What Positive Psychology is NOT for a Better Life?

Are you suspicious about how positive psychology might transform your life? You are not alone.

When I was an undergrad in psychology, I was both curious about the impact of positive psychology and suspicious about its promises. Being divided into two, I started reading more and more. This was the decision for me to which part of psychology I will be in: ill-being or well-being.

The more I read about, the more I was sure that mental health is not about being free from mental disorders. It was about having vitality, joy, purpose in life, meaningful connections with others, having a sense of agency, behaving authentically, and thriving in general. And when you cannot have these in your life, this is when the psychological disturbances emerge.

At that point, I made my decision. I was crystal clear. I was going to focus on creating conditions that blossom human effectiveness and mitigate the risk factors to prevent ill-being. That was super cool, feasible, and way impactful than curing/treating mental illnesses after they happen.

I spent 3 years getting my master's degree, and then 5 more years getting my doctoral degree. I don’t know how many hundreds of hours of reading, writing, presenting it includes. Hundreds of people’s data, analyzing what works what does not, and learning from other scientists’ work… Plus, a psychotherapy training that took 7 years to complete.

Now I can call myself I know enough about Positive and Negative Psychology and I can understand the negative first impression for Positive Psychology it has for many people. For some people, it sounds like magic, for some others it sounds like a trap. Let’s look at what it is and what it is not.

1. Positive Psychology is not focusing on positive things.

It is not a shift of focus. It is a shift of lens.

That means I am not focusing on just positive things. I am focusing on things through a different lens which is about framing and elaborating what we see in a growth/positive mindset. For example, let’s assume that I have failed on a project. I might be saying to myself that I am a failure. Or, I might say that I am still learning. This won’t change the fact that the project did not result in the desired way. This will help me to gain what I need to learn and do differently for the next time.

2. Positive Psychology is not ignoring negative things either.

This does not mean feeling positive all the time.

When using this lens, it is okay not to be ok. You can be sad, you can be upset, you can be disappointed, angry, anxious. They are all humane. If the mere aim is to just feeling excited, for example, it is impossible. We cannot know what does that mean to be excited without knowing how it is to be bored. Thinking that you have a double, and observing yourself feeling whatever you are feeling is a good strategy to prevent overidentifying with that emotion. At the end of the day, it is one of the emotions that you can let yourself feel. To feel and understand your need.

3. Positive Psychology is not magic work.

Nothing is incidental or magical in science.

It is awesome to have things in your life all of a sudden, magically, incidentally. However, science is based on a cause-effect relationship. Things might be associated with each other. It is good. This is where scientists start. Remember how Archimedes ran naked through the streets of Syracuse shouting “Eureka!” — or “I have it!” in Greek when he discovered the fluid mechanics. Yes! Start from these observations. After what, do you feel floating but not sink? Experiment those over and over and you have your own manual :) This is what I love calling MEsearch with research principles.

4. Positive Psychology is not a trap either.

Normality is a statistical assumption where you might not be the “normal”.

This does not mean that you are abnormal. What we study as science is “under certain conditions”. The ice reaches its melting point at 0°C and water reaches boiling point at 100°C. However, it changes when the circumstances change. When the pressure changes for example. Recall your simple physics and how it is a matter of transformation of the material with the existing conditions.

So do human beings. What the research suggests is what a person on average does under certain conditions. If your conditions are not identical, different results might emerge. Many people try a few times and then give in by saying “oh no, this does not work for me”. In that sense what positive psychology suggests might sound like illusory boosting that expires very quickly. New routines take time, behaviors turn into habits gradually. Give yourself time and space to see what is your favorite and how do you want that. Medium, rare, well?

5. Positive Psychology is not one size fits all.

It is about the general process, not specific content.

As in the example of medium, rare, well; everyone has a taste. Positive psychology tells us gratitude, hopefulness, and mindfulness are good for example. However, how you reach these and how would you process these might change from one person to another. For someone, being grateful is about having a secret journal to take note of what went well each day; for another, it is about discussing what went well in the dinner table as a family routine. You might be enjoying your meditation pillow, and your friend might be enjoying observing a leaf or grass or roses in the garden mindfully.

6. Positive Psychology is not only for one single group of individuals either.

Well-being is not a luxury.

Although it is not one size fits all, it is not exclusive to a privileged group of people. It is not about being stress-free, it is not about having lots of money, it is not about being a celebrity. It is having a meaningful, purposeful, decent, peaceful life with your basic psychological needs met. Think of a moment where a child plays with sand and stones and creates a joyful castle. The more this child is busy with fancy toys, the less this child will be using creativity and spontaneity with the sand and stones. Chances are, this child is unhappy for one single missing piece of this collection where there are already dozens of other toys at home. A toy can make a child authentically happy if that child already has a purpose with that toy, show competencies, and be playful with the peers or adults around. Same with everyone. What “toy” depends on each individual. However, being playful around that, having meaningful social connections, being agentic in what is going on in your life, and feeling efficient what you do is the key.

To summarize, integrating positive psychology into your lives, in schools, in workplaces, at homes, in relationships, in culture, everywhere, is not only important. It is essential!

Positive Psychology is not the answer to all human problems. Yet, Positive Psychology is still the best way to answer to all human problems anyways.

This is why well-being comes before ill-being. And this is why not working towards your well-being can pave your ways to ill-being in the long run.

As silence is not the absence of any noise, but a quality of mind; well-being is not the absence of symptoms, but the quality of life.