuff over here on this blog, too. Let me know if you like it, or if I’ve lost my whole mind. I’m also going to post this as a book review there.

I’ve reached saturation point with Instagram posts masquerading as whole-ass books. You know what I’m talking about, right? The endless self-help about setting boundaries, respecting your true inner-calling, and blah blah blah.

The discomfit has been rising in me for some time. Self-help used to be straight-forward hokey, like Susan Jeffers’ Feel the Fear … and Do It Anyway, which has a good message but also a whole lot of shameless copywriter tricks. You could see the exclamation points and know you were choking down a marketing platform, along with the timeless advice to get over yourself.

I’ve read many books of the Influencer Self-Help Variety before. It just so happened to be Pooja Lakshmin’s A Transformative Program for Redefining Wellness: Real Self-Care (Crystals, Cleanses, and Bubble Baths Not Included) that threw me over the edge. I feel bad about this, because in reading the book, I quickly come to like her as a person and more or less agree with her political inclinations.

And her basic point is spot-on:

“Self-care” as we know it is commodified and stupid (steamed vaginal eggs, anyone)? To retreat into floofy, femininey products or services for purchase won’t really get at the root causes of what you need. What you need is boundaries, girl! P.S. The world is an asshole to women. We’re expected to do everything, and enjoy putting others first. WTAF?

The problem is, the above can easily be accomplished in a short series of slides, or a quick video. Maybe an op-ed for those who hit it big time. And it is. All the time. By influencers. The author included. But the Penguin Life imprint slid in and decided to make this a pulp-and-cover thing, and got my library involved. Which is where I picked it up.

I have some regrets, because while Lakshmin’s basic message is sound, as a bound book it’s frustrating.

Instead of being straight-forward, hokey self-help, which back in the rugged, pre-social media days was at least honest about what it was doing (giving the author a platform for speaking engagements, where the money is!), it lulls into that luscious mix of glittering generalities and carefully negotiated vulnerability (with micro-doses of trauma dumping) that is associated with influencers. It speaks directly to you.

But also, it holds back. This is frustrating, because there is so much more that could be said. Lakshmin commits the error editor and author Susan Bell warns writers to stay away from–holding back your best material for another time. You’ve got to use your best material now. In this case, Lakshmin repeatedly alludes to having joined a female orgasm meditation cult because she bottomed out with stress, which ultimately wound up being the opposite of the real self-care she needed.

Holy batman, that’s such a good story! We could all learn something there! But instead of telling us that story, she alludes to it what feels like dozens times without ever trusting her readers enough to let us in. We receive an empty preach instead, with a small dose of “trust me, because I’ve been there.” Take us there, hon. We can handle it. We’d probably learn a lot.

Mostly, I found the book frustrating because it seemed an inevitable variant rejection of Lean In, and instead of getting interesting and embracing a dialectic, by which I mean resolving multiple seemingly opposing ideas to get at something deeper, it’s just backlash. In other words, instead of Sheryl Sandberg telling you to be the boss, whatever it takes, Lakshmin encourages you to tell off the boss, no matter how crummy that makes you feel, because you need to rest.

How do we get enough rest and build power? Seize power? How do we change the nature of power? Get comfy cozy with power? How can we do this when women are expected to do more, for less pay, or no pay, and 9/10 are not gonna simply ditch their family obligations? These are serious questions.

Too serious for an approach that mirrors content.