Why no one seems to write books about the power of negative thinking

Have you ever asked yourself why are people so negative? You can't do this, you can't do that. This negativity affects every aspect of our lives and our relationships. I think it's all about fear and fear of failure.

My belief is that negative thinking kept us alive back in the caveman days. The fear of all things dangerous made a difference in our survival. I don't think any caveman survived by positive thinking and optimism. The pragmatic thinking that I may die, if I don’t look for danger, kept everyone alive. The negative person was the winner.

That same negative thinking probably affected relationships. Any man or woman who helped you survive was a good person. A day when everyone made it back to the cave alive at the end of the day was a good day.

So how does positive thinking affect us today?

Well this excerpt from the opinion pages of The New York Times makes an interesting point.

The Power of Negative Thinking

GREED — and its crafty sibling, speculation — are the designated culprits for the financial crisis. But another, much admired, habit of mind should get its share of the blame: the delusional optimism of mainstream, all-American, positive thinking.

Positive thinking is endemic to American culture — from weight loss programs to cancer support groups — and in the last two decades it has put down deep roots in the corporate world as well. Everyone knows that you won’t get a job paying more than $15 an hour unless you’re a “positive person,” and no one becomes a chief executive by issuing warnings of possible disaster.

When it comes to how we think, “negative” is not the only alternative to “positive.” As the case histories of depressives show, consistent pessimism can be just as baseless and deluded as its opposite. The alternative to both is realism — seeing the risks, having the courage to bear bad news and being prepared for famine as well as plenty. We ought to give it a try.

By Barbara Ehrenreich - Published September 23, 2008

It seems that positive thinking may not be all that it is cracked up to be. But negative thinking, in my opinion, has helped us survive for long time.

The Kitchen Table Anthropologist

Man’s Best Friend is Still a Hunter

In looking at ourselves, our pets seem to take on our personality or we see it in our pets. It is often said people seem to look like their pets.

Our pets are an important part of our lives. They bring us comfort, companionship and become a part of the family. We have made the hunting dog a house pet; we have made the working dog a companion. Have our pets really changed or are they still domesticated wild animals?

Let me offer this example of pet behavior that makes me think our pets have not changed either. A good friend of mine who has two very large dogs pointed out this behavior to me. She is a student of her dogs and their behavior. As soon as I understood her theory I realized I had also experienced this form of dog behavior.

 

We have all purchased a squeaky toy for our pets. They come in all sizes and shapes. Some of them are shaped like mice for our cats; others are shaped like small animals for our dogs. The one thing they all have in common is the squeaky sound they made when squeezed. They all have this little plastic noisemaker which is the first thing to break while our pets are playing with them. I had never stopped to consider the reason why toy makers put this little squeaky deal in their toys until my friend shared her experience.

We had a small dog-named Trixie as a house pet; she had the hart of a lion. She weighted under 20 pounds and was a great little dog. Her whole world was our house and backyard. One day she came up to the back door with a small baby rabbit in her mouth. As it turns out a wild mother rabbit had a litter of babies in our back year. She had not realized that she was sharing the yard with our feisty little Trixie.

We found the bunny nest and brought one of them into the house to feed and care for it since the mother rabbit was not taking care of it. I was up in the middle of the night feeding this cute little creature with an eyedropper. This little baby rabbit had won our harts.

Then tragedy struck, I was up stairs when I heard this high pitched squeaking sound coming from our family room. We all ran downstairs only to discover our little dog had gotten into the box with the baby rabbit and was killing the little guy. Rabbits in the wild never make a sound but when injured make a loud squeaking sound, one that I will never forget. To end the story the little baby rabbit died and our dog seemed to get a real charge out of doing her “job” of killing this little creature. What struck me and will always remain with me was the sound. It was a perfect match for the sound that pet toys make and I came to realize why our pets love the sound. They have been killing other smaller animals for thousands of years and for dogs, which are predators, it is the sound of the kill.

So next time your pet attacks their squeeze toy you know why it’s such an appealing sound, the sound of a successful hunt and kill. 

Animal behavior like our behavior never seems to change.

Women pay attention: Men are still hunters

Man has been a hunter since he first walked the earth, no one will argue with this concept. Man is still a hunter today, many will disagree. Because man has been hunting for thousands of years why would he stop today? Well he has not stopped hunting, it just looks different today. I am not talking about the political incorrect hunting of birds and animals that take place every fall around the world. I am talking about hunting behavior.

Yes man still hunts for food, but in most big cities traditional hunting has fallen out of popularity. In small towns all across America hunting in the fall of the year is still a tradition that has not changed. Fathers taking sons hunting and teaching them the traditions of the hunt has been going on for thousands of years and most likely will not change. Big city people, on the other hand, are not exposed to hunting and don’t understand why someone would want to go hunting; yet they are hunters also.

 

Man, the big city hunter does not go out and bring back a deer for his family he hunts in other ways. He hunts for a cab, hunts for a mate (or two, or more), hunts for tickets to the ball game, hunts for a better job. Hunting is a concentrated effort to survive by providing food for the family group.

Let’s take a look at hunting behavior; it has two basic parts, the hunt and the kill. For the big city hunter step one is hunting for a cab, which is followed by step two the “kill” or finally getting the cab. Hunting always takes patience and skill but the “kill” is like finding tickets to a playoff game and can be a thrill. Men, everyday in our society play out this two-step process. They even teach these rites of passage to their male children.

For early man to be successful at hunting for food; skill and patience were required. Sitting still for many hours waiting for that wild animal to come along was normal behavior. Men would hunt in small groups for safety and to help each other. They would sit quietly for hours not talking just waiting, watching and moving slowly. They would have food and drink but could not make any noise that would scare away the animals.

Today modern men can sit with each other and watch football on TV for hours and not talk with each other. When I grew up the men in our family always gather in the den after a big family and watched sports on TV. The women usually sat in the kitchen and talked. I could only cope so long with the men in the den; they could sit for hours and not say a word. I am much too social so I would go into the kitchen and sit with the women and talk. As I got older I realized I was the only male in the family who sat with the women in the kitchen.

Men have the ability to bond without saying a word. This type of bonding is very strong but since men never talk much, they never learn much about each other. They just bond for the next ball game (or hunt). Men can spend hour after hour on the couch watching TV with such concentration that they never hear their mate. Men can spend years together in the work place and never know much about each other. Women on the other hand can meet someone new and have a complete life history in five minutes or less.

Sound familiar? All those years of hunting has helped to mold modern man.

The Kitchen Table Anthropologist