What is Toxic Positivity? and has it gone too far?

0:02 A listener production. Hello, and welcome to another solo episode of Crappy to Happy. Today, I want to talk about this idea of toxic positivity, and not in the way that you might be expecting you see. I tend to feel at the moment like perhaps we've swung too far in the opposite direction. And what I'm seeing and maybe you're seeing it too, is all positivity being labeled as toxic? Any attempt to shift somebody out of a negative frame of mind, or to suggest that people remain hopeful or optimistic or express gratitude, particularly if people have been going through something that's really difficult and challenging, they're being accused of toxic positivity, when in fact, the fact remains, the science remains that positivity, a positive frame of mind, positive emotions, positive outlook are very, very, very beneficial. So I want to do a little pr job for positivity today. I want to just suggest that not all positivity is toxic.

1:14 So where do we draw the line? How do we find the balance? I would like to remind you, in case you have forgotten of what the benefits of positivity really are for your health, for your happiness, for your success in work, and in life, for your ability to recover from illness and injury. There are so many proven, documented benefits from doing the best job you can of maintaining a positive outlook. And of course that doesn't mean pretending that things are fine when they're not, or dismissing denying negative, very real, very genuine negative thoughts and feelings, But it does mean being able to find that optimistic outlook when things aren't going well. I would love to start with reminding you of what are the benefits of a positive outlook, or what are the functions of positive emotions?

2:06 What purpose do they serve, how do they benefit us? I did do an entire episode on this way way way back in the beginning. It might have even been in season one, potentially season two, but it was called Think Happy Thoughts, and it was all about the benefits of positive thinking and positive emotions. So I'm going to touch on that again today and then talk about how this idea of toxic positivity came about, what it is, and where we can draw the line, because I really don't think it is helpful at all for us to be accusing people of toxic positivity when really, sometimes they are doing a very good thing in attempting to maintain a positive outlook when things are challenging. So a positive mindset is the breeding ground for creativity, expansive and visionary thinking, empathy, cooperation, and connection. All about the name of Barbara Frederick's and has been studying positive emotions for about the last thirty or more years. She's done loads of research, She's written books, she's published papers. She really explored what is the function of positive emotions because we know what the function is of negative emotions. When you feel something like anger, discussed fear, those things that we typically would call a negative thought or a negative emotion, what they do is they narrow our focus so that we can identify a problem and fix it, so that we can fight off an attacker, so that we can get ourselves out of the situation, so that we can reject something that is dangerous or

3:37 harmful to us, so that we can avoid things that are likely to cause us harm. And obviously we have a very strong inbuilt negativity bias in all of our brains. We've talked about that often. That is our ancient instinctive primitive survival strategy. That is our brain being wired to help you to be on the lookout for things that could potentially cause you harm so that you can avoid those things, so that you can stay safe and reproduce and ensure the species continues. Our brains tend to be wired towards looking for problems, and when we do, when we experience something that is painful or difficult or negative, it triggers us into action to keep us safe. So serves the purpose of narrowing our focus, wrapping our mind around a problem so that we can solve the problem.

4:30 Now we all know that that can be something it's very useful keeps us safe. We also know it can be very detrimental. We know what it's like to have our minds wrapped around a problem so tightly that we can't see the wood for the trees, that we can't think about anything else. That is the role and the function of that fight or flight response to narrow our perspective, to narrow our focus, to zone in on a problem, and sometimes that can create a very negative downward spiral where all we're doing thinking more and more and more negative thoughts, engaging in more and more unhelpful behaviors, creating a stress response in our body, flooding our body with adrenaline and cortisol, because that again, that's all part of that same fight or flight response that's designed to keep us safe. But over time, that reduces our immunity, it reduces our physical health, it reduces our psychological health, disconnects us from the world around us, from our relationships, stops us from communicating with the people who are important to us.

5:26 Not good for us, not good for anybody around us. Until Barbara Fredrickson and probably some of her colleagues came along, we weren't really interested in studying the role and function of positive emotions. We looked at emotions in general and the purpose that they served. We weren't equipped with the ability to experience positive emotions unless they serve a purpose. From an evolutionary perspective, everything serves a purpose. So what she found is what is now called the broaden and build theory, is that what positive emotions do is they broaden our thought, action, repertoire, and other wors words. They widen the pool I guess of available actions. They broaden our perspective. They open up a world of possibility. So, for example, the feeling of joy inspires us to want to play and have fun and play serves many many useful purposes, not just for kids, for adults as well.

