Having suggested, sometimes with tongue firmly in cheek, tips and tricks for raising children and teenagers, Nigel Latta is now offering advice to adults on how to cope with ... themselves.
The former Dunedin, now Auckland-based, psychologist's latest television series, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Grown Ups, premiered on TV One last Sunday.
At the respectable hour of 7pm, it obviously doesn't delve too deeply into the nastier depths of adult existence (unlike the criminal profiles Latta provided on Into The Darklands); instead, it's an attempt to shed a little light on what makes grown-ups tick.
It's a wide-ranging investigation of adult life, says Latta, who explores issues both big (relationships, careers, family dynamics, growing old and spirituality) and small (television, haircuts, health fads and the concept of cool).
"We've done kids and teens but mums and dads are people, too. So what are adults like when considered independently of children?
"When you're a child, you have an idea of what your adult life will be like and that generally involves Lamborghinis and being rich and the boss of everything. But when you do actually grow up, you realise that life isn't quite like that," Latta says.
"Currently, our happiness models are movie stars and these incredibly rich people and we feel bad about ourselves in comparison, so really the series is asking, 'What's that all about?'.
"We look at happiness and relationships, love, money and materialism, a whole swathe of things, really."
In fact, people shouldn't expect to feel happy all the time, Latta warns.
However, that's not to say we shouldn't be able to reach a certain age and look back on our lives with a degree of satisfaction.
"I think part of the problem is we all labour under the misapprehension that being a person should be this tidy, orderly, clean process; that we should all have our stuff worked out; that we should all be quite sane and normal.
"But the truth is, being a human is quite messy.
"We have got the same brains we had 200,000 years ago, basically, so life now is a messy, complicated business.
"Most people have weird, quirky little habits and feel bad about them.
But the truth is they shouldn't. Some people just keep them better hidden than others. The key point is: does how you experience the world cause problems for you or other people? If it does, you've got a problem; if it doesn't, fine."
Latta says he's talked to plenty of people who might be considered, well, strange.
"We interviewed a guy in Christchurch who thinks he's a vampire. Sure, it's not for me, but it works for him."
Point taken (as long as vampire-man doesn't bite his neighbour/girlfriend/granny too deeply on the neck).
"In one of the episodes we talk about the concept of normality.
"What's the line between normal, everyday behaviour and what is problematic?
"Fundamentally, we are trying to provide stuff for people to think about. But there are some things in the series regarding approaches to life that are more likely to work out."
Latta also discusses the concept of "internal" and "external" lives, i.e. the personality within versus the one we choose to reveal to others.
He stresses they are not the same thing.
"The world couldn't survive. Society couldn't survive if everyone was completely honest and voiced how they truly feel about everything.
"We don't expressly talk about lying in this series, but a part of social living is effectively lying: if someone invites you to a barbecue but you don't want to go, you'll say something else instead. That's part of living in a social group."
The series is not unlike Latta's parenting seminars, he maintains.
Interesting ideas are packaged in a fun way.
"We just want to entertain people and reassure them. Their lives may throw up [expletive] but so do the lives of other people. One of my favourite quotes is the Buddhist thing about life being suffering.
When you accept that, life becomes easier."
In offering advice and/or insights into the human condition, Latta acknowledges he is presupposing that most members of his television audience can handle opening the door on a little self-scrutiny. Some won't be interested at all, he concedes.
"There are some people who want to sit around and ponder the nature of the universe and some who don't care. I guess I'm trying to focus on that everyday living stuff. It isn't some long philosophical diatribe, though we do look at some interesting concepts.
"It certainly isn't preachy. Another one of my favourite quotes is also a Buddhist one, and it is basically, 'Don't believe stuff just because people tell you it's so'.
"So, for God's sake, don't take my advice."
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Grown Ups screens Sundays at 7pm on TV One.
