“That we should always look on the bright side has gone too far and may be damaging our wellbeing.” This is the opinion expressed by Conor Feehly in “The Happiness Trap” (New Scientist, June 8, 2024).

The problem with repeatedly chanting such mantras as “I am a lovable person” or “Every day in every way I’m getting better and better,” explains Feehly, is that they don’t work. Assertions such as “happiness is a choice” and that “I am in control of my emotions” turn out to be fallacies. “It’s going to be okay” may be false optimism. Devising strategies to avoid negative emotions is what Susan David of the Harvard Medical School calls “the tyranny of positivity”. Psychologists have found that these exercises in self-affirmation are ultimately ineffective primarily because they aren’t believed by those who are reciting them. The long-term effects are really to cause damage because they create a world of illusions, described as “toxic positivism”.