17 - Will Storr - The Cult of Self-Esteem

7:02 Derren Brown’s book Happy
7:50 The positive thinking movement
9:18 The concept of the self from the ancient Greeks to Margaret Thatcher
22:33 Suicide
23:42 Being a Westerner at different points in history from the Medieval monasteries to Silicon Valley
25:11 “The Death of a Dreamer”: the story of Austen Heinz
36:37 Social perfectionism
43:26 Likeability
45:51 Self-loathing
50:06 Cognitive behavioural therapy, Adlerian psychology & other approaches
58:07 Connection versus status
1:03:33 Why do so many of the most loved people hate themselves?
1:06:10 Social media, narcissism & depression

Read more of Will Storr's writings here:
http://www.willstorr.com

Find Will's latest book, Selfie, here:
https://www.amazon.com/Selfie-How-West-Became-Self-Obsessed/dp/1447283643

Or follow Will on Twitter @wstorr.

Other references
Jonathan Gottschall, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human:
http://jonathangottschall.com/storytelling-animal

Derren Brown, Happy: Why More or Less Everything Is Absolutely Fine:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Happy-More-Less-Everything-Absolutely/dp/0593076192
I review this for Areo magazine here:
https://areomagazine.com/2019/01/21/in-praise-of-stoicism-derren-browns-happy-book-review/

You can find the Cosmopolitan March 2019 article about Jordan Peterson (“Why does every guy you know worship Jordan Peterson”) by searching for the keywords here:
https://www.pressreader.com/

The Esalen institute:
https://www.esalen.org/

Will’s article on Austen Heinz:
https://quillette.com/2019/01/30/the-death-of-a-dreamer/

David Burns website (an introduction to cognitive behavioural therapy, CBT):
https://feelinggood.com/

Ishiro Kishimi & Fumitake Koga, The Courage to be Disliked:
https://www.amazon.com/Courage-Be-Disliked-Phenomenon-Happiness-ebook/dp/B078MDSV8T

Jonathan Haidt, The Happiness Hypothesis:
https://www.amazon.com/Happiness-Hypothesis-Finding-Modern-Ancient/dp/0465028020

Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff, The Coddling of the American Mind:
https://www.thecoddling.com/

(I review this for Areo here:
https://areomagazine.com/2018/10/26/good-intentions-gone-awry-jonathan-haidt-and-greg-lukianoffs-the-coddling-of-the-american-mind-book-review/).

The ripple effect:
http://humanityhealing.org/who-we-are/the-ripple-effect/

For more on Mary Orben & her work on social media:
http://www.ox.ac.uk/news-and-events/find-an-expert/amy-orben

Jean Twenge: iGen: Why Today’s Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood:
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/iGen/Jean-M-Twenge/9781501152016