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DON'T WORRY - YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE HAPPY ALL THE TIME
WHEN THE RELENTLESS PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS BECOMES TOXIC POSITIVITY – HAVING THE REVERSE EFFECT AND MAKING YOU FEEL WORSE
By LEE-ANNE CARTER Chasing happiness. Sounds like a plan, right? Who doesn’t want to be happy - isn’t that what we all strive for? I’ve written stories on how to manifest positive change, that is how much faith I have in positive energy. And therein lies part of the problem: we are all (myself included) so vested in becoming happy that we can lose sight of everything else.
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Today, much is made of Happynomics, and the need for positivity in all aspects of life, said to be achieved through life-changing affirmations, gratitude lists, vision boards, mindfulness etc., all of which I believe in - to a point.
You will find happiness front and centre of nearly every agenda these days. In India they even teach happiness classes to primary school-age children. 36 | THRIVE #3 Annually, we receive a list of the Happiest Countries in the World from the World Happiness Report survey - an arm of the United Nations - which looks at the state of global happiness in 156 countries, incorporating six measurement factors. The report is very serious – remember, depression and other mental health issues cost governments billions on a global scale.
For those wondering, in 2020 the happiest country in the world is Finland, for the third year in a row, followed by Denmark, Switzerland, Iceland, and Norway. Anyone else see the correlation? March 20, 2021, has been assigned International Day of Happiness. Newspapers have (s)ad blockers. The lists go on.
Today, it seems we want to - or is that need to? - surround ourselves with happiness, be uplifted, feel good, be kind. Nothing wrong with that, right? Wrong.
Unfortunately, there is a dark side to relentlessly chasing happiness. As a recent WGSN (the global authority on consumer and design trends) future balanced, the World Happiness Report also looks means we examine things from all sides), increased
consumer report so articulately put it: It’s difficult and, even more so, negative emotions assist our
to see red flags through rose-coloured glasses.
Trying to maintain happiness all the time often leads to failure, and the danger of “toxic positivity”, resilience, which is a positive (strange much?)
as termed in the aforementioned report. No-one can be consistently “up” all the time. Particularly during a pandemic. Not without some form of substance abuse, or endless chanting reverberations to keep the brain in a heightened state - which allows for no other thought, by the way - just the steady murmuring hum of a repetitive chant overtaking the brain.
Granted, this also has its time and place. But, although I love a meditation class or two, I draw a line at a consistent hum used to drown out the “noise of the world” in order to make me happy. To me, it’s Being force-fed happiness is not cool. That does not mean that optimism is uncool, it just means that a balance is needed. Mindful of being at the unhappiest places in the world. For 2020, Afghanistan was named the unhappiest place in the world, followed by South Sudan and Zimbabwe, although the pandemic may upend those stats.
The focus on positivity being the only way to live life creates more issues than it rectifies. I have said it once, and I will state it again - a balance is needed in all things. Embracing negative emotions keeps us anchored. In fact, it does much more than that.
According to recent reports, embracing and accepting the down side of things leads to better decision-making skills (that stands to reason, as it wealth (which is probably a result of those great decisions), better marriages (kind of interesting) and lower risk of heart attack (say what? How?).
But there you have it. Negativity can beget success survival. That is the very reason they exist.
Instead of the happiness train, how about we take the time to just be a little kinder to ourselves? Accept the good and the bad as part and parcel of the human condition. Embrace the fact that life is not a bed of roses, the grass is not always greener, and sometimes feeling down can give us the impetus to get back up again. Confronting challenges builds akin to a bottle of trapped bees buzzing in my brain.
So, it would do us good to remember: only with shadow do we know light exists.
Lee-Anne Carter is an Australian-born journalist who has worked variously for the BBC and as Lifestyle Director of New Idea magazine. In 2009 she became Head of Global Trend Intelligence for Swarovski Professional, based in their headquarters in Austria. This role saw her travelling the world visiting major fashion and creative houses to tap into and predict forthcoming consumer trends. She still consults to Swarovski but moved to Morocco with her husband Andre in 2018 to start her own business, Creative Soul, as a creative consultant and writer. www.creativesoul.agency
