Why I Turned to Spirituality Instead of Self-Help
When I first started my healing journey, I thought loving myself meant fixing myself.
I devoured every self-help book I could find. I highlighted the affirmations, I made lists of habits, and followed every method that promised confidence, productivity, and growth. And for a while, it felt like I was making progress.
But underneath it, there was still a quiet ache.
A pressure to become someone better.
A belief that I was only worthy if I could become a more polished version of myself.
Self-help told me I needed to change.
Spirituality reminded me I was already whole.
There’s a big difference between improving your life and believing you need to improve yourself to be lovable.
Self-help often operates from a subtle message:
“Here’s how to fix your flaws.”
“Here’s how to become someone worthy.”
And sometimes, it becomes a performance.
As Mark Manson writes in his brilliant piece “5 Problems With the Self-Help Industry”,
“Self‑help reinforces perceptions of inferiority and shame. … The irony here is that the pre‑requisite for self‑help to be effective is the one crucial thing that self‑help cannot help: accept yourself as a good person who makes mistakes.”
That line stopped me in my tracks, because I’d been living it.
I was consuming all the right advice, doing all the right routines, but underneath it all, I still believed something was wrong with me.
Every journal prompt became a checklist.
Every morning routine felt like an audition.
I wasn’t healing. I was trying to earn my love.
Why I Chose Spirituality Instead (A Softer Path of Inner Truth)
Spirituality, for me, was a soft return. A way back to who I am underneath the fear and conditioning. It didn’t ask me to become more. It asked me:
To meet myself where I was.
To listen instead of force.
To trust instead of prove.
I no longer try to impress anyone except two versions of myself:
My inner child, who wants to feel safe, seen, and loved
My higher self, who intuitively knows where I’m going
Spirituality taught me how to be the parent my inner child needed. How to listen for those quiet, intuitive whispers that know what I want, before I’ve even said it aloud. How to trust my knowing, even when the world says “do more.”
When I honour those two voices—my past self and my highest self—I feel anchored.
I can finally exhale.
I don’t need to fix anything at all.
Self-doubt doesn’t survive when you know yourself deeply. Fear softens when you realise you already have your own back. Unworthiness melts when you finally believe, to your core, that you’re enough.
That’s the shift.
These days, I still read and reflect—but not to change who I am. I’m not chasing the “best” version of myself anymore. I’m coming home to the truest one.
And I’ve realised that the highest version of myself doesn’t need to be perfect. She just needs to be loved. By me.
A Note To You,
What if you stopped trying to prove yourself and started trying to know yourself?
When you learn to love everything you are, flaws and all, you realise that knowing yourself to the core is the biggest superpower you own.
