312. Can self improvement go too far?
The Psychology of your 20s
iHeartPodcasts
4.9 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 11 July 2025
⏱️ 62 minutes
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Summary
Does chasing your "best self" ever feel like an endless race? You're constantly striving, optimizing your routines, and learning new skills, yet sometimes a quiet exhaustion creeps in, or you wonder if you're truly any happier. It's as if the very pursuit of perfection leaves you feeling perpetually inadequate. In today's episode, we're diving into the hidden costs of this modern obsession with betterment: when personal growth can go too far.
Things we discuss:
• The deep-seated desire to grow and reach our potential
• The impact of societal pressures and the booming self-improvement industry
• Understanding the roles of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation
• When toxic over-striving is disguised as discipline
• Self-improvement burnout
• Actionable ways to cultivate sustainable growth
If the non-stop quest for "more" sometimes leaves you feeling depleted, this episode is for you.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello everybody and welcome back to the psychology of your 20s, the podcast where we talk |
| 0:11.2 | through some of the big life changes and transitions of our 20s and what they mean for our psychology. |
| 0:23.8 | Hello everybody. Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to the podcast. New listeners, |
| 0:29.9 | old listeners, wherever you are in the world. It is so great to have you here back for another |
| 0:34.9 | episode as we of course break down the psychology of our 20s. |
| 0:40.1 | If you have read the title of today's episode, you will know exactly what we're talking about. |
| 0:45.7 | And what we are talking about is the tricky trap of self-improvement, when it goes too far, |
| 0:52.6 | whether there is such a thing as too much self-help content, |
| 0:55.8 | and whether it is beneficial to constantly be chasing something better for ourselves or improving |
| 1:03.5 | our lives. Let me firstly begin by addressing this. The irony is not lost on me that you are tuning into what is, |
| 1:13.1 | in essence, a self-help podcast, and yet we are talking about the downfalls of self-help, right? |
| 1:20.7 | You know, I have literally written a self-help book. It is titled Person in Progress. Like, |
| 1:27.2 | there is probably not a more self-helpy. It is titled Person in Progress. Like there is probably not a more |
| 1:29.7 | self-helpy title for a book out there than that. And a lot of what I speak about on this podcast |
| 1:35.5 | is really geared towards knowing yourself better, knowing your brain better, knowing your |
| 1:40.5 | psychology, elevating ourselves. And yet in the background, personally, I have become a |
| 1:45.7 | little bit disenfranchised with this kind of approach to our lives, with this feeling that there is |
| 1:50.9 | constantly something that we need to improve, we need to fix, we need to work on. Personally, you know, |
| 1:56.9 | I think I have taken self-improvement way too far in the past and I have fallen into |
| 2:01.6 | trap of thinking that if I just wake up at 5am, if I just quit caffeine, if I just do as many |
| 2:07.1 | meditation retreats as possible, if I read that book, if I only listen to motivational podcasts, |
| 2:13.0 | my life will be better and I will finally uncover the secret to happiness. Guess what? None of those |
... |
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