6:18 We adults are not very good at playing, but play is really good for us. The positive emotion of contentment enables us to really saveor and appreciate positive experiences in our life. The positive emotion of curiosity inspires us to be inquisitive, to seek and acquire new information. Love inspires us to connect with people. They actually also literally broaden our vision. We tend to see more in our peripheral vision when we are in a positive mood. We tend to see other people in a more positive light when we're in a positive mood. When you're in a negative frame of mind. When you're in a negative mood, it literally narrow your field of vision. That's all part of that biological fight or flight response. We are less attuned to what is going on in the world around us.

7:07 When you're feeling positive, you are much more open to what's going on around you. You see more, you hear more, you pick up more. And what those experiences then go on to do is they're building. So remember I said it's the broaden and build theory. They are building your repertoire of resources that will then help you to cope more effectively when things get challenging in the future. So, if you are experiencing positive emotions, positive thoughts, are optimistic and hopeful outlook, feelings of gratitude and appreciation. If you are happy, then the actions that inspires in you, the experiences that you are more likely to have as a result of that, also serve the purpose, serve the function of equipping you with resources that then down the track help you to cope more effectively when things go badly.

7:56 Let me just give you a little run through of what some of the benefits are to you and to the people around you of being happier. Now, I say happier happiness is a fleeting emotion, but you know, I'm really talking about the whole idea of emotional wellbeing, which is generally feeling good, feeling positive, having a positive mindset, a positive mood, a positive optimistic outlook. So emotional wellbeing predicts long term prognosis of physical illness. So, in other words, if you are unwell, if you are experiencing heart disease or even cancer, studies have shown people have a better outlook, they get a better prognosis they live longer, they recover more quickly. When they have a positive outlook. People do better even when they're really really unwell. People who can maintain a positive outlook on the whole, clearly this is not like every single individual on the whole, they tend to do a whole lot better. The outlook is a lot better. There is a whole lot of major literature reviews so that have synthesized all of the research SHO and eventually have concluded that the effects of well being as in positivity on physical health, better health, reduced risk of injury and illness, and lower mortality rates. As I said, people with a family history of heart disease so therefore who are more at risk of heart disease, who also have a positive outlook are one third less likely to have a heart attack or another heart cardiovascular event within five to twenty five years than people with the same

9:29 family history who have a negative outlook. People in the general population who don't have that family history so therefore are not necessarily at that increased risk, are thirteen percent less likely to have a heart attack or another currentary event than somebody who is typically more negative has experience this more negative emotions, low mood. One study that I read from the University of Kansas found that smiling, even fake smiling, reduces heart rate and blood pressure during stressful situations. So physical health and wellbeing much better in people who are positive on the whole. What about on the job, happy workers enjoy multiple advantages over their less happy peers.

10:09 That is a direct quote from an article that I read. So individuals who are high and subjective well being again, that is, being happier, more positive. They are more likely to secure job interviews. They are evaluated more positively by their supervisors. Once they get the job, they show superior performance and productivity. They handle responsibility better. They are less likely to succumb to stress and burnout. On the job, they're promoted more often. They're paid more in sales, they sell more in customer service. They have higher customer satisfaction ratings. People who are happy do better on the job. They're more likely to graduate from college even before they get to the workplace. They also are found to secure better jobs.

10:51 And when I say better, I mean jobs that have more meaning, more autonomy, because we know that autonomy on the job is associated with job satisfaction and more variety. They're just more likely to succeed. They're more likely to be cooperative, to be well liked, to get good results in the workplace. Now, I just want to make the point here that for the longest time, when people drew the associations, when people found the associations between happiness and success, people initially used to assume, well, that, of course those people are happier because they've got the long lasting marriage, and they've got the good job, and they're making them more money, and they're physically healthy, and maybe it's the fact that they're just having a really good run in life, that you know, life's treating them pretty well, and that is the reason that they are happier. The studies have since proven that it's actually the other way around. It is the happiness often the positive mood, the positive outlook that leads people to have more satisfying relationships, better job prospects, more satisfying jobs, higher quality of friendships, and better health and wellbeing. People who have a positive outlook are more likely to engage in healthy habits. They eat more healthily, they're less likely to use substances, they're less likely to be smokers. People who have a positive outlook, engage in more pro social behavior, that is, behaviors that are designed to benefit other people, contribute to the community. They're more altruistic, they're more generous, they're more likely to help others. Suffice it to say that the benefits of having a positive outlook,

