Reddit reviews The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking

It wouldn't do any harm to read, many people have found it helpful. Just don't get involved with him or the community, it's rage porn escapism that'll leave you mentally worse off. Just look at how awful the posts in his subreddit are - leftists are just as miserable, but generally more out of despair and empathy than rage. (There are many exceptions, I know, I've been one more than a few times.)

A friend recommended this book: https://smile.amazon.com/Make-Your-Bed-Little-Things/dp/1455570249. Probably gets the same point across but in half the pages.

The only one I've found helpful is The Antidote. The author's accent is pleasant, it's a good audiobook to walk around with if it hasn't yet gotten too cold where you are. Or just to play mindless video games like Diablo or Katamari Damacy with. Here's a 30min talk he did, worth giving a shot if stoicism has ever resonated with you.

And I might as well throw this talk out as well. Not necessarily productive, but it was very comforting and validating for me after having been long burnt out on Alan Watts platitudes.

But back to jbp - again, the book resonates with a lot of people (I think he functions as a stand-in father figure for many), I'm sure you can pick out what's helpful and leave the rest if you want. His cultural criticism is laser-focused on diversity and his fan base is continually upset, though, so I think there are more constructive writers out there.

This is getting way too long, sorry, but adding one more link: for anyone who feels they might be in an upswing right now and receptive to "you should try harder" advice, I enjoyed this blog post.

No. What I find painful is being in situations where false jollity is required. Perhaps that's what you're describing, I don't know.

My times of genuine happiness are probably the reason I'm still alive. If I were never happy I'm sure I would have offed myself decades ago.

As the philosophers say, happiness is not an end state in itself; it is a side effect from doing other things. Whether that is performing useful work, or conjuring up useful theories, or being truly present when you share time with your significant other or children, doesn't matter. It will vary from one person to the next. But too many people think "well if I just do X and Y and Z, I will be happy someday", as if it's a destination at the end of a train ride.

Edit: I believe you'd find this book useful: The Antidote - Happiness for people who can't stand positive thinking. I recommend it highly, especially to INTP folk. From the review: "...they argue that in our personal lives, and in society at large, it’s our constant effort to be happy that is making us miserable. And that there is an alternative path to happiness and success that involves embracing failure, pessimism, insecurity, and uncertainty—the very things we spend our lives trying to avoid."

I feel you, winter always gets me in these positions. I started recently reading this (maybe a fit for you, maybe not) might be worth a shot: http://www.amazon.com/The-Antidote-Happiness-Positive-Thinking/dp/0865478015

With summer coming and a little more physical activity in my life, things seem to be looking up after a good year or so in a slump. I hope the best for you.

>Visualizing Success Can Actually Lead to Failure

I completely agree! You're setting yourself up to fail, over and over again, because you'll rarely be as good as you visualize yourself to be, and just end up feeling like a failure every time.

I much rather like the Stoic practice of negative visualisation with the approach of hoping for the best but be prepared for the worst by visualizing the worst than can happen. Just as the very best rarely happens, the very worst also rarely happens. Things almost never turn out as bad as you imagine, so you're setting yourself up to succeed all the time realising that things are actually not that bad, making you feel better about yourself, instead of worse.

As it turns out, research has shown that the happiest people are the ones that are best at dealing with things that go wrong in life, not the ones that think most positively.

I recommend this book: The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking.

I'm currently reading The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking
by Oliver Burkeman. I think the title says it all, but so far I found it to be a very down to earth book that states that trying to constantly stay positive is self-defeating and can actually sabotage your goals as well as make you more depressed when things turn for the worse.

Can I give you a little perspective from someone that has been down a similar road.

Unless you make peace with the worst parts of yourself and just accept that they exist, you are going to have a very hard time making positive progress.

All the things that you categorize as awful: "selfishness, greed, egotism, laziness, compulsive behavior, lying, cheating, manipulating " are things that actually serve an survival and evolutionary purpose.

Many of these things, for example, are rooted in trying to take care of yourself first and foremost and ensure that you come out on top. You mention being scared and a direct reaction to being scared is self-preservation.

If you are scared that people will not love you if they knew the "real" you, then you might lie and manipulate to make yourself look better than you feel on the inside. If you are scared of failure it might manifest itself as laziness because if you don't do anything, then you can't fail.

That shadow-self is part of you and without it, you will not be whole. You open with a bible verse and I don't know if you come from that world but one hard part of coming from Christian theology is the concept of the sinful nature and the war with it. It can promote a very dualistic mindset. The good you and the bad you and they are at odd with each other.

Let's go really base with it. If you are a straight male and you see a beautiful woman, your first impulse might be something lustful. Then "good you" chastises yourself and your depravity... but that impulse still continues.

The problem is everything in your being is wired to want to sleep with the hot woman you just saw. You aren't fighting against a sinful evil version of yourself, you are trying to deny things that are built into the most primitive parts of yourself!

The balanced version would be seeing the beautiful woman, recognizing that yes, you would love to sleep with her and then deciding what to do with that impulse. If your faith or beliefs or life situation do not allow it, then you make a choice to live according to those beliefs.

