Self-Help Mantras Screw You Up

Here is an interesting article about how self-help mantras aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.

The researchers, from the University of Waterloo and the University of New Brunswick, asked people with high and low self-esteem to say “I am a lovable person.”

They then measured the participants’ moods and their feelings about themselves.

In the low self-esteem group, those who repeated the mantra felt worse afterwards compared with others who did not.

However people with high self-esteem felt better after repeating the positive self-statement – but only slightly.

I’ve always thought this stuff was bullshit; it’s nice for my inclination to be confirmed by some research.