12:22 of being positive are profound, and there's loads of research to support that. And I really think we went through a period where that information became really widely known and understood. And this is where studies were coming out and media reports were coming out espousing the benefits of a positive outlook, and this is where I think we started to see all of these good vibes only and we need to all be keeping a gratitude journal, and we need to always be optimistic. And obviously the field of positive psychology, which is still twenty five years old now, so still relatively young, that positive psychology research started coming out and so was it made its way into the mainstream media, and we saw all of the benefits of being happy and you know, ten things that you can do to make yourself happier today, and then the backlash started. Then I think people started to recognize that sometimes this was not always helpful, that life is not always happy, of course it's not. Life is difficult and challenging, and suggesting that somebody just be happy or good vibes only, or just be grateful for what you've got, or just diminishing and undermining people's negative experiences. Some examples are things like, you know, look for the silver lining, everything happens for a reason. This kind of attitude and this kind of suggestion was really undermining and invalidating people's very real, very natural,

13:54 difficult emotions, painful thoughts and feelings. And so we developed this new term called toxic positivity, and we started to recognize that that can be really harmful, and maybe we shouldn't just tell people to everything happens for a reason, and maybe we shouldn't tell people to just look on the bright side, because maybe that's actually really not very helpful to anybody. And that's true toxic positivity. The definition that we use now is the excessive and ineffective over generalization of a happy and optimistic state across all situations. So this applies sometimes to an individual who is personally not allowing themselves to acknowledge the full extent of their own pain, their own grief, their own suffering their own difficult negative emotions, their sadness, their anger, their frustration, their irritability, you know, denying their own emotions. And it also refers to people projecting that onto somebody else, So telling somebody else that they should just get over it or think happy thoughts or that kind of invalidating somebody else's experience.

15:00 So it's not just something that one person does to another. It can be something that you are doing yourself. I want to throw in here that another term that is kind of banded around a fair bit is spiritual bypassing. So if you've not heard that one, spiritual bypassing is this idea of using spiritual thoughts and ideas in the same sort of way to just avoid, deny, dismiss, negate again difficult painful emotions. So this is more the kind of somebody who's really hurt you badly and you just send them compassion, you know, love and light rise above using these kind of spiritual ideas to really distance yourself from your own difficult, painful experiences. So these ideas are all valid. Positivity has proven benefits. Toxic positivity is a real thing. My point today, I think is just to remind and you me everybody that not all positivity is toxic positivity. I saw, particularly during the pandemic, which was a really difficult, challenging time for a lot of people, there are certain, you know, people and groups of people who chose to focus on being optimistic, on being hopeful, on reframing difficult experiences to find some positive benefit or to maintain a positive outlook even when things were really tough,

16:32 and those people being accused of toxic positivity. Not everybody who chooses to find a positive outcome, to see a silver lining, to find something to be grateful for, to look forward with hope and optimism, to find meaning in something that is difficult and painful. Those people are not all guilty of toxic positivity. It's kind of negative and cynical to accuse anybody who is being a little bit too happy of toxic positivity because it is not all toxic, and that kind of negativity and that kind of cynicism is just as toxic in fact, literally physically, probably even more so, because that's the kind of stuff that's going to get you, like really suffering from inflammation and stress in your body. And as we've said, all of the opposite of all of those positive benefits I just listed to do with positivity. I think sometimes people worry or people are concerned that by sharing the idea that having a positive outlook improves outcomes in people who are physically ill and this is proven, like this is not me making this up, then somehow or rather, that is blaming a person who is sick for being too negative. I think that's where the problem lies. If being positive improves health outcomes or reduces your risk of illness or injury, then if you're sick, it must be your fault that you weren't positive enough, that you must have been being negative.

