The Guru-Bro’s Click Bait Self-Improvement Tropes Distorting Your Reality and Making you Miserable

“Fasten your seatbelts… this post is way more unhinged than I originally planned…”

In the past I’ve posted challenges to switch off social media for 31 days, and how social media is killing your wellbeing.

I’ve never quite had the strength to switch off altogether, but decided a good way to reduce my use was to be strategic and limit my presence to a few platforms.

I uninstalled Facebook and Instagram, I decided to offboard the Threads hype train before it even had a chance to leave the station (after all I realised the last thing I needed was to have yet another a profile declaring my existence in this world).

…And I haven’t used my personal Twitter(X) for over a year.

The idea to get off Twitter began years before it even became cool. Every time I logged onto the former bird app (sometimes dozens of times a day) I would come away feeling hollow.

Perhaps it was the quality of the people I followed, but it got to a point like I was spending all my free time being lectured at, and told I was failing at everything in short snippet format by influencer bros.

My motivation to join came from old blogging advice that you needed to be on the socials “to grow”, and somewhere along the way realised tweeting your latest post wasn’t the way to get noticed, so stuck around to build “my brand reputation.”

Even further on I realised I was spending more time engaging in pointless conversations, and trying to brainstorm short McAdvice, than actually doing what I enjoyed – writing blog posts, so one day I decided I would stop visiting and stop tweeting altogether.

Curiosity took me back to my XBird profile in January with thoughts of restarting, and see what I’d been missing.

It took me about a minute to realise: not much.

There were still anon accounts hiding behind classical statues with bad repurposed stoicism for the zoomer generation.

Still big claims of big success, with zero proof.

Still people saying to do this, or do that, or you’re… (weak, not a man, a loser, a normie… whatever).

And still accounts stroking their own ego’s drunk in the belief they were some unique dreamweaver standing out from the dullness of the normal crowd.

Now with new clarity it all just seemed so phoney and unnatural to have people posting random self-improvement thoughts – I mean what are you supposed to do with that? Let’s be honest TwitBird is just something to pass the time on the toilet.

My short return made me think why did I spend so much time (and participate) in the first place?

It was branded as ‘self-improvement’ but really it was toxic positivity of humble bragging and condescension designed to make consumers of this ‘content’ feel insecure and depressed.

You couldn’t enjoy success because there was always someone doing better.

You couldn’t be happy because someone was telling you what you were doing was wrong (or not enough).

Your view of reality on self-improvement Xitter is warped by all the inspiration bro gurus. And why? So they could sell you a book, or a course, or a program!

When using self-improvement social media I advise caution, you can think following all these inspirational accounts will make you a better person, but there are techniques, click-bait if you will to make posts more appealing to you and the algorithm, that do nothing to help your growth.

This is not just a problem on Twitter, it’s everywhere social communities exist – even Medium, the open platform writing site that claims to be about bringing ‘experts’ and ‘dynamic thinking’ has been ruined with low quality click-bait promising quick wins.

Spotting Guru-Bro Manipulative tricks

To help you identify the tricks and tropes of Guru-Bro’s, I’ve put together a list so you don’t fall for these emotional manipulations (and this isn’t definitive, do let me know of any more types you see in the comments).

Guru-Bro Trick 1: Promise instant gratification

This trick the guru-bro post will make out that something that takes a long concentrated effort such as building muscle, or making large sums of money can be done in a short space of time.

See: every posts with a title like ‘Use ChatGPT to make 1000 dollars by the end of today’

Problem: this gives an unrealistic expectation of what you can do in a limited amount of time –  deception of truth and shortcuts (such as performance enhancing drugs), are methods that guru-bro-influencer never caveat.

Guru-Bro Trick 2: Doing more in less time

This is focused on being more productive, working less, and achieving more gains

See: 4 Hour Work Week, 12 Week working year, I work 2 hours a day in my new career as a freelance writer and make x10 as much as my stupid old 9-5.

Problem: guru-bro-influencer-man makes you feel like crap because you haven’t got your life in order and work a normal 9 to 5 week (like a lot of people).

Guru-Bro Trick 3: Why aren’t you doing more all the time?

