It turns out people will pay a lot of money just to clear levels, you know.

I just keep being promised there's something at the end of all of them,

which is why I played two dots for four years.

After strolling down a particularly frustrating down a particularly frustrating memory lane in part one of our series on the inspirational

1993 bestselling book Chicken Soup for the Soul, Sarah Marshall and I are following up in part two

with a tale of two motivational wealth coaches who went on to create one of the biggest

cultural touchstones of the self-help obsessed 1990s. We'll also take a look at what is currently happening with the

failing and flailing feel-good company as new leadership has led it down a dark and exploitative

path, allegedly. Of course, Sarah and I continue to get hella mad at the book's messages of neoliberal

mysticism and prosperity gospel manifestation, especially in the context of what is currently happening

with the chicken soup for the sole company, as well as American politics at large. So now, let's dive back

into this text, full of what contemporary folklorists call Glurge, a sickly sweet

subgenre of the urban legend. I'm your host, Chelsea Weber Smith, and this is American Hysteria.

Hello, okay, fuck yeah. Hello, Sarah. You are back for part two, a second helping of chicken soup for the soul.

Thank you for being here.

Hello, Chelsea.

Please, can I have some more?

Or will I have to give myself sponge baths?

You can't have your pudding if you don't eat your meat.

All right, great strong start.

I'm happy with that, yeah.

Well, on our first part of our Chicken Soup or the Soul series, we kind of just put this sickly sweet book into its context when it came out in the early 90s. And we read quite a few stories and talked about them to kind of like get in the spirit. Just right into that bowl of chicken

...