17:59 That is not the case at all. Anybody sharing that message. Obviously that's really dangerous, that's really harmful. But I just think we need to get this balance right again. We need to just find this balance between recognizing and understanding and valuing the benefits of finding a positive outlook. We all have the power to choose where we focus our attention. That is not to say that we should deny our very real, painful thoughts and feelings. We have to make space for difficult, painful thoughts and feelings because they're all part of life. But if you are spending a lot of time really dare I say, wallowing, sinking deeply into suffering, and almost sometimes there's a little bit of that making ourselves a victim as well. There are times when it's really would do us well to just recognize what we're doing and to recognize that we have the choice of focusing on what we can control, focusing on what is out of our control, choosing where we put our attention, where we direct our thoughts. It's not about tending that things are great when they're not. It's not about slapping on a smile and pretending you're fine if you're really not fine. But it is about recognizing the danger of being consumed by difficult, negative, painful emotions and thoughts and spiraling around. You know, when your mind does that thing where it just wraps around a problem and it gets stuck and you find it really difficult to pull yourself out of that. Just recognizing that that is potentially really harmful,

19:30 not just for your mood, but you know, for lots of things in life, your health, your relationships. There is just so much power when you're able to to be able to recognize that that is what is happening, and to be able to find a way to shift yourself into dare I say, a more positive frame of mind? How do you find that balance? I guess Reframing how you think about a situation is not the same as denying the reality of a situation. Reframing means a shift in perspective, and example here it's just a really simple one that I read somewhere. Instead of stressing about being in a traffic jem because you're going to be late, well, yeah you are stuck in a traffic jem, and yeah you are going to be late, and yeah, that's probably not going to be a really good outcome for you, and there's probablysm negative consequences potentially to that. But if you can't change the situation, then maybe you could instead of sitting there the entire time stressing about what is wrong, because what happens, you know, negativity breeds negativity, right, so as soon as you start thinking about what's wrong, you start thinking of every other thing that's gone wrong as well.

20:38 So maybe you could appreciate the fact that this gives you some time to listen to some music, to plan the rest of your day, listen to the news, just accepting that there's nothing that you can do anyway, So what can I do to turn this around? Put on my favorite playlist and just at least shift my mood so that I don't just arrive late and stressed and irritated and allow that to carry through the rest of my day. But I can actually, I'm going to arrive late anyway, but maybe arrive late in a little bit of a better mood. And I know that's just a really trivial, probably not very in a pretty low stakes kind of example, but it is just an example of how we can reframe the way we think about something and it can shift everything. Really, So when things go badly, which inevitably they will, that's life, you know, just being careful not to fall into that catastrophizing thinking, that despair and that disaster kind of thinking. It's like that optimism, the optimistic outlook that I talked about in the last episode when I talked about approach and avoidance motivation. An optimistic mindset is recognizing when something happens, if this is temporary, if this is not my whole life, this is just this one little area of my life, and that it's not all my fault, and I'm not a bad person, and I haven't been singled out to suffer, you know, when everybody else is having a great time. Potentially there are factors outside of me that were out of my control that contributed to this situation. But yes, this is painful,

22:10 Yes this is difficult, and yes, feel what you need to feel, but also then trying to see the bigger picture when you can, so that you can maintain some sense of perspective and a positive outlook. Often the ones who come out of a traumatic or a really awful tragic situation are the ones who are able to find some meaning, to be able to channel their pain into something that is of a greater good, so using their pain for the benefit of others looking for the meaning, just being able to recognize in time, not in the moment of shock and despair, clearly, but in time to be able to see the potential benefits of that suffering or that painful, traumatic, tragic experience. None of that is toxic positivity. That's all very real and very useful. The takeaway MEGE is that we don't want to gloss over difficult, painful feelings, so it is about striking that healthy balance.

23:07 I hope that all makes sense. I hope that has reminded you that it's okay to be positive. It is okay to find the silver lining, it's okay to be grateful even if something terrible happens. Maintaining a positive outlook is very, very good for you, Which is not to say that you should never experience a negative emotion. Of course, you should keep it in perspective and when you are ready to move on and to find that positive outlook, then that is absolutely not toxic positivity. Don't let anybody tell you that it is. So that's it from me. I hope that you have enjoyed this. I hope it's been a helpful reminder to you, and I will catch you on the next episode of Crappy to Happy Listener