I can't claim credit for coming up with it, I'm afraid! The bolded text is a link that explains the concept and what it looks like. It's a very unhealthy impulse that I had to unlearn.
Re: "toxic positivity": I thought it meant what it does mean in the article you linked to. "Where positive thinking becomes toxic is when it is expected to get rid of negative feelings. It can be presented as a demand that we must be positive at the expense of other feelings."
This is what I've experienced in the past but never had a name to put for. It is quite comforting to know that if people are constantly advising you to think positively when to you your life looks like crap you can understand there is something noxious about that.
I read Johann Hari's "Lost Connections" and he had a similar term: cruel optimism. In a nutshell, your happiness is your own responsibility, so if you're not happy you must be doing something wrong.
Healing from trauma and abuse is complex and still not well understood, even by most of the professionals who get paid to treat mental illness. So if you're not getting better, you might think something is wrong with you, but chances are that your therapist is not a good fit, or you're misdiagnosed, or you don't fit into any of the boxes of the DSM-5 anyway, or the drugs you're prescribed aren't helping or might even be making things worse.
I completely agree with the author that accepting your anger or whatever feelings you're having is really important. For me, it's the only thing that's worked consistently. Untangling all your messed-up feelings can be a long journey, so it doesn't bring any easy answers, but it feels like a true path to me.
I like your term "toxic positivity". I think I'll find opportunities to use that
I can't claim credit for coming up with it, I'm afraid! The bolded text is a link that explains the concept and what it looks like. It's a very unhealthy impulse that I had to unlearn.
Re: "toxic positivity": I thought it meant what it does mean in the article you linked to. "Where positive thinking becomes toxic is when it is expected to get rid of negative feelings. It can be presented as a demand that we must be positive at the expense of other feelings."
This is what I've experienced in the past but never had a name to put for. It is quite comforting to know that if people are constantly advising you to think positively when to you your life looks like crap you can understand there is something noxious about that.
I read Johann Hari's "Lost Connections" and he had a similar term: cruel optimism. In a nutshell, your happiness is your own responsibility, so if you're not happy you must be doing something wrong.
Healing from trauma and abuse is complex and still not well understood, even by most of the professionals who get paid to treat mental illness. So if you're not getting better, you might think something is wrong with you, but chances are that your therapist is not a good fit, or you're misdiagnosed, or you don't fit into any of the boxes of the DSM-5 anyway, or the drugs you're prescribed aren't helping or might even be making things worse.
I completely agree with the author that accepting your anger or whatever feelings you're having is really important. For me, it's the only thing that's worked consistently. Untangling all your messed-up feelings can be a long journey, so it doesn't bring any easy answers, but it feels like a true path to me.