In the command to be happy, there is a weird silence. The smile of the well-intentioned, the sunshine emoji, the sunshine itself, and the chipper comment of it could be worse, are like pieces of glitter that, for a while, drift through the air but land like little shards of broken glass. And you, of course, are possibly familiar with being there also, in the middle of your storm of emotions, being given a rainbow sticker to stick over the booms inside.

This article is not a rant of happiness. It is a letter, an unwinding, a breath. It is a place where we just sit with this heaviness, which we cannot discard, no matter how someone tells us to think positively.

Because the truth is…

When positivity refuses to acknowledge pain, then it turns into poison.

The Sugar-Coated Lie We Got Told

We are in a happiness-driven world. It is marketed to us periodically, rolled up in reels, on T-shirts, as captions with golden-hour filters:

Vibes are only good.

Worry, nor be happy.

On the bright side.

What does one do in case there might be no silver lining that day? What happens when you are reeling from a loss, you are drowning in anxiety, or you are grappling with burnout, and someone tells you to be grateful, and that is going to be equivalent to a band-aid to your soul that is bleeding?

That is what is termed toxic positivity, the need to constantly strike a cheerful, upbeat pose regardless of how you feel. It is not only tiresome. It's invalidating.

It tells you:

• It is an inconvenience on your part to suffer.
• That thy sadness is weakness.
• That at thy wrath is ugliness.

And what is worse, it influences you into feeling guilty because you are a human being.

What is Toxic Positivity?

It has multiple masks on nearly every face, and sometimes it even looks like love.

You are crying, and someone reminds you: Don't cry! Strengthen up.

You confess your being overwhelmed, and they say, You have so much to thank God for.

You make confessions of anxiety, and they respond with an answer: “You just need to stop thinking excessively.”

These words do not come across as dangerous. But behind you, your feelings are being laughed off, so that the only option you have of being accepted is to conceal the actual self.

Toxic positivity lies not only in what other people say. It is also what we mumble to ourselves:

• Why am I like this? My life is not that bad at all.”
• I am not supposed to be sad. Some of the other people are worse off.”
• I shall be obliged to grin it out. Nobody wants to be an encumbrance.”

When we attempt to repress pain, we repress authenticity.

The Reasons We Get Into the Trap

Simply because it is easier to smile than to talk.

Since human beings prefer cheerfulness to reality.

Since we were once told by society that positivity is a strengthand emotion is a weakness.

And somewhere down the road, we started to think that healing was to hide, that emotional survival was to pretend, until we at least pretended to make it.

Covering up wounds, however, has never been about healing. It is a matter of being with them and sharing the same blood and breath to allow them to naturally close.

The mental cost of being miserable: The Psychological Toll of Forced Happiness

Not being able to reveal your real feelings makes you feel lonely, so you think that you are unique in this world because you are not thankful enough or strong enough.

Toxic positivity may result in:

• Storage of pressure in the body brought by suppressed emotions
• Shame, to be (or feel) too much or too deeply
• Discommunication with friends who are unable to carry your truth
• Psychological problems, e.g., depression, anxiety, burnout

Paradoxically, the attempts to remain happy create more suffering, the suffering that can hardly be noticed by others, the internal one. As we are being taught to act happy but not be happy.

True Positivity and Toxic Positivity

Optimism is a healthy thing. It goes like this:

I understand that you are being hurt. I am over here with you.

Saying that it is okay when you are not okay.

We are going to sit with some hurt together.

True positivity does not call on you to disregard the storm.

It reads, Let's have the courage to share the umbrella.

An Epistle to the Wait-and-Seers

Just in case you read this and you realize you have been holding your own emotions back just to make others feel good, then I want to tell you this:

There is nothing wrong with you being sad.

The fact that you need some help does not make you weak.

It does not mean you are broken because you cannot be happy on this or that day.

It is not wrong that you are hurting. Sacred are thy tears. You are no less lovable because of your silence.

And when the world says to you, Everything will be all right, think to yourself, What a ghastly joke!

“No. Today I must weep.”

How We Can Improve (Both of Us and the Rest)

Rather than toxic positivity, we should go with emotional honesty.

What happens when a person discusses pain?

Don’t fix it. Don’t preach. Just listen. Be sympathetic without strings.

In case you feel overwhelmed:

Pause. What do you want? Not what they want to see you present.

As you are tempted to say, be positive:

Rew in words dried in your style—words like these, Overcome it; I am here for you. Got something you want to talk about?”

In Valediction: It Stands to Reason

We are not created to have sunlight all the time. Even the flowers blossom best when there is some harmony between the rain and the light.

And let sorrow sigh. Anger yells. Fear shakes.

Since recovery begins where the truth is permitted to be alive, raw, messy, and unrefined.

And in that gap, Don Juan, gradually, tenderly...

Happiness makes a comeback.

Not that it had to, but that it could come back.

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