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| Cover via Amazon |
Positive thinking has become so integrated into the value
system of our modern culture, it might seem somewhat odd to find an argument
against it. And yet that is exactly what Barbara Ehrenreich does. The release
of this book, which was published as “Smile or Die” in the UK has corresponded
with the publication of more bold books, willing to challenge the power of
positive thinking. A little while back I read Steve Salerno’s unrelenting
attack on the self-help movement, “SHAM: How the Self-Help Movement Made
America Helpless” and since then we have had “The Art of Failure: The Anti-Self
Help Book” by Neel Burton. Even the great psychologist Richard Wiseman has
taken positive thinking to task and looked at the real science behind self-help
in “59 Seconds”, which came out the same year as “Bright-Sided”. This book was
not an overt criticism of the self-help movement but rather a genuine attempt
to use case studies, raw data and proven psychological methods to help people
improve their lives. However, in keeping to the science Wiseman highlighted
just how much of the self-help movement was bogus and even damaging. His first
chapter, “Happiness”, began with a total debunking of positive thinking and
revealed that far from being innocuous at worse, these techniques endorsed by
the vast majority of the self-help movement could actually be harmful.
