Greg Gutfeld - Self-Help for People Who Hate Self-Help

ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

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The Joy of Hate

The Bible of Unspeakable Truths

Threshold Editions

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Copyright 2020 by Greg Gutfeld

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First Threshold Editions hardcover edition July 2020

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Interior design by Jaime Putorti

Jacket design by Jason Gabbert

Jacket photographs by Mark Mann

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Gutfeld, Greg, author.

Title: The plus : self help for people who hate self help / Greg Gutfeld.

Description: First Threshold Editions hardcover edition. | New York :

Threshold Editions, 2020. | Summary: From New York Times bestselling author Greg Gutfeld comes a self-help book for those who dont believe in self-help, advising readers with his trademark humor and skepticism how to command ourselves to make positive decisionsProvided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020008528 (print) | LCCN 2020008529 (ebook) | ISBN 9781982149918 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781982149925 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9781982149932 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Self-actualization (Psychology) | Decision making.

Classification: LCC BF637.S4 G89 2020 (print) | LCC BF637.S4 (ebook) | DDC 158.1dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020008528

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020008529

ISBN 978-1-9821-4991-8

ISBN 978-1-9821-4993-2 (ebook)

To Elena Moussa

(some lady I know)

I pretty much finished this book on the second week of January, 2020.

Around the same time, I was reading about some weird sickness erupting in China.

Tipped off in a Periscope podcast by Scott Adams, I started to obsessively pay attention to the frightening videos of nurses weeping in hospital scrubs, as body bags piled up.

Roughly ten days or so later, I went on The Five to demand we shut down travel from China to the United States. It should have been said sooner, but the media was still yakking about impeachment. Yep, impeachmentthe predetermined failure that occupied the press and their accomplices in government. Imagine, if just one reporter peeled himself away from that bitter exercise in futility to see what was going on in Wuhan, who knows if things would have been different. (A few of them, at Fox, did, actually.) Instead this idiotic adventure gobbled up the breathless media, the government, and the president. Sorry I know that assigning blame is pointless right now. Its a minus. Lets be a plus.

I sent the book off, and that seems like another century ago. Since then weve experienced a once-in-a-lifetime event that has changed our lives. We shut down our economy, watched the stock market crash, and socially distanced ourselves, as storefronts closed and odd people hoarded toilet paper. Also, people died. But hopefully, far, far fewer than expected, because of our collective action. Oh, how I hate that word collective. Its always on a flyer pinned to a bulletin board at an independent bookstore (Come join our vegan pacifist collective poetry group meeting every third Thursday of every month unless Mercury is in retrograde or I overslept). Its usually a code word for angry weirdos with purple hair.

But in this case, this collective was 340 million strong, and were, I hope, getting it done.

You could say This is just like a movie. But its not. Because in a movie, America would descend into violent chaos. Our streets would fill with maniacs. Wed turn on each other.

Reality, so far, proves the movies wrong. We didnt turn on each other. We turned toward each other. Obviously from a distance. But we did so to kick the viruss ass. I cant say if weve kicked its ass yet, because its the middle of April, and I am in lockdown, like you. But Im cautiously optimistic. Or optimistically cautious.

Because regardless of risk of sickness, and even risk of death, people are running toward the crisisnot away. How did we do that?

First, we accepted the brunt of the sacrifice, as a country. We voluntarily accepted draconian limits on our freedoms. We did it to save others, not just ourselves. Many of us could have continued to live normal lives. Most Americans under sixty-five probably would have been fine. In a country of 340 million, 1.5 million deadthats a third of 1 percent. Nearly 3 million die each year anyway, from all sorts of stuff. Who cares?

Well, we did. And we still do.

We refuse to stomach that loss. We could have let this virus run its course, but instead we dramatically changed our lives, to save those lives.

Sure, some went on spring break, but since when is it news that young people do stupid things? I just wish their parents hadnt paid for their flights. Theyre the jerks in this storybecause theyre adults, with actual brains.

Let that go. After all, so many people did so many great things.

There are the doctors, nurses, paramedics, ER staff, and rest-home workers on the front lines, doing what was necessary, even if it might kill them. Ranchers, farmers, and truckers keep the food going, grocery clerks restock as they deal with panicked customers and hoarders. Pharmaceutical companies donate meds. People float loans to workers. Every person who could offer some benefit has done so. In this crisis, its like assholes simply disappeared (although you could still find a few in the media, in the usual spots).

Everyone became a plus. Which made it harder for the minuses to hide.

As my wife could attest, I have almost no real talents that could save the earth. I cant fix things; I only break them. I am not the person to ask when you need help moving.

However, the help I giveif you askcomes in a check. Ill pay for the move, so we can go out and drink.

Thats one of my two pluses. I throw cash at peoples problems. The other plus: offering optimism and hope on the shows I host. I think that matters.

Its a strange coincidence that I decided to write a self-help book about becoming a better person, before a massive, horrifying event that demands all of us to become better people. I can actually put the principles into action myself. And I can watch others do the same. Its unreal, how the chapters seem to fit with this challenge.

For example, in this book I suggested cultivating your own curriculumlearning new skills to make you feel extra awesome. And, lo and behold, that has become a potent prescription during the claustrophobic moments of this pandemic: if youre home right now, and cant do anythingI say that you can: consider this moment an opportunity to get better at stuff (and life). I say this, though, realizing its not so easy when nothings going into your bank account.