Get Determined About Being Positive…
There is a scene in black comedy After Life where the brother-in-law of Tony, the character played by Ricky Gervais, has a heart attack. Tony puts it down to him bottling up his emotions, whereas he (Tony) lets them go, shouting and swearing at people and even throwing a potted plant at a driver who doesn’t stop at a zebra crossing!
However appealing it might be to throw a potted plant at a driver that annoys you, letting your anger run free isn’t really going to help you. It activates the stress hormones - the flight or fight system - and it becomes harder to switch back to feeling happy.
I’m lucky to be working with a smart neuropsychologist, Dr Victoria Burmester, who understands how the brain works (unlike me) and I’m going to outline some of the points from our workshop on Overcoming Negativity - which is a tendency to consider only the bad side of something; to have a lack of enthusiasm or hope!
It’s hardly surprising negativity is having an effect. Even with signs that we are now coming out of the pandemic, many of us, our families and loved ones, have been severely impacted. It’s been a period of enormous change and uncertainty – we have all worked remotely, whatever our home circumstances. Emotions like stress and worry have spiked as people have health, family and job concerns. We may feel isolated and anxious about an uncertain future. We see social injustice, political turmoil, a climate emergency and we can’t escape from 24 hour news and social media.
I would stop here as I don’t want any of you to lose hope or enthusiasm but bear with me. Just to top it off, we also have our own internal negativity bias to deal with. This is a mechanism we all have and it’s something that has actually been designed to protect us. Way back as cave dwellers it was critical for our survival, to wonder where the sabre-toothed tiger might be lurking. Our brains are programmed to go to the negative first, which now could be worrying about paying bills or what people are saying about us.
Whether the message to the brain is positive or negative affects how we take it on board and how long we remember it for. We are much quicker to learn from a negative event than a positive one – you don’t need more than one shock to learn not to touch an electric fence. We don’t forget these negative experiences quickly either, they are more durable than positive ones – the one hurtful comment on social media has more impact than the 300 positive ones.
Negativity bias is thought to be processed by the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, which means that it’s not just an automatic reaction but that there is some processing and effort involved in it. In people with depression the negativity is more significant, impactful and harder to let go of. Every one of us though needs to make some effort to let it go.
Other manifestations of negativity include poor emotional regulation, reduced memory, increased rumination and a lack of confidence and motivation, which may show itself in things like imposter syndrome.
We’ve also missed the connection with friends and colleagues and the release of oxytocin (the love hormone) that comes with compliments and eye contact, something you can get from dogs too.
The odds are stacked against us, hence the point about getting serious and determined about taking the fight back to the negative. There are things you can do. To be positive requires more effort and investment. I’ve written before about the importance of sleep, exercise, diet and mindfulness – and they are fundamental pillars of good mental and physical health.
On top of taking these elements seriously also make an effort to reframe the negative into a positive. If you are experiencing imposter syndrome chances are you are pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone (I’ll let you into a secret, I experience it talking brain science with Victoria!). It also means you have humility, self awareness and you’re not a smart alec who knows everything.
Next time a driver cuts you up and you notice the rage coming – hold on tight to your potted plant, smile and wave at them, deep in the knowledge that you know far more about neuroscience than they do. It’s possible to reframe imposter syndrome, road rage - we can reframe almost anything irritating so it doesn’t get to us – they all teach us something, if only to be patient.
And try this, make a commitment to five small positive acts a day – for example, one might be to decide to smile and say good morning to ten people you pass on the street looking at them in the eye (good for releasing oxytocin) - they might think you’re odd but it’s not about them. If you’re not comfortable to do this with strangers, you could start with dogs. Remember, we need to get determined about being positive!