TRY this on for a new self-help mantra: “I’m not good enough, I’m not smart enough, and doggone it, people may not like me all that much.”
According to a new study, a little negative thinking may be more helpful for the chronically insecure than purely sunshine-filled affirmations of the kind made famous by now-senator Al Franken’s “SNL” character, Stuart Smalley.
Psychology professor Joanne Wood, of the University of Waterloo in Ontario, says her research was inspired by the relentless flow of cheer-up statements found in popular culture. The claim is that thinking happy thoughts actually improves your quality of life.
“They’ve advocated it for years and years, without any evidence, in magazines, in self-help books and on TV,” says Wood.
She’s not kidding. The trend that started with a 1952 book called “The Power of Positive Thinking,” by Norman Vincent Peale, has spawned a multimillion-dollar industry. Need convincing? Here are a few snippets from the latest crop of buck-up books:
n “Every self-limiting thought that you employ to explain why you’re not living life to the absolute fullest — so you’re feeling purposeful, content, and fully alive — is something you can challenge and reverse.” (“Excuses Begone! How To Change Lifelong, Self-Defeating Thinking Habits” by Dr. Wayne W. Dyer)
n “So how do you feel about yourself? Are you your number one fan?” (“What is Your Self-Worth?: A Woman’s Guide to Validation” by Cheryl Saban, Ph.D.)
n “All you have to do is choose happiness. Why? Because when you choose happiness you make everything else more possible too.” (“Be Happy! Release the Power of Happiness in YOU” by Robert Holden)
Wood and her colleagues were skeptical. “We had a suspicion they might not work for everyone,” she says. “So we put that to the test.”
They found that repeating the statement “I am a lovable person” made people who started out feeling good about themselves feel better, but that it made the already gloomy people feel worse.
“They repeat those statements, and they start thinking, ‘Well, these are all the ways in which I am not a lovable person,’ ” Wood says. “And I think the other thing that happens is, they believe that this kind of positive statement should work, and they shouldn’t have any negative thoughts, and then when they do, they think, ‘I’m really failing at this, too.’ “
A more successful alternative, she says, was for the depressive types to think about both the ways the statement was true, and the ways that it wasn’t.
Ed Yong, author of the science blog Not Exactly Rocket Science, thinks that makes perfect sense: “Positive thinking isn’t worthless,” he says via e-mail, “but it must be tempered by reality. The study suggests that telling yourself something that’s positive, but that falls into the boundaries of what you believe, is a much better approach than outlandishly optimistic statements.”
So go ahead: Celebrate your mediocrity, starting today. You deserve it!