What are you doing reading this post when you could be making money?

Guru-bro-influencer-man-hustler posts tell you to push the limits to your working capital productivity, and stop being so damn lazy using the responsibilities of a house, wife and kids as an excuse to why you need to sleep when you could be flipping vintage Micro Machines cars you bought at a carboot sale for x10 profit on Ebay bro!

See: Gary V, any hustle bro content.

Problem: we all need to switch off, waking up earlier, working later, taking on side-hustles and not taking time to enjoy life is a ticking time bomb to your burnout.

Guru-Bro Trick 4: Promise of independence/control

A trope you’ll see on self-improvement socials is a focus on why life is so much better being your own boss.

See: Work for yourself by starting your own business, be location independent, narrative around escaping the rat race, retire at 40…

Problem: Guru-bro-influencer-man-hustler-mindset-motivation bigs up the positives of being self-employed, but does so leaving out the negatives of owning your own business such as working at all hours, no holidays/vacations, pain of getting paid for work done, employing people…

Guru-Bro Trick 5: Achieving a list of things by a certain age.

Ugh, I despise this one.

Guru-bro-influencer-man-hustler-mindset-motivation-bitcoin puts out a post of a list of everything you should have achieved.

See: ‘What every respectable man should have achieved by the time they are twenty.’

Problem: The reality is life is complex and everyone is different – we all have our own definitions of success, we take our own path, sometimes the things we want don’t happen, or take longer than we thought they would.

A list saying you should be able to bench 300lbs, financially independent, by a particular birthday milestone is crap (and I think we all know it but are bad at calling these people out!)

Find sanity, reality, and escape planet Guru-Bro

Here are some ways I’ve switched off from the Guru-bro-influencer-man-hustler-mindset-motivation-bitcoin-location-indepedent folk.

Set success to YOUR routine:

Whatever you’re looking to achieve, set your definition of success, and stick to a set routine that makes it easier to measure progress.

Be consistent, do the same thing, stop mixing it up, or feel the need to change what you’re doing based on the latest advice from guru-dimwit.

Filter out information overload:

Enough is enough and it’s time you stopped listening and believing everything you read/hear.

Stop constantly seeking information, stop doom scrolling – escape the echo chamber and focus on people you trust and people who don’t make you feel like crap because you didn’t buy their overpriced course that isn’t even fit to be a free gift for a newsletter sign-up.

Reflect on real progress:

Everyday you’re… trust me (I’m not a guru-bro).

It can be something small and insignificant, like getting up without hitting snooze on the alarm, it can be every time you showed up for that workout when you didn’t want to… hell, give yourself a huge pat on the back for showing up to any workout.

It can be something new you’ve learnt, something you’ve tried that scared you, it can be moments you’ve experienced, spending time with the kids.

It can be something good you’ve done today to help someone without expecting anything in return.

It can be talking to yourself with compassion, not putting yourself doing.

It can be anything that gets you towards the end goal.

That is real progress – not what anyone else says.

Be grateful what you do have:

Everything from the roof over your head, the food on your plate, not drinking another day,, the health and happiness of your family – we all have something to be grateful for.

When all seems lost go back to the basics and think – gratitude, gratitude, gratitude.

Conclusion: TL:DR

In a nutshell if you couldn’t be bothered reading the previous 1400 words and have just scrolled to the end to drop a ‘Like’ in the hope I’ll notice you, this TL:DR is for you:

• There are a lot of people talking a big game online.
• This can make you feel insignificant.
• (Though a lot of it is bullshit).
• Guru-Bro’s* have the same old tricks and tropes that sound like self-improvement, but just make you miserable.
• (Seriously go back and read these)
• I shared some awesome tips to help you switch of, and regain some sanity.
• (Go and read these, they’re positive, and simple bits of advice anyone can do it).

Wishing you the best in your success (unless you’re a guru-bro),

James @Perfect Manifesto

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*Footnote

I don’t think I defined what a Guru-Bro is in this post. Basically think of the biggest bullshitter in your school. The Guru-Bro is that boy all grown-up let loose with a Twitter handle.