# Is Positive Thinking a Disease in the US? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 18, 2010, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213 "2010-09-18T19:46:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/61 "2010-09-20T11:34:32Z")
I once had someone, after the “how are you/I’m fine” dance, actually said, “You should tell your face”, as apparently I did not look fine. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/62 "2010-09-20T11:59:21Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > > [@monstro](#): > > > > How about saying, "I can’t imagine how hard it must be, just getting out of bed everyday. I’d probably fall to pieces if I were in your shoes, but you’re so strong. > > I think this would be encouraging to hear if I were suffering, but is it _that_ far off from telling someone to think positively? Look at what you wrote here: the consoler is pretending or portraying themself as someone who would be weak and helpless in the face of the other person’s struggle, while telling them the sufferer that they are strong and capable (with the implication that they are not as weak as other people.) But maybe the person doesn’t want to hear that they are especially strong, when tears are pouring down their face, because it feels like the other person is telling them to _act_ strong when they can’t or don’t want to at that moment. > > It seems like human nature to dispense with sympathy in this kind of way. We emphasize hope and optimism and “you can do it!” when we talk to others, and don’t focus on validating the actual feelings of suffering due to fear of contributing to self-pity. But it’s situation dependent. When a loved one dies, rarely do I see people preaching positive thinking. Probably because it’s something we can all relate to and is clearly outside the scope of one’s control. The difference is that you acknowledged the suffering first, before moving on to the encouragement. And it is used in grieving, just differently. Rather than tell the person to think positively, positive things are said. We still have the compulsion to try to make the person feel better. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/63 "2010-09-20T12:34:01Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > The other people I want to punch out, were all the people who said to me, when I was about to be laid off, “When one door closes, another opens” and, “This will turn out to be the best thing that could have happened to you.” I STILL want to punch those people out! > [@](#): > > Fuck you all, with a broomstick. (No offense, **Broomstick** ) None taken ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/64 "2010-09-20T13:14:30Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Basically, she thinks Americans have been programmed to view the world as something they can control solely with their thoughts. If you want the world (or your life) to be a certain way, all you have to do is have the right “mind frame” and everything will come into place for you. It is this mentally that has made us blind to things that we could very well change, but only through pratical action. I think it’s important to distinguish between believing you can control the world/your life colely by your thoughts, and believing you can affect it with your actions. Martin Seligman (the author of _Learned Optimism_ who’s already been mentioned in this thread) talks about “learned helplessness,” the belief that nothing you can do will make any difference, and how deadly it can be. > [@](#): > > Then she talks about the mass marketing of positive thinking through the motivational speaker circuit. Well, in **some** cases, the message of the motivational speaker is “Don’t give up; don’t give in to despair.” And for some people, that’s precisely the message they need to hear. The right inspirational speakers/literature can act sort of as spiritual antidepressants. But yeah, I think the criticisms you mention are all too often fair ones. > [@TriPolar](#): > > I guess you don’t want throw positive thinking gasoline on a greed fire. This is my favorite line of the thread. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/65 "2010-09-20T13:19:43Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > > [@RickJay](#): > > > > What she’s describing is really no different from praying to God. It’s just a new agey version. > > > > Is this really a new thing? > > Praying is different from “positive thinking”, IMHO. With prayer, a believer is _asking_ God for whatever, with a humbled spirit. With “positive thinking”, the believer almost makes demands on him, as if they feel entitled to whatever they want just because they “believe” hard enough. > > The power of positive thinking in changing one’s health gets its start back in the mid-1800s, in the nascent form of Christian Science. Plus you’re supposed to follow _ora et labora_: pray, yes, but also work toward what you’re asking for; the “ora” is to help you plan the work and tackle it serenely, but you still have to tackle it. It’s not a matter of saying “oh God, you are great, merciful and all-powerful. Please make me POTUS. I’ll be watching reruns of Married With Children, kthxby.” The people who say “oh, don’t cry” are not trying to console anybody, they’re not trying to make the crier feel better or empathizing; they’re doing exactly the opposite, rejecting that person’s mental, emotional or physical pain (which is tantamount to rejecting the person) in order to protect their own little bubble. Selfishness is a lot older than positive thought, but some of these people use positive thought as an additional shield: “oh, if you just stop crying you’ll see how things get better!” Uh, I just stubbed my big toe and half of the nail broke and now my toe is bleeding, I’d like