Help Me, I Think I'm Falling

For this shite again. In a new book, former self-help editor/current self-help exposer Steve Salerno argues that, within the "Self-Help and Actualization Movement (SHAM)"

the talks and tapes offer a momentary boost of inspiration that fades after a few weeks, turning buyers into repeat customers. While Salerno was a self-help book editor for Rodale Press... extensive market surveys revealed that "the most likely customer for a book on any given topic was someone who had bought a similar book within the preceding eighteen months." The irony of "the eighteen-month rule" for this genre, Salerno says, is this: "If what we sold worked, one would expect lives to improve. One would not expect people to need further help from us--at least not in that same problem area, and certainly not time and time again."

Surrounding SHAM is a bulletproof shield: if your life does not get better, it is your fault--your thoughts were not positive enough. The solution? More of the same self-help--or at least the same message repackaged into new products.

Hmm. Why do I read this and think, "Tom Cruise"?

Link via 43 Folders.