Mental health is an aspect of human health that needs to be treated properly. If mental health is not given enough attention, a number of unhealthy mental conditions can arise, even disrupting daily life. Disturbed mental health can affect the thoughts, feelings, and behavior of people who experience it. Many things play a role in the occurrence of mental disorders, one of which is a tendency called toxic positivity.
What is Toxic Positivity ?
Toxic positivity is actually not a diagnosis or mental disorder, but a fairly popular layman's term that is used to describe the phenomenon when someone provides encouragement or entertainment in the wrong way, whether too excessive (excessive) or out of place. This will often have a negative impact on the recipient.
What makes someone do toxic positivity ?
There are no special characteristics in people who do toxic positivity . However, there are a number of things that might be a contributing factor to a person's toxic positivity . For example, they are less able to recognize their own feelings and lack the skills to empathize with others. This can happen for various reasons, one of which is the influence of parenting or culture.
How to avoid toxic positivity towards others ?
To avoid toxic positivity, you can do the following:
- Listen carefully to the person who is pouring out his heart to us
- Make sure the person is comfortable to talk to us
- Do not interrupt someone who is telling a story
- Shows our curiosity and concern
- Before giving advice, it's best to first assess whether the person needs advice or just needs to be heard.
How to not get toxic positivity?
The way for us to avoid toxic positivity is to be smart in choosing people to tell stories. Everyone has different characters and conditions, so this will affect how a person responds. In addition, we should also have more than one coping mechanism, so that it can be a substitute method if one method is considered less effective.
What are the negative effects of toxic positivity?
There are a number of negative impacts of toxic positivity on people who do it, namely:
- Those who do it will find it increasingly difficult to empathize with others. If someone has toxic positivity , it means that they are reluctant to recognize other people's problems and empathize with them
- The party that does it will have difficulty in providing the right solution to the problem. This is due to the fact that existing problems are not first listened to and understood.
Meanwhile, toxic positivity can of course have a negative effect on the mental health of someone who receives it. These negative impacts include:
- Feeling unheard and appreciated
- Feeling isolated and having no one to understand
- Toxic positivity can also make a person question himself, so that person tends to become insecure easily
Toxic positivity is dangerous for someone's mental health who constantly gets it. This can trigger more serious mental disorders. Therefore, we should avoid Toxic Positivity behavior by wisely controlling what we feel, think, and say when someone tells us about their problem, so that person will feel heard and appreciated.
If you have a mental health problem that is serious enough, it should be handled by more professional help. You can visit a psychiatrist (psychiatrist) or a psychologist at the EMC Hospital so that mental health problems can be treated properly.
Article written by dr. Anna Elissa, Sp.KJ (Mental Health Specialist (Psychiatrist) EMC Sentul Hospital).