Self-help literature as a genre is characterised by a predictable narrative arc—tapping into human potential for improvement using a few hacks and drawing inspiration often from the rich and the famous. The philosophy is deceptively simple: making money through hard work is a virtue that one must inculcate. The end remains the same; it is the unique means that every self-help book draws our attention to. Everyday practices are made to look like art by defining them in a spiritual vocabulary; then exemplars are sought among the most successful materialists.

Pushkar Anand’s Manifest Your Infinite Riches, while largely sticking to the tried and tested formula of the genre, makes a crucial contribution by compelling us to turn our attention towards contentment. The book, it seems, asks us this........

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