Filmmaker Matt D'Avella is a self-avowed self-help addict, and has read over 100 books which purport to make readers happier, healthier and more successful, from The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle to Deep Work by Cal Newport to How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. In a new video on his YouTube channel, D'Avella shares everything he has learned.
"Taking action, no matter how small, is the key to making progress," he says. "If the goal is to actually make improvements in your life, whether it's for your business, finances, or mental health, it's essential to make sure you're taking these small steps forward, not just theorizing what might actually work."
D'Avella has come up with his own general rule when it comes to self-help books: take three concepts from what you've just read, and try to put them into practice in your daily life. (To be fair, if you're reading the sheer volume of self-help content that he is, remembering more than two or three takeaways is going to be pretty difficult.)
He also recommends avid, prolific note-taking, and advises not being too precious about earmarking or annotating your books, as making a log of the most impactful points will help you to remember them. "The convenience of audiobooks and digital e-readers is huge, and I still use them to this day, but nothing beats reading from an actual book," he says. "It's easier to take notes, find exactly what you're looking for in the future, and it's so much stickier for your brain to read from a physical book."
Perhaps most importantly, though, is avoiding the impulse to recreate everything you've read in a one-size-fits-all fashion, and taking everything you read with the tiniest pinch of salt.
"Just because something worked for the author, doesn't mean it's going to work for you," says D'Avella. "One of the biggest mistakes people make when reading self-help books is to blindly follow the advice being shared... It's your responsibility to question everything and ask yourself, how can I adapt this to work for my life?"
