Mind Matters: Positive psychology? Get real.

Ever get tired of yet another pop psychology book on
“positive” thinking? Barbara Ehrenreich’s book, “Bright-Sided: How the
Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America” is one
antidote to the pap of positivism.

As a psychologist, I, of course, want to help people
re-frame their situations and find meaning and hope in their lives. But to have
an authentic life, we really do need to feel all our feelings and stop naming
happy as positive-good, and sad as negative-bad.

There is a popular positive psychology movement afoot that
Ehrenreich rightly takes to task, and not because she’s some sort of dour
sourpuss. She says:

“I do not write this [book] in a
spirit of sourness or personal disappointment of any kind, nor do I have any
romantic attachment to suffering as a source of insight or virtue. On the
contrary, I would like to see more smiles, more laughter, more hope, more
happiness and, better yet, joy. But we cannot levitate ourselves into that blessed
condition by wishing it. We need to brace ourselves for a struggle against
terrifying obstacles, both of our own making and imposed by the natural world.
And the first step is to recover from the mass delusion that is positive
thinking.”

Our culture is grounded in Calvinism which is rooted in the
notion of predestination. This gave us a very strong work ethic that eschewed
pleasure and play. (Picture the image of American Gothic—you know, the farmer
and his wife standing strong and stern.) However, Calvinism, with its
predestination also promoted the idea that if you did well in this life, you
deserved it and that you could expect to be well off in the hereafter too.
Hence, the poor “deserved” to be poor, and the rich were simply fulfilling
their own manifest destiny.

Well, now we seem to have tossed out the part of Calvinism
that spurns pleasure, while keeping some of predestination afloat. It’s an odd
combination we have here. On the one hand, we are urged to think positively—go
shopping, be consumers, that having, getting, and doing will make us happy. We
are informed that we can make things happen by thinking positive thoughts.

On the other hand, if we don’t pull this off, if we aren’t
always “positive” because we see that there are situations in our lives that
are difficult or see in the world that there is great suffering, or if we are
not making it by in the grand scheme of things—well then, we’re back to the
predestination of the Calvinist era—if you’re not rich or happy, it’s your
fault.

Of course, we need to take responsibility for our behaviors,
for our lives, but that is not to say we create our context. There is, to my
mind, something subtly sinister about both the old and the new Calvinism that
fosters a sense of “you get what you deserve” or “you can make your
materialistic dreams come true.” It’s the loss of a true sense of universality
and connection of the common good—the sense of care for each other.

Says Ehrenreich, “… the myth, fortified with bracing doses
of positive thinking, persists. As two researchers at the Brookings Institute
observed, … in 2006:”

“[the] strong belief in opportunity
and upward mobility is the explanation often given for Americans’ high
tolerance for inequality. The majority of Americans … believe they will be above
mean income in the future (even though that is a mathematical impossibility).”

This misguided optimism isn’t about hope—hope implies a
journey through obstacles, a struggle through adversity. This misguided
optimism is a denial of reality.

In order to have hope for a better world, I would agree with
Ehrenreich that we need to open our eyes to life as it is—“the full
catastrophe,” as Zorba the Greek would say, and to acknowledge the suffering,
acknowledge the pain, the injustices.

We don’t need to scowl, American Gothic style. We can still
smile—just without denial.

* Kayta Curzie Gajdos holds a
doctorate in counseling psychology and is in private practice in Chadds Ford,
Pennsylvania. She welcomes comments at
MindMatters@DrGajdos.com or
(610)388-2888. Past columns are posted to
www.drgajdos.com.

About Kayta Gajdos

Dr. Kathleen Curzie Gajdos ("Kayta") is a licensed psychologist (Pennsylvania and Delaware) who has worked with individuals, couples, and families with a spectrum of problems. She has experience and training in the fields of alcohol and drug addictions, hypnosis, family therapy, Jungian theory, Gestalt therapy, EMDR, and bereavement. Dr. Gajdos developed a private practice in the Pittsburgh area, and was affiliated with the Family Therapy Institute of Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, having written numerous articles for the Family Therapy Newsletter there. She has published in the American Psychological Association Bulletin, the Family Psychologist, and in the Swedenborgian publications, Chrysalis and The Messenger. Dr. Gajdos has taught at the college level, most recently for West Chester University and Wilmington College, and has served as field faculty for Vermont College of Norwich University the Union Institute's Center for Distance Learning, Cincinnati, Ohio. She has also served as consulting psychologist to the Irene Stacy Community MH/MR Center in Western Pennsylvania where she supervised psychologists in training. Currently active in disaster relief, Dr. Gajdos serves with the American Red Cross and participated in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts as a member of teams from the Department of Health and Human Services' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.Now living in Chadds Ford, in the Brandywine Valley of eastern Pennsylvania, Dr. Gajdos combines her private practice working with individuals, couples and families, with leading workshops on such topics as grief and healing, the impact of multigenerational grief and trauma shame, the shadow and self, Women Who Run with the Wolves, motherless daughters, and mediation and relaxation. Each year at Temenos Retreat Center in West Chester, PA she leads a griefs of birthing ritual for those who have suffered losses of procreation (abortions, miscarriages, infertility, etc.); she also holds yearly A Day of Re-Collection at Temenos.Dr. Gajdos holds Master's degrees in both philosophy and clinical psychology and received her Ph.D. in counseling at the University of Pittsburgh. Among her professional affiliations, she includes having been a founding member and board member of the C.G. Jung Educational Center of Pittsburgh, as well as being listed in Who's Who of American Women. Currently, she is a member of the American Psychological Association, The Pennsylvania Psychological Association, the Delaware Psychological Association, the American Family Therapy Academy, The Association for Death Education and Counseling, and the Delaware County Mental Health and Mental Retardation Board. Woven into her professional career are Dr. Gajdos' pursuits of dancing, singing, and writing poetry.

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