Barbara Ehrenreich is nothing if not a controversial author, and her latest book Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America takes on our most cherished modern possession: our unlimited (she would say unwarranted) optimism. From preachers telling us God wants to give us success, to professionals in medicine and psychology teaching that we can cure ourselves if we only will, we are constantly told to think positive. In many ways Barbara blames all these happy talkers for our current financial difficulties. According to Barbara, Joel Osteen owes us an apology. As one of the most visible and successful preachers of the contemporary positive thinking movement, he was one of the voices encouraging all of us to keep looking at the bright side, while in reality the housing market couldn't maintain its explosive rise in value, real wages continued to fall, and government regulation gave way to corporate abuse and corruption.
The problem, says Barbara, is that an insistence on positive thinking can grow into a refusal to see things as they are. This has led to middle and lower economic class voters to vote against their interests in favor of the "ruling class" because the power of positive thinking encourages them to assume they can be rich too. She cites Joe the Plumber explaining his opposition to Obama's proposed tax on income of $250,000 or more because when he bought his own business he'd have that income and didn't want to pay more taxes then.
Worse still, this "if you only believe" philosophy makes it easy to blame the victim, who clearly won't get out of their own way. It's a more comfortable world of we can blame the victims for their own misfortune.
You may hear of lot of that kind of happytalk when you work with a coach as well. "Just believe," you'll hear. "The universe is just waiting to fulfill your dreams." You may even think you read that on my web site. But you'd be mistaken. Because dreaming isn't enough. Belief isn't enough. The principles of See, Say, Do require more than mere belief or confidence. Those principles require work and risk and effort. And those principles don't guarantee that you'll always get exactly what you want when you want it. The universe is not a vending machine. You don't just insert a token of belief or affirmation and get dispensed a great life. That would be easy, I'll admit, and I'm sure that's why the philosophy is so popular. But some people are seeking something to believe in and hook themselves up with Secrets and other stuff. Other people are simply seeking a method and technology to make change in their life, not a new religion. In a coach they see a teacher, a trainer, and a motivator, but not a guru.
I guess you can tell that her message resonates with me. Looks like a book I'm going to have to read. You can find this book and others by Barbara (and other interesting and challenging writers) in our web site bookstore. Visit often as we are always adding new material.
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