Five years ago, if you asked a lifestyle guru how to turn your life around, the answers were predictable: “Wake up at 4 am.” “The grind never stops.” “Optimise every second.” The books that flew off shelves echoed this discipline-first ethos — Robin Sharma’s The 5 AM Club and Jay Shetty’s Think Like a Monk.

Fast forward to today, and life advice has softened. We’re all about “giving ourselves grace” and “holding space for each other”. The shift is visible on bestseller lists too: The Time Energy Toolkit by Apekshit Khare, 108 Ways to Live Your Best Life by Shoba Narayan, Shoo the Noises by Anamika Mishra, and the South Korean hit I Am Not Lazy, I’m on Energy Saving Mode by Dancing Snail — all these books share one core belief: self-improvement shouldn’t come with self-flagellation. They acknowledge that failure is inevitable and instead of shaming readers, they allow for stumbles along the way.

Few of the most popular self-help titles take a kind approach towards readers