Tedcore: the self-help books that have changed the way we live, speak and think

Unveiling the transformative power of Tedcore, a genre of self-help literature that has revolutionized our lives, reshaped our communication, and redefined our thought processes. Discover how these books have become instrumental in personal and societal change.

Tedcore is a sub-genre of self-help books that combines the comforting yet impenetrable vocabulary of modern therapy with pseudoscientific grand theories on human behavior

These books peddle feel-good Marvel movie versions of philosophy that don’t challenge our conceptions, but validate our feelings, often backing up their circular logic with dubious “research” and “experts”.

The Body Keeps The Score by Bessel van der Kolk

Our bodies remember traumatic events and will chemically induce anxious responses when triggered, even if we know our tragedy is behind us

• With a combination of pharmaceuticals, specialized forms of CBT and other physical interventions, we might convince our brain to stop reliving trauma in a way that simple talk therapy can’t accomplish
• The way forward is not looking outward, but looking in

Those looking for a mirror will surely find it in Attached

The book peddles attachment theory, dividing all people on Earth into three “attachment styles” – secure, anxious, and avoidant

• Attachment security: directs us to the “comfort zone”
• Deactivating strategies: leads us to a “danger zone” where our “signals” are viewed as threats
• Esther Perel, a Belgian couples therapist and author of Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence
• A sex-positive European, she eschews Freud and looks down on American puritanism
• She has a mission: to get her heterosexual readers in frustrated marriages to have more sex
• While she is brave enough to speak about the bottom’s desire for submission, she still studiously avoids Freud, or truly plumbing the depths of human desire

Her book is organized as a dictionary of emotional terms

In large font on glossy pages, she demystifies apparently inscrutable emotions like “joy” or “despair” by consulting Merriam-Webster then reporting back:

• “Vulnerability is the emotion we experience during times of uncertainty, crisis and emotional exposure.”
• On regret: “Both disappointment and regret arise when an outcome was not what we wanted.”

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Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones

Renaming things that already exist

• Stacking: doing something after you do another thing
• Temptation bundling: offering yourself a little treat for doing your stacked habits
• All habits consist of a “cue, craving, response, and reward”

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