Self Helping Yourself

The Weight Loss Habit – Coming June 9

May 13, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks Leave a Comment

I’m thrilled to announce that my book The Weight Loss Habit: The No BS, No Gimmick, (Sort of) Easy Way to Lose Weight and Keep It Off Forever will be released on June 9, and is available for Pre-Order.

I’ve been teasing this book for quite some time, and am excited that this is finally happening. I do hope you’ll check it out.

Losing weight doesn’t have to be hard

Have you always struggled with your weight? Have you tried countless diets you couldn’t stick to? Do you gain the weight back as soon as you stop? Have you resigned yourself to a life of being heavier than you’d like?

I used to be like you. I grew up fat and had many failed diet attempts. Then I stumbled onto the right way to lose weight. I’ve kept the weight off for twenty years now, and it wasn’t even that difficult.… Read more

Keep a “Something I Like About Myself” Journal to Improve Your Mood [Guest Post]

May 12, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks Leave a Comment

(This post about keeping a “Something I Like About Myself” journal is from friend of the blog John Tchoe. If you are interested in writing a guest post, please e-mail stevenraymarks at gmail.com.)

I don’t know how needs this, but I had an idea this morning that may help some of you out there.

Every day for the last couple months, I’ve been filling a page with sentences beginning with, “I am grateful…”

I’ve found that this simple exercise has made me feel happier and reduces stress. It makes me feel like a lucky and fortunate person, and makes me want to be more generous toward others.

Defeating Negative Self-Talk

So this morning, I thought, what if you were to turn that inward?

I know a lot of people struggle with negative self-talk, and in their heads, are constantly putting themselves down.

When they are thinking about doing something, they say, “You’ll probably just screw it up again.”… Read more

Announcing A New Site Focus

May 8, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks Leave a Comment

I’m excited to announce that I’ve changed the tagline of the site to “Self Improvement Made Easy.”

I’ve also added a new top-level essay called “Don’t Challenge Yourself!” I recommend reading it to explain the new focus of the site.

Clarifying Focus

Why did I make this change?

Self Helping Yourself previously had the tagline “Self Improvement For Skeptics.”

Whenever I told people about the site, I always had to clarify what this meant. I had a link from the top of the site to an 1,800 word essay explaining it.

The short definition is that my skeptical approach tries to find self-improvement methods that work by avoiding the mystical and the excessively difficult, and embracing the positive.

But that isn’t evident from the tagline. Maybe you could guess that I avoid the mystical. But nothing about “for skeptics” suggests that I favor a positive approach to self-improvement, or that I oppose suggestions that are unfeasibly difficult.… Read more

The No Snerking Rule is an Easy Way to Be Happier

May 1, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks 2 Comments

Nelson Muntz saying "Ha Ha!" to represent snerking

I have a rule for myself: No snerking.

What does snerking mean? It’s mocking people who have different ideas or beliefs, in a way that expresses smug superiority.

The difference between snark and snerk is that snark is sarcastically mocking something; snerk is mocking something while demonstrating you believe the people connected to it are inferior and you are better than them.

(Note that the definition I’m using doesn’t quite match up to the dictionary or Urban Dictionary, though Urban Dictionary definitions 3 and 5 come close.)

Why do I have this rule? There are many reasons, but the most important is that refraining from snerking improves my mood, outlook, and happiness.

Snerking Trains You to Be Unhappy

Snerking can be fun. I won’t deny that.

So is eating a daily tub of ice cream, riding a motorcycle with no helmet, and drinking 12 shots of tequila. That doesn’t make them good ideas.… Read more

Self-Editing Yourself Can Keep You Out of Trouble

April 23, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks Leave a Comment

Pen crossing out words to symbolize self-editing yourself.

The name of this site is Self Helping Yourself, but today I want to talk about Self-Editing Yourself.

Some Examples of Self-Editing Yourself

To clarify what I mean by self-editing yourself, let me give you a few examples from my own life.

I previously mentioned that a couple weeks ago I spent two days writing a blog post, only to abandon it before publishing because I realized it was kind of obnoxious.

This recently happened again. I started writing a post, and the further I got into it, the more I sensed it was going off the rails.

I took a break to do some random chores, and then kept doing additional random chores to avoid returning to the post. Normally once I start a post, I’m excited to finish. But this seemed like a burden. Eventually I realized it was my subconscious telling me the post was all wrong and I should throw it away.… Read more

Eating Fast Food For Fun And Weight Loss

April 17, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks 2 Comments

Fast food is the bogeyman of the health industry. But you can eat fast food and lose weight if you do it in the right way. Here are some strategies on how to do so.

Tooting My Own Horn – And Why You Should Too

April 15, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks 1 Comment

Alpine horn with caption "I'm Just Here to Toot My Own Horn"

In general I try to avoid tooting my own horn. When I was younger, I was quite arrogant, and in many ways that made me an unlikable person. Eventually I grew out of that, and learned to not rank myself or other people.

But as someone who advocates positive-oriented self-improvement, I believe it’s important to celebrate successes.

Celebrating Our Achievements

It’s worth remembering for all of us that huge wins and achievements are special. Nobody likes a braggart who constantly goes on about how great he is. But big accomplishments don’t come along every day. That’s what makes them big accomplishments, and they are big deals.

You should be excited about them. If you don’t share that excitement with others, they either won’t think it’s important, or won’t know it happened at all. Then the excitement and joy you ought to be feeling over this epic win will be diminished and hollow.… Read more

The Coronavirus Lazies Are Nothing to Be Ashamed Of – And Some Tips to Fight Them

April 13, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks 2 Comments

Woman laying on bed to represent Coronavirus Lazies

Lately many of us have been feeling the Coronavirus Lazies. The Coronavirus Lazies is the mix of loneliness, depression, worry, and stir-craziness that makes it hard to motivate ourselves to do basic functions like showering, putting on pants, and keeping our homes in any vague semblance of order.

The Pressure to Be Amazing Despite the Coronavirus Lazies

Yet I keep seeing challenges and demands that people use the quarantine time to complete some sort of grand project. These come in the forms of memes and attempts to be motivational from a certain type of self-help guru.

Obnoxious Jeremy Haynes tweet accusing people of lacking discipline.

These tell people that they have an obligation to take advantage of this global tragedy to produce something amazing. If instead they fall prey to the Coronavirus Lazies, they should be ashamed of themselves.

Even when advice-givers are less obnoxious about it than that Jeremy Haynes tweet, the message is still the same. I was recently taking a webinar about book marketing, and the instructor acknowledged that we’re all suffering from COVID doldrums, and sometimes it’s hard to just get out of bed.… Read more

Just a Funny Story About Kittens

April 10, 2020 by Steven Ray Marks 1 Comment

A pile of kittens as main image for a funny story about kittens

Here’s a funny story about kittens.

Yes, I know that’s not what I usually talk about. But I haven’t had any real content this week, other than announcing that I now have affiliate links.*

I’ve been working on a long post that’s about a sensitive issue where I want to take extra care to not be hurtful, and haven’t quite gotten it to the point where it’s ready to be published. (And I’m debating whether I should publish it at all.) I have another post semi-written in my head about giving ourselves a break during the COVID crisis. But now it’s Friday afternoon, which is a terrible time to publish a blog post. So that will have to wait for Monday morning.

But two of my Rules to Live By are “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good” and “Doing something 30% is better than not doing it at all.”… Read more