The books you read say a lot about what matters most to you. I was being nosy at a party this weekend, and looked at some of the books one of my guy friends and classmates here at HBS had.  When I playfully teased my friend about his one self-help book among his many business books, he said, “Oh, I have lots of self-help books. I love reading them.” I was impressed that he “admitted” loving self-help books since I think the genre as a whole gets a bad rap from the intellectual elite—who tend to believe that we can think and problem-solve our way out of any situation. I don’t know where the rest of his self-help books were, but it got me to thinking what one’s bookshelf says about you—and what some of us might want to do to “clean up our image.”

If someone walked into my room, I think a scan of my bookshelf would make me look self-absorbed, desperate to get married, and desperately seeking spiritual solutions. Now, all of these things are true to some degree, but my books would make me look like a sheer basketcase. I love self-help books and think that they really have the power to shift the way people think, incite people to address taboo subjects (like depression, abuse, addiction, etc.), and are even fun to read. I hope to be a paid and well-known self-help writer someday. However, I truly believe it may be in your best interest to read certain self-help books discreetly.

Because you guys love it when I talk about dating (I know because I get four times as much traffic for any post about dating than other topics), let’s take a tour of my dating/relationship books, and see why I keep them discreetly shelved behind other books.

A tour of Kaneisha’s Dating Books:

·         Why Men Love Bitches

·         Why Men Marry Bitches

·         He’s Just Not That Into You

·         Men are From Mars; Women are From Venus

·         Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man

·         Love in 90 Days

·         Living Through the Meantime

·         The Five Love Languages

With plans to purchase:

·         Why Him? Why Her?

·         The Rules

·         Men Are Like Fish

Now, why does any one person need that many dating and relationship books? In my own defense:

·         My passion: I love reading self-help books and I love learning about love! I really just cannot get enough of these books. I find them entertaining, enlightening, and great conversation pieces.

·         Cross-Referencing: The best books (such as the ones listed above) are consistent among one another with the advice they give. It does not get repetitive for me, because I appreciate hearing the advice from different perspectives and seeing how each author puts a different spin on the advice.

·         Self-Help: These books have helped me a lot in my dating life and in my relationships. Just today I referred to Men are From Mars; Women are From Venus to figure out how to bring something up that was bothering me to my boyfriend without making him feel blamed. The conversation went so much better than the other times I had tried it “on my own” and I realized once again how easy it is to improve communication if you are aware of productive and counter-productive methods of communication.

Looking Sane to Visitors

I don’t mean to contribute to the rhetoric that says that something is wrong with you if you read self-help books. I think people who read self-help books tend to be self-reflective, optimistic people who believe they can be even better people than they already are. However, a plethora of self-help books could cause some unease among a visitor—especially if that person is still getting to know you.

I shelve my dating books discreetly, because men hate the idea of being “studied” like a primate in the zoo. They don’t like the idea of a woman “scheming” how to “catch him” or “trick him” into doing something. Lots of men hate these dating books, because they feel like they encourage women to “play games,” be “high maintenance,” or be dishonest or inauthentic in some way. It’s a shame that men don’t actually pick up and read some of these books. I think that they would agree with most of what the authors are saying—and encourage more women to read them. However, most men are not about to hunker down with a Heineken and read Why Him? Why Her? They might curiously skim through it while you are in the bathroom, but that’s about it.

Therefore, I save myself the trouble of having to explain myself and the trouble of looking crazy or conniving by just shelving them behind more “appropriate” books like The Audacity of Hope. I don’t do it to be dishonest (I’m blogging about it after all). I just think that I have the right to display the books I choose to—and that I had better if I don’t want to scare my love interests away.

Here’s a list of made-up books that might scare off a woman if she saw them on her guy’s shelf:

·         How to Get out of Proposing: 7 Fool-Proof Ways to Stay off Your Knees

·         From Dinner to Bed: The Man’s Guide to a One-Night Stand

·         Tuning Her Out: How to Look Like You’re Listening

·         I’m Busy, I’m Tired, and Other Excuses She’ll Believe for Why You Aren’t Calling

·         Why Women Love Jerks

·         Third Time’s a Charm: How to Get Some as the Rebound Guy—Again

See how crazy he would seem? I do not mean to say that all men have the bad intentions insinuated by the books above, but I think these books would sell pretty well if someone wrote them in an engaging style with practical advice. In fact, books like this do exist, such as The Game: Penetrating the Society of Pickup Artists, which has 600 customer reviews. Ladies, I promise you that you will never see this book out where you can see it.

Just like guys hide their dirty videos, I hide my dating self-help books. Think about it.