In my seventh year of handling self-help books, I’ve turned a corner that I didn’t know existed in publishing. Back before my eyes turned into computer-singed black holes, I couldn’t help but slam some of the genre’s offerings. “Who in her right mind,” I wanted to know, “dubs herself a ‘Tantric sex guru, motorcycle enthusiast, and life coach’?” Self-help, to an outsider, often seems like a pathetic and ridiculous alternate reality where people are incapable of figuring out anything for themselves. I kept waiting for a self-help guide to surviving self-help books.

Thankfully, I’m older, wiser, and blinder. Perverse self-marketing and shoddy writing suddenly don’t irk or amuse me in this new year. Self-help is what is, a formula that is often repeated with zero original twists. I’ve finally accepted that—only to have to readjust my view thanks to some singular surprises.

Take these starred books from the January 15th Self-Help Column by Deborah Bigelow: Melissa Kirsch’s The Girl’s Guide to Absolutely Everything, Steven Solomon & Lori Teagno’s Intimacy After Infidelity, and H. Norman Wright & Sheryl Wright Macauley’s Making Peace with Your Mom. There are even more goodies in the February 15th installment: Jane Isay’s Walking on Eggshells, Varla Ventura’s Wild Women Talk About Love, and Kenneth Adams’s When He’s Married to Mom.

What’s it all mean? Can self-help actually serve a meaningful, practical purpose and not just gaze into its shallow navel? Having just taken my first successful dip into the genre (see This Girl’s Guide to Absolutely Everything), I’d have to say yes, but I don’t kid myself. A self-help golden age this probably ain’t (though 2005 had its moments, too—see the best of the genre here). There’s a tidal wave of crap coming any second now, and I’ll be there to soak it up with my new, improved Zen-like attitude.