Toxic Positivity – Why I Don’t Encourage Positive Thinking After Trauma
You will never hear me tell clients to ‘just think positively’ after trauma. Not because optimism is bad, but because it can feel like denying someone’s lived experience, minimising what they’ve been through, or an attempt to mentally override a nervous system in survival mode.
In my opinion, there’s nothing worse than going through something really difficult, feeling broken and overwhelmed, and then someone trying to put a positive spin on things. This sort of toxic positivity often sounds like, ‘everything happens for a reason’, ‘things could be worse’ or ‘look on the bright side’.
I’m sure the people who say these things believe they’re being helpful, but pressuring someone to maintain a happy, optimistic outlook no matter what can easily do more harm than good. In this article, I’ll explain why this is the case and share what healing from trauma actually looks like.
The Difference Between Optimism and Toxic Positivity
Before we go any further, I want to highlight the difference between optimism and toxic positivity.
Optimism means hoping for a good outcome or happy future while fully accepting your current pain as part of life.
Toxic positivity forces happiness, avoids difficult feelings, and pretends everything is fine when it’s not.
Optimism allows you to feel sad, angry or scared without shame.
Toxic positivity labels these feelings as ‘bad’ or unhelpful, forcing you to mask or deny them.
Optimism faces problems head-on and looks for solutions or opportunities for growth.
Toxic positivity runs away from discomfort and deep pain.
If we’re expected to be constantly happy and upbeat, we aren’t being our fully authentic selves. We’re ignoring or pushing down the more negative emotions in pursuit of being positive. And just as being constantly negative isn’t healthy, being positive all the time isn’t either.
The Problem with Positive Thinking After Trauma
Toxic positivity in the wake of trauma is particularly problematic. First, it ignores the body’s automated responses that occur during and after trauma. These responses, and the long-term impact they can have, are deeply ingrained. You can’t just think positively and make them magically disappear. You can learn more about them via the links below:
Trauma also affects our ability to think positively in the first place because it impacts the pre-frontal cortex. This part of the brain is a bit like a control centre, supporting lots of our behaviour and functioning. It plays a key role in things like emotional regulation, executive functioning, decision-making and reasoning.
In the short term, trauma affects our ability to think rationally and regulate how we feel. If a traumatic memory is triggered, we can struggle to regulate our emotions and think rationally about that memory. In the long-term, if we are chronically, consistently exposed to trauma, the actual capacity and structure of the pre-frontal cortex changes. The volume of that area of the brain is reduced, leaving us with less capacity to manage emotions.
Finally, encouraging people to think positively after trauma can be hugely invalidating. Usually, when someone talks to us about things they’re finding difficult, they just need us to listen and be with them. It’s important to acknowledge when things are really horrible, painful, or hard, instead of ‘looking on the bright side’ or trying to change someone’s thinking.
What Healing Actually Looks Like
Despite what toxic positivity tells us, there are no short cuts to healing and suppressing our natural feelings can be harmful. We have to move through our emotions to heal.
After trauma, your beliefs don’t come from a particular ‘mindset’, they come from repeated experiences of threat, rejection, or neglect. The brain forms snap, protective assumptions like, ‘I’m not safe’, ‘people can’t be trusted,’ or ‘it’s my fault’.
These beliefs once helped you survive, so they feel deeply convincing. Healing isn’t forcing yourself to think the opposite – it’s slowly teaching the brain something new. ‘I understand why I learnt this, and I’m learning something kinder now.’ This process should be grounded in compassion, pacing, safety, and neuroplasticity, not pressure to be positive.
If you’re struggling and finding things difficult to cope with, I want you to know you’re not being ‘negative’. You’re recovering from experiences that shaped your inner world. These things can be rewritten, gently, over time. When your thinking finally starts to shift, it can be an indicator of healing and post-traumatic growth, but it’s rarely the first step.
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Therapy for Trauma
If you’re struggling with any of the things described in this article and you’d like an expert to help you heal and recover, please get in touch. Alternatively, you can subscribe to The Trauma Toolbox to receive my insights and tips straight to your inbox every month. I also share lots of mental health education via Instagram.
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