When confronted with a patient who professes to be preoccupied with the world's ills, therapists have traditionally refused to take such concerns at face value. They act on the assumption that, instead of owning up to his or her issues, the patient is supposedly projecting them outwards to keep them at arms length.
At least those therapists are devoting their attention to somebody's problems. That's more than you can say for those who practice "positive psychology," as it was christened in 1998. In "Some Dark Thoughts on Happiness" (New York magazine, July 17) Jennifer Senior explains that's when Martin Seligman, then president of the American Psychological Association, coined the term in an attempt to "shift the emphasis of psychology away from pathology and toward functionality, resilience, and well-being." In other words, away from the origins of mental disease.
Functionality? Resilience? Obviously, especially since our country is well on its way to becoming an anti-welfare state, in which the weak are increasingly abandoned by the side of the road. But "Shift the emphasis of psychology away from pathology"? Is the patient then free to deny he's sick? Or, if he's the type to luxuriate in his illness, should his therapist empty out and dry up his favorite wallow?
But what's wrong with acting "as if"?* Nothing -- in fact, if you're capable of that kind of resolve, you're well on the way to "well-being." Still, the questions beg to be asked. Just how well can you be in today's world? And wouldn't it entail turning your mind into a gated community?
But for most people, achieving "well-being" is as much of a luxury as they find worrying about NSA spying in the face of terrorism. Furthermore, at a time when everyone is expected to dedicate their lives to making a small fortune, any notions of well-being begin and end with the state of one's finances.
Health care costs and credit card payments have reduced significant numbers of us to the level of serfs living in indentured servitude. Meanwhile, many of those approaching their retirement years (once called "retirement," but now just the years you'd have once been retired) spend every waking moment beating back panic. Years from accumulating the small fortune required to retire in earnest these days, they're tormented by that nineteenth-century phrase "He died a pauper."
Of course, positive psychology can't help but resemble a regimen for the well-off. But anyone rich enough to dispense with health-care insurance that dictates he or she see an MSW who's recompensed $25 a session doesn't need, deserve, or, no doubt, want our sympathy about how well is their being.
Well-being's other nemesis, aside from finances, is war and its subdivision, terrorism. Soldiers themselves, traditionally less concerned with their own safety than that of their comrades, were also, in more civil times, conflicted over the command to kill. Likewise, it's easier for the public to come to terms with life as a target and victim than the implications of our armed forces being targeters and victimizers of others.
Thus, most of us tune out what our duly elected (well, sort of) government has set in motion in Iraq. In the long run, though, retreating to the Green Zone of our mind is a greater threat to our well-being than the threat of terrorism. Positive psychology likely agrees that it's a mistake to insulate ourselves from the world's troubles. It's just that, from a PR point of view, the whole concept of positive psychology smacks of narcissism.
What about those on spiritual paths to whom the pursuit of peace of mind is a quest? As wanna-be Babas with legitimate teachers are no doubt aware, that entails:
1. Strengthening yourself, not to ward off onslaughts, but to experience others' pain. With their concerns paramount in your mind, you'll escape the haunting that blocking them out incurs and instead be inspired to work for change.
2. Divining the nature of the work for which you were put on earth. (If it doesn't include service, that's not your intuition you're tuning into, it's your wish list.)
Today, more than ever, it's impossible to avoid concluding that the will to happiness is selfish and immature. It's also impossible to avoid concluding, no matter how obvious it is and despite how many religious tracts and self-help books got there first, that the only salvation lies in service.
"Agitated members of the American Psychological Association are making final plans to challenge a policy that allows psychologists to participate in the interrogation of detainees during the 'war on terror'. . . [during which they would] play 'a valuable and ethical role to assist in protecting our nation, other nations, and innocent civilians from harm' by consulting with interrogators."
It looks like the current APA leadership's idea of service is to assist Vice President Cheney in his forays to the dark side.
Russ Wellen is the nuclear deproliferation editor for OpEdNews. He's also on the staffs of Freezerbox and Scholars & Rogues.
