Editor’s note: This article was first published in August 2010. The list of the ten most searched-for self-help books is a 2010 ranking of Spanish-language titles, and the original gives no source for it.
The books people look for reveal society’s worries and, therefore, consumer needs. I’ve heard psychologists say that self-help books that aren’t written by professionals may be of no use at all.
I think that someone who has lived through an experience doesn’t need to study psychology to get across the message they want to share. The clearest example was Allen Carr and his book The Easy Way to Stop Smoking (published in Spanish as Es fácil dejar de fumar si sabes cómo).
Allen Carr had everything he needed to get a message across: he had been a chain smoker and had managed to quit easily. He shared his method with the whole world and helped thousands of people everywhere kick the habit. Here is the list of the 10 most searched-for self-help books right now:
- No consigo adelgazar (“I can’t lose weight”), by Pierre Dukan
- Cinco días para aprender inglés (“Five days to learn English”), by Robert Wilson
- La inutilidad del sufrimiento (“The uselessness of suffering”), by María Jesús Álava Reyes
- Reinventarse, tu segunda oportunidad (“Reinventing yourself, your second chance”), by Mario Alonso
- Método Pretabac de autoayuda para dejar de fumar (“The Pretabac self-help method to quit smoking”), by Carlos Andrés Jiménez
- Mobbing, manual de autoayuda (“Workplace bullying: a self-help manual”), by Iñaki Piñuel
- El futuro empieza hoy (“The future starts today”), by Norbert Bilbeny
- El secreto (The Secret), by Rhonda Byrne
- No puedo más (“I can’t take any more”), by Lory A. Leyden
- La paradoja, relato sobre la verdadera esencia del liderazgo (“The paradox: a story about the true essence of leadership”)
And let’s not forget all the self-help books that came out during the crisis to give us ideas on how to earn extra money or how to boost our skills as entrepreneurs and investors.
For free book downloads, we shared a link in a previous article on downloading free books, where there is a wide variety of books to download.
We also published a post that I hope will help you save money and generate extra income from your savings: ideas for saving money and making money from saving.
And for those of you who love the pursuit of wealth and financial freedom, I strongly recommend reading how to become a millionaire: the only secrets, where we set out the only keys to reaching financial freedom. When it comes to getting rich, there aren’t many secrets, just a few guidelines to follow.
As for self-help books, whether they are good or not depends on the faith you place in the person who wrote them. Nobody but you can decide whether a book is useful or not. Remember that there is a wide range of opinions on every aspect of life.
Featured image: Tziaraa, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
