Help Me
My Perfectly Disastrous Journey through the World of Self-Help
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4.1 • 22 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A hilarious and heartwarming rampage through the world of self-care
Marianne Power was a self-help junkie. For years she lined her bookshelves with dog-eared copies of definitive guide after definitive guide on how to live your best life. Yet one day she woke up to find that the life she dreamed of and the life she was living were not miles but continents apart. So she set out to make a change. Or, actually, to make every change.
Marianne decided to finally find out if her elusive perfect life—the one without debt, anxiety, hangovers or Netflix marathons, the one where she healthily bounced around town with perfect teeth to meet the cashmere-sweater-wearing man of her dreams—lay in the pages of those books. So for a year she vowed to test a book a month, following its advice to the letter, taking the surest road she knew to a perfect Marianne.
As her year-long plan turned into a demented roller coaster where everything she knew was turned upside down, she found herself confronted with a different question: Self-help can change your life, but is it for the better?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this frank, funny, and occasionally heartbreaking debut, journalist Power ably lays bare her yearlong quest to live by the tenets of a different self-help book every month. Power reads Rhonda Burns's The Secret, Get the Guy by Matthew Hussey, and Tony Robbins's Unleash the Power Within. Taking a retreat based on John C. Parkin's F**k It: The Ultimate Spiritual Way, Power travels to Italy with other self-help junkies. None of the ideas changed her life, but Power's book itself becomes her key to self-help. She ruminates on the endless quest to be the best person possible, and the many detours it has inspired. She believes that continually setting the bar higher has made her feel like a failure, and that "perfection 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." Already a bestseller in Power's native England, the book will surely find a welcoming American readership. Power's total honesty and openness will make readers realize that, at heart, everyone has similar secret fears and insecurities.
Customer Reviews
Perfect timing
For me, I found this book at the perfect time. I was becoming a self-help junkie. I identified with so many experiences Marianne was going through- including being mid-30’s and single. I connected to this book in a surprising way. I laughed a lot and appreciated the honesty. If you have a background in reading self-help books you’ll love this book!