"You just have to think positive" cliche.
Posted: August 6th, 2014, 8:01 am
First off, I am seeing a pattern on this board of posters that are tired of being given automated lines being passed off as advice.
"You just lack confidence"
"You'll find someone when you are not looking"
"Just have a good attitude"
"It is what you make it"
Feel free to add more but my overall point is when people feed me these clichés, they imply that I am having a bad attitude towards life or that being depressed is my fault because I am a negative thinker. As if these people know what is in my head and how my thoughts affect my reality.
Every person who has said that to me thinks they are dispensing wisdom when really they just love the sound of their own condescending voices. It isn't helpful; it is actually quite insulting. I went through a depression for almost all of 2009 spending months at the gym working out a lot. I wasn't training for the Olympics. I was trying to feel better. I went out to public places trying to have a good attitude towards people only to witness their bad attitudes and their toxic personalities. I wanted to go out and have fun but others just want to sit there and sneer at people like jerks. Yeah, you should have a good attitude but if you are in a toxic social culture you are going to be very lonely. Positive thinking only goes so far and then there is observable reality. I went out thinking people were friendly and easy to connect with and they showed me how not true that is.
But as I never tire of stating, when I got to Costa Rica all of that changed. It was refreshing that people noticed that I existed. I no longer felt excluded by the friends/dating scene because my personality, attitude actually fit in with the friendly vibes of the people there. There is nothing lonelier than being surrounded by the wrong people in life. So it is not just positive thinking as it is you need to be around positive people. Unfortunately, people don't take the time to listen or understand and so they presume to know everything about me. I just want to tell people to spare me their automated BS.
"You just lack confidence"
"You'll find someone when you are not looking"
"Just have a good attitude"
"It is what you make it"
Feel free to add more but my overall point is when people feed me these clichés, they imply that I am having a bad attitude towards life or that being depressed is my fault because I am a negative thinker. As if these people know what is in my head and how my thoughts affect my reality.
Every person who has said that to me thinks they are dispensing wisdom when really they just love the sound of their own condescending voices. It isn't helpful; it is actually quite insulting. I went through a depression for almost all of 2009 spending months at the gym working out a lot. I wasn't training for the Olympics. I was trying to feel better. I went out to public places trying to have a good attitude towards people only to witness their bad attitudes and their toxic personalities. I wanted to go out and have fun but others just want to sit there and sneer at people like jerks. Yeah, you should have a good attitude but if you are in a toxic social culture you are going to be very lonely. Positive thinking only goes so far and then there is observable reality. I went out thinking people were friendly and easy to connect with and they showed me how not true that is.
But as I never tire of stating, when I got to Costa Rica all of that changed. It was refreshing that people noticed that I existed. I no longer felt excluded by the friends/dating scene because my personality, attitude actually fit in with the friendly vibes of the people there. There is nothing lonelier than being surrounded by the wrong people in life. So it is not just positive thinking as it is you need to be around positive people. Unfortunately, people don't take the time to listen or understand and so they presume to know everything about me. I just want to tell people to spare me their automated BS.