some peroxide and a bandaid please, not platitudes. Choosing to be optimistic is a useful tool. But refusing to accept the possibility of failure (or merely of setbacks) is terribly unpractical… hey, now I think about it, Just In Time is a form of positive thinking. It’s a way to plan Production and Procurement which involves assuming that Everything Will Go According To Plan: trucks never get flats, truckers never get the runs. And then Iceland gets the burps and car factories in Spain close less than 48 hours later because they don’t have parts, oopsies 😛 ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/66 "2010-09-20T14:24:40Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > That has been my experience. When someone asks, “How are you”, they really don’t want to hear anything other than “I’m fine”, because it makes them uncomfortable and they will find a reason to change the subject as soon as possible if you tell them how crappy you feel. Yeah, rhetorical greeting is rhetorical. And I find rhetorical greetings to be annoying. But I don’t consider them to have anything to do with real conversations people have with sick people, and definitely have nothing to do with actual positive thinking. It seems like the author isn’t really against positive thinking, she’s against all of the myriad ways people can do stupid things and wrongly call it positive thinking. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2010, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213/67 "2010-09-20T23:43:04Z")
> [@jackdavinci](#): > > Well I haven’t read that book, but the premise sounds really silly. Blind faith or superstition can certainly be dangerous, if it overrules common sense (the man ignoring the rescue boat to wait for God dies, and God says but I sent you a rescue boat!), but positive thinking as an addition to ration thinking can pretty much be only a good thing. You really need to read the book before leaping to judgements like this. There’s optimism (which I think is what most people think of when they think of “positive thinking”) and then there’s _positive thinking_, which is the kind of quasi-spiritual stuff that “The Secret” springs out of. > [@](#): > > I’m not buying it. At most, positive thinking might have negligible physical value (but it’s emotional value should not be ignored). I can’t imagine it having any serious detriment in the general population. She makes a good argument for why it’s “disabling” us. “Dangerous” isn’t quite the word, but “handicapping” is. Positive thinking can get people way in over their head in debt (because they “claimed” something they couldn’t afford). It takes people down useless paths in regards to their health and other problems around them. It can make corporations do very bad things to their employees (like firing employees for not having the right "spirit"just because they voice a complaint or if they aren’t meeting ever-shifting, unrealistic goals). It can make people very self-centered and noncompassionate human beings, as has been explained in this thread. > [@](#): > > > [@monstro](#): > > > > Quote: > > It is this mentality [edited] that has made us blind to things that we could very well change, but only through pratical action. > > Can you give some concrete examples? OK. If you’re putting all your energy to thinking “I’m gonna get the best job evah!” but you aren’t also examining your marketable skills, interview techiques, resume style, job search strategy, networking, etc., then you are not going to get a job. No amount of “thinking” will get you anything without action, and Ehrenreich points out that many motivational speakers ignore this when they preach “Think happy thoughts!” And why would they? Who wants to be told that there are things that they can actually _do_ to improve their situations? It’s so much easier to blame some nebulous “energy force” rather than do a real self-examination. Another example: You’ll often hear people say to someone in trouble, “I’m sending out positive vibes to you” or “I’ll be thinking about you.” Do these things really change anything for that person? Wouldn’t it be more meaningful to actually _do_ something? Or at least offer some real assistance or practical advice? Another example: Ehrenreich mentions the story about a real estate agent who listened to motivational CDs to “pump her up” before taking clients to see houses. She also talks about how another real estate agent was humiliated by a “positive thinking” boss by literally being spanked in front of all of her co-workers for not performing well (because he did the same thing to male employees, it was determined by the courts that it wasn’t sexual harrassment.) Now, if I had to listen to motivational CDs every time I did my job, or I had to be subjected to humiliation if I didn’t meet some arbitrary standard, then I would seek another career or workplace. But “positive thinking” keeps people complacent and sheep-like. It couldn’t be that the real estate agents chose the wrong career or that maybe the economy is just in a downturn. No–it’s all in their “attitude”. Without the chains of “positive thinking” holding them down, the two employees might actually see how much bullshit this is and change strategy. > [@](#): > > [Quote=monstro] > > Having the right attitude can help you get better. Well, that’s true. Not because of magic, but 1) the general placebo effect and 2) stress inhibits health, and negativity causes stress. [/quote] My mother has spent much of her adulthood riddled with rheumatoid arthritis. It’s gotten so bad that she’s had to go to the ER because the pain was that bad. She’s also an ordained minister, very spiritual, and is one of the most “positive thinking” people I know. She was probably thinking happy thoughts even as she was screaming