Screw Positive Thinking! Why Our Quest for Happiness Is Making Us Miserable
http://www.alternet.org/personal-health/screw-positive-thinking-why-our-quest-happiness-making-us-miserable
The man who claims that he is about to tell me the secret of human happiness is eighty-three years old, with an alarming orange tan that does nothing to enhance his credibility. It is just after eight o’clock on a December morning, in a darkened basketball stadium on the outskirts of San Antonio, and — according to the orange man — I am about to learn ‘the one thing that will change your life forever.” I’m skeptical, but not as much as I might normally be, because I am only one of more than fifteen thousand people at Get Motivated!, America’s “most popular business motivational seminar,” and the enthusiasm of my fellow audience members is starting to become infectious.
“So you wanna know?” asks the octogenarian, who is Dr. Robert H. Schuller, veteran self-help guru, author of more than thirty-five books on the power of positive thinking, and, in his other job, the founding pastor of the largest church in the United States constructed entirely out of glass. The crowd roars its assent. Easily embarrassed British people like me do not, generally speaking, roar our assent at motivational seminars in Texas basketball stadiums, but the atmosphere partially overpowers my reticence. I roar quietly.
“Here it is, then,” Dr. Schuller declares, stiffly pacing the stage, which is decorated with two enormous banners reading “MOTIVATE!” and “SUCCEED!,” seventeen American flags, and a large number of potted plants. “Here’s the thing that will change your life forever.” Then he barks a single syllable — “Cut!” — and leaves a dramatic pause before completing his sentence: ‘… the word ‘impossible’ out of your life! Cut it out! Cut it out forever!”
The audience combusts. I can’t help feeling underwhelmed, but then I probably shouldn’t have expected anything different from Get Motivated!, an event at which the sheer power of positivity counts for everything. “You are the master of your destiny!” Schuller goes on. “Think big, and dream bigger! Resurrect your abandoned hope! … Positive thinking works in every area of life!’
= new reply since forum marked as read
guys like Schuller and Deepak Chopra almost always associate happiness and freedom with uber wealth.
what a load of nonsense.
the biggest mistake one can make in the "quest" for happiness is looking to others, who obviously have an agenda, to define for you what your happiness is.
I think it's obvious that -- simply for our own sanity -- it helps to try to be optimistic rather than pessimistic all the time about everything. However, I've seen the whole "be positive" mantra and subsequently "you create your reality" trends take a decidedly negative turn. People end up feeling WORSE, like they are solely responsible for life's misfortunes, and it makes them more depressed and unable to have hope.
I can be hopeful and optimistic yet still be aware of the injustices all around, so long as I work toward having a positive impact and trying to move things forward in a more humane way. That's tough to maintain a balance between the two though, because sometimes reality is friggin brutal. But being hopeless is a self-fulfilling prophecy, imho. The uber-Pollyanna approach doesn't seem healthy either.
Thanks for the great stuff you post, xchrom. 
K&R
