

The Perils of Positive Thinking - philk
http://www.unlimitedmagazine.com/2010/06/the-perils-of-positive-thinking/print/

======
BrandonM
I think the title is a bit misplaced. The point is not that positive thinking
is bad, but that you will likely be happier focusing on your relationship with
others and accepting yourself as you are, as opposed to trying to make
yourself "better". The title is linkbait that only vaguely references the
material in the article.

Still, I thought the article pretty good. A key insight was a quote by Dr.
Neel Burton:

 _"In traditional cultures, people lived in very close knit communities. They
knew each other, and they didn’t really focus on themselves so much. The focus
on life was on the survival community and not on their own individuality.
Modern society is very different from that. There’s a huge emphasis on me; my
goals, my life, my death. That puts a lot of pressure on people, and it’s not
the kind of pressure that we’re evolved to cope with. That’s the source of
many of our problems."_

~~~
thomaspaine
I'd love to see some evidence for that quote. This assertion paints
individualism as a social rather than biological construct, and it's not
obvious to me that this is true.

~~~
BrandonM
The quote is part of a larger work ( _The Art of Failure: An Anti Self-Help
Guide_ ); I'd bet that it's addressed with more depth there.

Even still, there are many pieces of evidence that seem to suggest social
rather than individualist roots. We (meaning normal, functional human beings)
all have the ability from a young age to sympathize with others. We have a
strong desire to be part of a group. We feel guilt when we do something
socially wrong. Intimate relationships release endorphins that give us
pleasure. Language itself is only necessary in a strongly social species.

Honestly, I can't fathom human society as it is today beginning from small,
isolated groups of people who are strong individualists. Only a select few of
us can survive happily by ourselves, and I suspect that's been true for
millennia. Our ability to cooperate and evolve socially, as opposed to
biologically, is what has allowed us to become the most dominant species on
Earth.

~~~
Retric
Looking at primitive society's that survived into the modern day paints a vary
different picture. Cooperation won in the end, but primitive society where
extremely violent.

For example the earliest traders slid between bandits and merchants largely
based on how strong you where. Or consider traditional views on corporal
punishment. Violently beating ones family members was considered normal and
proper let alone what society at large would do to people.

------
tjmaxal
So in summary: 30th birthday + regret + hangover = pompous treatise on the
state of the American psyche from a self righteous Canadian?

How on earth did this get on the front page.

~~~
rdtsc
A lot of HNers are also about 30, have some regret, and some have a hangover?

------
jtbigwoo
You see this tendency creeping into larger Christian churches more and more.
If you can stop swearing, donate more money, avoid sex outside marriage, and
generally focus on your own purity, you'll be happy and enjoy rewards in
heaven. It's perfect for mega-churches and those that aspire to be mega-
churches because they don't have to figure out how to create a meaningful
community out of 5000 attendees. Each attendee is his/her own congregation,
perhaps with a "buddy" to help enforce self-discipline.

~~~
rdtsc
> Each attendee is his/her own congregation, perhaps with a "buddy" to help
> enforce self-discipline.

There should be a new fad : Agile 'life'. Work with a partner. Always run
tests by validating that what you are doing is aligned with the official
"Christian" doctrine.

~~~
msg
Not sure if you needed the sarcasm tag, but the one-on-one discipleship,
accountability group, and small group study have been part of Christianity
since Jesus gathered his fishermen.

Some religions, like LDS, make these issues official in the sense you are
talking about. Eg, a bishop must judge your purity and sign a form before you
can do certain religious rites at the temple. I have not seen this in my
Protestant experience, and I would be sad to hear about it.

I attend a somewhat large church. I hesitate to call it a megachurch, because
it is not focused on production values and the prosperity gospel. But there
are four services every week.

There is a problem for every large church in how to shrink the church you
regularly interact with to an appropriate size. My church tends to stratify
classes and outside groups by stage of life (think the seven ages of man) and
geographical barea. There are still opportunities to mix, but the main point
is to give church more continuity.

~~~
jtbigwoo
I worry that one-on-one discipleship and small group study can become the be-
all and end-all. I don't recall anything in the bible that says, "Get yourself
together before you help others," but it seems like that's the main focus of
many churches. I guess it's a matter of order... Do you believe you can
improve your members and in doing so change the world? Or do you work to
change the world and in doing so improve your members?

