[yesenadam]

>"There is a great deal of money to be made by those who diagnose and treat our fears of inadequacy; Cederström and Spicer estimate that the self-improvement industry takes in ten billion dollars a year."

That seemed a strange sentence, so I read the article; still seemed as strange. Not sure what you'd have to believe to be able to write that. If I write—

"There is a great deal of money to be made by those who diagnose and treat our fears of inadequacy; the medical industry takes in ten billion dollars a year."

—hopefully the incoherence is more obvious. It seems the original was ridicule dressed up as science.

I guess I could perceive that because I bought quite a few self-help-type books of various kinds, and got a lot from them; they helped me immeasurably. I'm not really a course/group kind of guy, but I did one 2-week course that was amazing. I don't think any of it was due to my "fears of inadequacy". It was more my wanting to learn about myself/humans, to overcome problems I had from childhood, to be happier, to have better relationships; stuff like that. And I think I've achieved all that. :-D (Well, it's a neverending journey..)