What you have now done is recognize the impulse, accepted it, you did not moralize it in either direction, and you made a choice of what to do with that impulse based on your values and choices for your life. You walk away just a normal person, feeling normal things, and making the decisions you want in life.

This is the healthy way to improve.

I am sure you can see how this applies in other situations as well!

All the things that are a part of you, the things you see as negative, depression, instability, are all things you can learn to accept and life with. I know this because I have lived this.

I spent a lot of time wishing I was just magically different. Guess what changed? Nothing. But while I wish I were wired differently and that, at my core, I didn't have such a capacity for being awful, I've made peace that those are the cards I was dealt and I can take control of my life from my impulses. I can make the right choices because I have already accepted the desire to make the wrong ones. I don't have to "react" when I've already thought it through.

Look into the concepts of Stoicism and you will find that there is a "negative" path to contentment in life and it comes from accepting things as they are instead of wasting the energy wishing it were different. A good starting point would be "The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking." This book serves as a good primer for some of the bigger concepts. I personally really enjoyed the audiobook if you are a listener and not a reader.

This isn't to say that you can't take Stoicism way too far and rob life of joy and happiness, but it is a good mental exercise in framing what is happening in your life as just being how it is. To tear away all things we build up to make things look better than they are so we don't have to face that reality.

But first and foremost, you, exactly as you are, do deserve love and acceptance from yourself and others. There are always ways to improve but you are not a broken thing. Give these two talks a listen by Brene Brown (The Power of Vulnerability and Listening to Shame) to get some perspective.

The worst parts of yourself, as you see it, are just things that exist in most of us that you only need a little practice in redirecting. Think of a child.. they are selfish, little assholes whose world revolves around themselves... yet no one faults them because they have learned to exist beyond that mindset. Some of us take a little longer to get there but we all can. Accept your where you are, and start your journey.

The Happiness Hypothesis - More or less a "best of" of self-help and positive psychology that focuses on tried and true stuff that actually works and not mystical mumbo jumbo. Haidt deliberately draws on a combination of modern psychology and ancient philosophy and does a great job of it. This is actually my go-to book to recommend to people for self-development.

The Antidote - A great book on how to cultivate happiness without denying the negative or unpleasant aspects of life and experience.

Happiness is a Serious Problem - Politically I often disagree with Dennis Prager but this book has fantastic practical advice on living a happier life.

To better understand meditation, I highly recommend The Antidote: Happiness For People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking by Oliver Burkeman. I have bought this book over 25 times to give to friends/family who are in difficult places in life. Only 1 or 2 have read it fully, but each of them said it's had a significant positive impact on their lives; I consider that a win if I can help even a small number of people.

I used to think meditation was "woowoo" (one of my new favorite terms, thanks Brady), but this book approaches it as more of a mental exercise for dealing with stress, anxiety, and even depression. Like any practice, there are a lot of know-it-alls and gatekeepers. Anecdotally, daily meditation has drastically improved my outlook on life.

Protip: Get the free app, Insight Timer. It has guided meditations that can help you start. I dislike that so many apps charge to teach something so inherently "free".

People have also failed miserably because they vastly overestimated their chances of success. People have achieved amazing things without overestimating their chance of success.

This sub is so lost. Y'all need to read The Antidote

Not giving a fuck is not about being positive all the time; needing to be positive all the time IS GIVING HUGE FUCKS.

The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking by Oliver Burkeman. It's an interesting and impressive argument. I find it more compelling than Chopra's missives, possibly because Chopra's work is aimed at a broader audience, but also because Chopra seems to limit his research and foundations to a rather narrow historical, philosophical, and cultural canon.

what /u/apunebolatumerilaila recommended and if that do not sound good, try https://www.amazon.in/Antidote-Happiness-People-Positive-Thinking/dp/0865478015

waise rone mein kya burai hai, aankhe saaf ho jaati hai, mann halka ho jaata hai. Rooo aur rone do should be the new moto.

The best example of modern Stoicism I’ve ever come across was out of The Antidote. An older couple, Jocelyn and Keith, both had PHDs and a promising future in academia. But Jocelyn, at a fairly young age, ended up with a chronic disease that left her unable to care for herself. Keith basically became her full time care taker, money quickly dried up, and you can imagine what sort of life they have. By all hedonic measures their life is shit, yet they were happy. Their example is so unglamorous; fortune had fucked them over. Such an important lesson for me.

I would recommend this book if you are still trying to read!

https://www.amazon.com/Antidote-Happiness-People-Positive-Thinking/dp/0865478015

OH my favorite: https://www.amazon.com/Antidote-Happiness-People-Positive-Thinking/dp/0865478015

'The Antidote: Happiness for people that can't stand positive thinking'

This an entertaining read (nothing too dry), a newish book that delves into Stoicism (amongst other things).

The way to overcome it is not the positive thinking mumbo jumbo that is over adviced. When you aren't wired like that it will only make you feel more miserable. A good book on how to not let your pessismism/negativity hold you back is The Antidote.

He describes it here www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOJL7WkaadY
The book: http://www.amazon.com/The-Antidote-Happiness-Positive-Thinking/dp/0865478015

http://www.amazon.com/The-Antidote-Happiness-Positive-Thinking/dp/0865478015