~~~
msg
There is a fair amount of stuff in Paul's first letter to Timothy that talks
about who should be leaders in the church, as in deacons or elders. They
should be people above reproach and so on.

You can interpret this directive or similar to mean that only the oh-so-holy
are the public face of the church. The forgiveness of Peter at the end of
John's gospel might be another case. I don't think it's a good interpretation,
but it's not so far from the truth.

It could really depend on the group and the church. At least for me, the two
things most likely to launch me into ministry (used broadly) are discipleship
and small groups.

And it could depend on the church's stance toward the culture and the world.
There are many possible positions, as in Niebuhr's "Christ and Culture". If
you believe the pop culture is full of filth and you are called to be outside
of it, you will get a very different sense of the church's mission toward non-
Christian people, or even toward Christians who are closer to the pop culture.

(edit: took an extra h out of Niebuhr)

------
sentinel
I love the irony in these lines:

"The answer, Burton believes, lies in the fact that the average self-
improvement treatise encourages the belief that personal happiness is the
product of sculpted abs, nicer clothes, or more personal wealth. Those are
dangerous distractions, he argues, from the true source of human happiness,
our relationships with others."

~~~
theorique
I explored this in a blog post that summarized a research article written by
one James Montier:

[http://thirtytwothousanddays.com/blog/2010/05/the-things-
tha...](http://thirtytwothousanddays.com/blog/2010/05/the-things-that-you-
think-will-make-you-happy-wont-make-you-happy/)

I wrote the following:

1\. Exercise, connect with friends, have sex, sleep, and be grateful. A lot.
Seriously, do all of these things as much as you can! (although perhaps not
all at the same time :) )

2\. Find work that you love and are good at, or are able to become good at.
(This will almost certainly be aligned in some way with your inner purpose.)

3\. Live in and enjoy the moment, and make nothing a means to an end. (A
regular practice of meditation can you help do this.)

4\. Take responsibility for your life, and set achievable goals.

5\. Don’t worry too much about getting rich - more income and wealth don’t
greatly increase your happiness level, once you have reached a basic level of
comfort appropriate to the community around you.

None of it was really "OH MY GOD, I DIDN'T KNOW THAT!" kind of stuff... but
the reminder is useful sometimes when doing strategic life planning.

The original paper was found here [pdf]
<http://www.trendfollowing.com/whitepaper/happiness.pdf>

~~~
jganetsk
Some people need to engage in self-improvement before they can have friends
and lots of sex.

------
mortenjorck
Unfortunately, the apparent conclusion of this piece is as dangerous as the
position it opposes.

Yes, we should embrace our imperfections. But not blindly. Doing so makes us
fat and lazy, while indeed trying to "bench press them out of existence" makes
us gaunt and workaholic.

I think the old cross-stitch on the wall in my parents' house got it right: we
need "the courage to change the things we can, the serenity to accept the
things we can't, and the wisdom to know the difference."

------
lvecsey
There is no sense of competition anymore in this society, with yourself or
others. Everyone just wants to blend into to previously considered notions of
normality.

~~~
jpdbaugh
Moreover I believe that the reason for most peoples disdain for life stems
from this in that life is utterly boring today because for most Americans
anyway there is absolutely no risk of failure. Here you can just coast by and
live a normal life.

------
c00p3r
_it was also a reflection of the realization on my part that my thirties would
be less about bravely exploring new horizons and more about repairing the
damage that I’d done in my twenties._ \- It is so common, so usual. It is
called the crisis of the middle age. And yes, it is time when you come to
realize that these strange world 'self-help' and 'self-improvement' (diet,
gym, regime) now are somehow related to you.

I have very simple visualization for such moment. Imagine an 'U' turned upside
down, or a classic bell curve. Before 30 you're going up and looking up, and
see something like a blue sky or other positive illusion. After crossing the
ridge, you're starting to go down, but you're looking back and up, trying to
push out from consciousness what you just saw ahead. All those activities are
mostly about supporting an illusion of remaining at the highest point.

For some people (it depends of your culture) it could be a cross, and that is
how they come to realize why religion exist. They just didn't saw it from the
opposite side.