"It's hard to tell people not to smoke when you have a cigarette dangling from your mouth." -- Mohamed El Baradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency
I have not been around for a few days, and I did not get a chance to read your article until now. I was trying to do my homework before responding, but I decided to take a break from "Some dark thoughts about Happiness".
So, I do not know enough yet to comment on the particulars you are discussing....and even without the 'extra reading material', I would have to read your article at least one more time before I can hope to fully understand it. For right now, the most important thing I wanted to say:
I feel the same way about Psychology as I do about Religion.....my beliefs regarding both are identical....."None of the Above'. That is very different from being an atheist. I do not believe against God or against Psychology......it's just that I 'know' , and I firmy think one cannot know something and believe it at the same time. (and I cannot substitute a belief for what i do not yet know) Of course, the focus on pathology in Psychology...and even more so Psychiatry...is not only not helpful, and completely wrong scientifically..... and it shows a total lack of insight and understanding about human nature....and it is harmful to more patients than it has ever been helpful to others. Yet, the 'Positive Psychology'
sounds to me like a movement of 'Against Prozac' coming back in retaliation against 'For Prozac'....and thereby it automatically has joined the 'None of the Above' list for me.
What I really wanted to say, and what 'I know without a theory to back it up with', is: I am shocked...and I feel sad...and I find it disturbing...that you submitted this article several days ago, and that there has been not one word of response, or even acknowledgement....of your thoughts, work, effort, and existence.
Anyway.... just wanted you
to know that I saw, and heard you ...and that I am interested (and still working on it) Katrin
by
Katrin R. (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 522 comments)
on Saturday, August 12, 2006 at 8:21:00 PM
Thanks for your kind words, Katrin. I have seen psychologists off and on over the years and have been helped by them. My only beef with them is, like most professionals, they think their years of training make them experts. If you venture an opinion on their field, they really bristle. It's almost like psychology is a religion to them and they think they're high priests.
by
Russ Wellen (58 articles, 1029 quicklinks, 66 diaries, 335 comments)
on Saturday, August 12, 2006 at 8:58:43 PM
.....and what's so frustrating to me is, that neither one of them is, or should be treated as a 'religion'. Neither one of them is that 'special'.....at least not any more special than the 'perfection' already inherent in the particular 'system' 'as is' (i.e. the making of a baby...pregnancy...childbirth....breastfeeding....or the mind) You don't have to add 'religion' to it to make it more special .....or 'less real' , less accessable, more sophisticated...more magical. With this attitude: 'A mere human 'being' should/ must resort to trust, belief and faith of those experts who have the special education, intelligence, insight and gift to practice and teach various 'secret healings', as they are not capable of 'knowing' the 'Religion', (special powers), and the 'Gods' (them).... who practice, and have that special Power and Knowledge and Expertise.'
And since all these different systems are interdependent ....when you take the 'exclusive right' to one single 'specialty', and study facts/beliefs blindly, alone , out of context, and as the only true.....an exclusive 'world' that matters..... and expertly only visible to you, or like you......you've by default ruined 'the truth' by taking 'the dynamics' out of it's natural relationship.....and by making something 'yours'...'.your perfection'......he is totally missing the point and 'the meaning of perfection'. There is no question in my mind that there is an exact science behind the workings of the soul, just as is true for the body and mind. I don't think God is any more or less special than the birth of a child, and/or many other things. It is very special without the religious packaging which keeps us from exploring more chemistry and physics. I don't think Jesus is that special either......no more than Ted Bundy, for sure.
I have no doubt that therapy really helped you. Therapy, or psychology...has so much to offer......it's a science and an art.....not a religion. You and your therapist, and your relationship, matter a lot too. You are most likely the dream patient for a very, very good therapist as well.....very tough, and promising at the same time. Therapy is like doing research.
"The true worth of an experiment consists in his pusuing not only what he seeks, but also what he did not seek'. Claude Bernard
"What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite." Bertrant Russell
Katrin
by
Katrin R. (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 522 comments)
on Sunday, August 13, 2006 at 2:20:55 AM
