1. What is toxic positivity?
Did you ever had friends or parents, who told you "Think positive!", "Don't worry about it" or again "Look at the bright side"?[What is toxic positivity?https://bit.ly/3pTuC9e].
Well, if yes, I am 100% sure you often felt more angry and frustrated than before. That is because in this way they make you suppress your emotions, making you feel anxious and obliged to put on a happy face and go on. This dynamic is called toxic positivity.
Tabitha Kirkland, a social psychologist and associate teaching professor at the University of Washington explains that "Toxic positivity is a way of responding to your own or someone else's suffering that comes across a lack of empathy. It dismisses emotions instead of affirming them, maybe coming from a place of discomfort". She specifies that usually this behaviour is not made to hurt you, even if in this way, people only shut you down.
2. Side Effects of Toxic Positivity
Before revealing how the #onlyGoodVibes culture affects your life, we have to point out that exist 2 forms of this behaviour: one coming from others and one you inflict on yourself. Both of these are dangerous, especially if ignoring negativity has become a habit.
So there, how toxic positivity can affect you:
Feeling bad about yourself. With time, always repressing true emotions leads to sadness, feeling angry, guilty and disappointed about yourself. Moreover, filling your body with these bad sensations and not letting them out, will make you explode, sooner or later.
Not facing problems. When bad things happen, you force yourself to acknowledge only the positive aspect. But you know the negative part exists, so you should learn to act through the problem and then transform the bad situation into a better one.
Mask true feelings every time. Pushing you emotions aside, when around friends, family or a partner affects harshly the relationships in your life: in this way, you are lying to yourself and to others, making you feel ashamed, alone and maybe depressed.
Minimizing other people's emotions. According to Caroline Carol, a psychotherapist, using quotes like "just be positive" pressure people around you to invalidate their experience, transforming their self image into being weak or insufficient.
Shaming who has no positive vibe. It's true, you don't need to obsess with negative thinking, but also you can't blame people for having bad times. You have to give chances in life, but also don't jump into them blindly and start to consider the bad side of things.
Conclusions:
Accepting and working through negative emotions will make you more resilient and capable of showing empathy and validation to other's feelings.
The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place and I don't care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life.
Rocky Balboa
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