in the hospital. You know what finally helped her get better? Experimental chemotherapy. Not her thoughts, unless it takes 30-odd years of “positive thinking” to actually kick in. Now perhaps you can argue that her outlook prevented her from sinking into depression, which would have just made things worse. I can get behind that. But that’s not the power of “positive thinking”. That’s the power of stoicism or optimism, which are two different things. The placebo affect isn’t proof that “positive thinking” works. A test of “positive thinking” is to take one group of sufferers and have them think “I will get better. I will getter better”, take another group of sufferers and give them medication, and use another group as a control. I’m betting that the results will show that the people on meds will fare a lot better than the people thinking “happy thoughts”. Perhaps the “positive thinkers” will report feeling better than the controls. I don’t know. And I disagree that “positive thinking” negates stress. Positive thinking requires you to block all negative feelings, doubts, and worries. That is stressful in itself! It would be stressful for me to not only go through the vagaries of medication, doctor’s visits, pain and suffering of illness, in addition to altering the natural course of my thoughts. You have to be able to vent. That’s why people find benefit in going to therapy. It gives you a chance to “air out” those negative feelings…which positive thinking denies you a chance to do. > [@](#): > > What the hell is wrong with not wanting to be depressed about your appearance on top of the horribleness of the cancer itself? Do they give male patients care packages filled with cosmetics when they’re going through chemo? Do they give them booklets offering advice about how to stay “masculine” after having prostates and testicles removed? How about teddy bears and coloring books? It’s STUPID, man. Cancer is a bad disease, but it doesn’t turn you into a child! This is more about how people have conceptionalized breast cancer and women’s health than it is about positive thinking, but it still shows how weird we become when it comes to illness. > [@](#): > > And what proactive actions, specifically, are people neglecting when they are busy thinking positively? If you walk into someone’s office and they have a bulletin board filled with pictures of yachts, McMansions, fancy sports cars, and $100 dollar bills, do you really think they care about anything else except themselves? That’s positive thinking taken to an extreme, yes, but I think Ehrenreich’s point is that when you become so inner-focused, you ignore other people and _their_ problems. Certainly you don’t have to become Mother Theresa, but selfishness isn’t a virture. > [@](#): > > That’s not a very good study. All that shows is that people don’t go to support groups if they already are in a supportive enough environment. And “not a better outcome” does not equal your suggested “worser outcome”. So you’ve read the book and know the background details of the study that I didn’t share in the OP? Cool. No offense, though, but I don’t think you comprehended it very well. > [@](#): > > If it’s a façade, then it isn’t really positive thinking. People shouldn’t suppress the natural negative emotions they already have, but they shouldn’t dwell on them either. They should express them and move past them. Positive thinking isn’t about repression. Why should they dwell on _positive_ thoughts? Why can’t they just think whatever they want to think? Why can’t they just “be” however they want to be? Why can’t one have a neutral outlook on life, neither negative or positive? Personal disclosure: I do not see very far into the future. Tomorrow exists for me, and maybe a few minutes of the day after that. But after that, I have no “vision” like other people seem to have. It’s really like a black wall–like I do not exist anymore (it sounds scarier than it is). I don’t have dreams for myself or make long-term goals; it’s only recently, with the help of a psychotherapist, that I have begun making plans that I can point to and say, “Hey, I’m actually looking forward to that!” I don’t know when this non-outlook exactly started happening, but that’s my reality and I’ve accepted it as “normal.” Even though I know it’s not. Now, depending on your perspective mine could be seen as a positive way of viewing the world. Live for today, don’t worry about tomorrow and all that. But it could also be perceived as negative and nihilistic. And when I was suffering from major depression, it was. But now that I’m not depressed, I think it’s pretty much a neutral attitude. I’m fine with it. Not thinking about the future works for me. If it’s holding me “back” somehow, I don’t care. I have what I want and need _now_, and that’s all that matters. I don’t need some chirpy, hyper-happy, in-your-face-type telling me that I need to be more “positive” by setting goals and “naming it and claiming.” It’s arrogant to tell me I need to be improved when one hasn’t even bothered to examine my thought processes to begin with. That’s why motivational speakers skeeve me out. They start off with the assumption that their audience is broken somehow, and that they aren’t already motivated “enough”. If people feel like they’re lives are going down the tubes, maybe they do need a pep talk. Maybe they do just need to change their mind frame. But maybe they need to go to the doctor. Maybe they need to break up with an abusive SO. Maybe they need to change jobs, learn some new skills, or move half-way across the country. “Positive thinking” excludes all these other options. And THAT is how it is undermining our sociey. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-positive-thinking-a-disease-in-the-us/554213.md?page=3)