What is toxic positivity and what are some examples of it?
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Toxic positivity is when you are sooo positive, that you cannot admit the crappy parts of a situation.
Sometimes this is pretty harmless, like when my friend says she’s hosting “playshops” instead of “workshops.”
Other times its really hurtful, like when no one had words for my spouse’s drug addiction. We said positive things, like “thank you for taking care of your body today” and “I’m grateful you made it home safe last night” even if they weren’t totally true.
We believed that if we said negative things, they would be attracted to us, and that meant we had caused our own misery, brought it on ourselves.
We believed that if we said positive thigs, then positive things would come true. And then we would take full responsibility for our own happiness and success.
This was really toxic in a few ways. Firstly, because it prevented making any real changes in our lives. It prevented us from understanding how change actually happens: through actions. We thought it was 100% mindset/attitude/perspective. Turns out that acknowledging all the crappy things really helps us know what changes need to be made, and helps us figure out how to make them.
Secondly, it was toxic because we put responsibility for happiness and sadness wholly on the person feeling them. So if someone felt angry about racist discrimination, it was their own fault for feeling angry, not the racist who was doing the actual crappy thing. Or if I got a great new job, I might think it was all my own doing, by attracting it, instead of all the people who helped me get ready for the interview. Putting responsibility in the wrong spot meant that no one could be helped, and nothing needed to change in our laws, culture, or relationships.
We believed the only thing we could change was our own attitudes and it meant we told people to stay in harmful situations.
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