Is Positive thinking Positive?

The idea of Positive thinking, or developing a positive mental attitude, is to train the human mind to change a perceived reality by repeatedly making positive mental statements, and to derive a more positive sense of well being, optimism, belonging, meaning and purpose to our lives. It is a process of choosing positive emotions from stimuli in the environment and applying them to perceptions and beliefs. The objective is to create an outlook that translates into a new or better chosen reality. Examples include writing and repeating affirmations, or visualizing how one’s life should be.

This is based on the assumption that thoughts and feelings determine our behaviour. But what if this was turned around and we changed our behaviour to then influence our thoughts and feelings. This is the “As If” principle, or as Shakespeare put it, to “assume a virtue”. By acting as if you are a certain type of person, you become that person.

However, is ‘positive thinking’ and relentless optimism really the solution to happiness and what we are looking for, or is it part of the problem. The alternative, ‘negative path’ to happiness and success involves embracing failure, pessimism, insecurity and uncertainty – those things we spend our lives trying to avoid.

Or perhaps thinking is where we’ve gone wrong in the first place!
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Once you sign up, the link will show up where venue address usually is, on right. Click on this link to join meeting.

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We'll follow the usual format- talk for an hour, have a break, then resume talking if more to say.

Handout including quotes can be downloaded here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cxrpEnueWBBeF_Kf7vbeDRIbkOdtI-U1/view?usp=sharing