You're having a truly awful day: your boss just yelled at you, there's talk of retrenchments, you're worried about a sick relative - and now as you stand in an elevator, a complete stranger tells you to "cheer up".
You feel like giving him a piece of your mind but instead decide to vent on social media. Surely your friends will understand.
But when you open up your Facebook feed, it's just wall-to-wall inspiration with people sharing platitudes like "Tears are for losers" and "When life gives you a hundred reasons to cry, show life a thousand reasons to smile!"
Smile, be grateful, be happy - around every turn we're told to ignore the negative and focus only on the positive. But this advice, although well-intentioned, isn't always helpful - in fact, in some cases it can actually be bad for your mental health.
In a new book, Toxic Positivity, American psychotherapist Whitney Goodman explains why.
WHAT IS TOXIC POSITIVITY?
When people hear the term toxic positivity, they often think I'm implying we should be negative all the time. That's totally not what this is about. It's about balance. Being human means making space for the positive, the negative and everything in between.
Sometimes the glass isn't half full - it really is one sip away from empty - and yet toxic positivity demands you see the good in every situation. No matter how bad life is, you're expected to slap on a happy face and soldier on.
Struggles are presented as "opportunities", grief as "love with nowhere to go" and weaknesses as "emerging strengths".
Negativity - even when it's totally justified - is seen as the enemy, and we chastise ourselves and others when they succumb to it.
If you're not positive, you're a drag to be around and if something goes wrong in your life, it's because you had a "bad attitude" or "didn't try hard enough."
All of this stops you being real and torpedoes any hope of genuine human connection.
Think about it. When you're feeling sad and someone says "just be happy," are you going to keep talking about how you feel? No. You're going to shut down the conversation as fast as you can.
HOW TO SPOT IT
At its core, toxic positivity is both well-intentioned and dismissive. We often use it to:
- Deny our reality
- Attempt to make people feel better - this usually involves the expression of hollow platitudes in situations where someone is looking for support, validation, or compassion
- End a difficult conversation
- Shame ourselves or others for not being positive enough
TO BE HUMAN IS TO BE NEGATIVE
Supporting other people and listening to complaints can be really challenging. When we're not able to fix something or a topic is overwhelming, we may be tempted to eliminate that person from our lives or simply refer to them as "negative."
But humans are inherently negative by nature. Our tendency to pay more attention to the bad stuff and overlook the good stuff isn't an accident - it's a product of evolution that is necessary for survival.
The human brain's main function is to look out for danger and keep us alive, not to make us happy.
This is why constant positive thinking can actually be both toxic and dangerous because it can cause us to overlook obvious threats - perhaps by ignoring obvious warnings being given out by a colleague who is planning to stab you in the back or avoiding going for necessary medical tests because you live in a haze of positivity and don't believe anything bad could ever happen to you.
SOMETIMES BEING NEGATIVE IS POSITIVE
There are thousands of articles online encouraging us to "cut negativity" from our lives and I find it pretty entertaining. When I hear this, I think, "What does that mean? Are you not going to talk to anyone who is negative or complains? What topics are off limits?"
Especially in the workplace, negativity is frowned upon and yet it's actually quite dangerous if we eliminate it.
Research shows us that toxic positivity stunts creativity and stops you from seeing important pain points that the business or customer may struggle with.
By focusing on the negative, or the problem, you're able to visualise possible solutions. But it's impossible to discover that solution without first really getting to know the problem - this usually involves complaining, venting, lamenting, and purposely pointing out the flaws in something.
Most positive thinkers or manifesters would run from this, but it's how we solve some of the world's most significant problems.
JOIN THE YOU BOOK CLUB | Sign up for our free weekly books newsletter and get access to reviews, author interviews, book extracts and giveaways
HOW TO COMPLAIN EFFECTIVELY
Complaining has a really bad reputation. Positivity gurus insist that too much complaining will "lower your vibration" and stop you from achieving your dreams, having friends, and living the life you want.
And yet complaining is something we all do despite our best efforts. It's an effective way to share how we feel, express what we need, connect with others and evoke empathy in the listener.
But like anything, too much complaining can have a bad effect on your mental and physical wellbeing. And if you get locked in a never-ending complaint cycle, it can also get super-annoying for the people around you.
But the right amount of complaining and doing it effectively can work wonders.
Dr Robin Kowalski, a prominent researcher of complaining behaviour, found that those who complain with the hopes of achieving a certain result tend to be happier. Complaining is most effective when the complainer uses facts and logic, knows their ideal outcome and understands who has the ability to make it happen.
If you're able to identify these three things, your complaining is much more likely to feel useful and effective, while also leading to a better outcome.
CAN YOU REALLY MANIFEST GOOD THINGS THROUGH POSITIVE THINKING?
Manifestation is one of the main tools used by positivity enthusiasts.
They believe that if you are constantly feeling negative emotions, you will attract negativity. But if you are positive and visualise what you want, it will come to you.
People are encouraged to focus on what they want, eliminate all toxic people that will get in the way, and to be very patient.
There's nothing specific that they need to do while waiting except believe wholeheartedly that what they want will happen.
Sounds easy, right?
But this advice is in direct conflict with most psychological research about motivation and goal achievement because there's no planning for obstacles that may occur, no assessment of individual abilities and no action plan.
It also implies that bad things typically only happen to people who manifest bad things, which is just not true. We all know that bad things happen to good people every single day.
Rather than relying on wishful thinking, Dr Gabriele Oettingen's WOOP tool is a useful way of choosing and achieving your goals.
Start with these questions:
- What is your Wish?
- What is the ideal Outcome?
- What Obstacles might you come across?
- What is your Plan to achieve this?
You can use WOOP to achieve pretty much anything. It will also help you identify solid goals and work out a practical plan to achieve them.
This is an edited extract from Toxic Positivity, Keeping It Real in a World Obsessed with Being Happy, by Whitney Goodman, published by TarcherPerigee, R335 from takealot.com.
JOIN THE YOU BOOK CLUB | Sign up for our free weekly books newsletter and get access to reviews, author interviews, book extracts and giveaways
