Notes on Rethinking Positive Thinking by Gabriele Oettingen

Rethinking Positive Thinking: Inside the New Science of MotivationGabriele OettingenPenguin Group US

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39 notes/highlights

Created by Nick de Vera   – Last synced August 31, 2022

Author’s Note

I am deeply cognizant of the rich intellectual contributions of my coauthors, my fellow travelers in the rethinking of positive thinking. Stockdale paradox? search, not found August 19, 20228

Preface

I call this method “mental contrasting,” and it instructs us to dream our dreams but then visualize the personal barriers or impediments that prevent us from achieving these dreams. August 19, 20229

When we perform mental contrasting, we gain energy to take action. August 19, 202210

The book then examines and documents the power of a deceptively simple task: juxtaposing our dreams with the obstacles that prevent their attainment. August 19, 202210

Chapter One: Dreaming, Not Doing

Martin E. P. Seligman, founder of the positive psychology movement and my research advisor at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, conceived of optimism as beliefs or expectations about the future that are based on past experiences of success.14 August 19, 202217

here’s the kicker. Irrespective of their judgments based on past experience, women who had strong positive fantasies about slimming down—the ones who most positively pictured themselves looking slender and attractive when going out with their friend, or who pictured themselves passing by the doughnuts without batting an eye—lost twenty-four pounds less than those who pictured themselves more negatively. August 19, 202220

We performed an analysis of articles in the financial pages of USA Today dating from the beginnings of the financial crisis during 2007–2009 using a computer program that finds and extracts words from the text that carry a given meaning.26 Extracting all words that dealt with the future or that carried a positive valence, as well as all words that were negative or dealt with the past, we created a “future positive” index. We used this index to perform a statistical analysis exploring whether positive thinking in the financial pages correlated with movements in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Guess what? We found a clear correlation: the more positive newspaper reporting was in a given week, the more the Dow declined in the week and month that followed. if true thats leaving a lot of money on the table August 19, 202227

Chapter Two: The Upside of Dreaming

The solution was to avoid positive fantasy.1 Neo-Freudians and followers of a school called humanistic psychology picked up on this thinking around the middle of the twentieth century, arguing that only thoughts corresponding to reality, and not fantasies, were “mentally healthy” and capable of leading to self-actualization. As one scholar, Marie Jahoda, put it, “. . . the perception of reality is called mentally healthy when what the individual sees corresponds to what is actually there,”2 August 19, 202231

Maslow proclaimed that “healthy individuals find it possible to accept themselves and their own nature without chagrin or complaint”3—a position that might be construed as implicitly critical of wishful dreams and fantasies.4 but necessarily. know what you are, and what you want August 19, 202231

As William James observed, “What holds attention determines action.”14 August 19, 202238

While fantasizing might help us satisfy some needs, it doesn’t help us fulfill needs that require significant energy, effort, or commitment. August 19, 202238

something about positive fantasies hinders us in handling hard tasks but spurs us to perform easy tasks. August 19, 202238

Watching images flow freely in their minds, people let themselves go, and in the process arrive at a comprehensive, intuitive understanding of what they really want for themselves, what is essential to their doing and being. They become aware not just of what makes sense, but of what feels right. August 19, 202245

they offer us escapist pleasure in the present, and they also help us “keep things real” by enabling us to virtually explore our deeper desires—in other words, what we really want, what belongs to us, and what we belong to. August 19, 202246

Chapter Three: Fooling Our Minds

We’ve seen that the principle of “Dream it. Wish it. Do it.” does not hold true, and now we know why: in dreaming it, you undercut the energy you need to do it. You put yourself in a temporary state of bliss, calmness—and lethargy. Unfit for the Hard Stuff August 19, 202250

As we expected, students who had been asked to positively fantasize reported feeling less energized than those who had been prompted to give a neutral fantasy. In addition, the less energized students reported feeling, the less they had accomplished during the week in question. Positive fantasies led to lower energy levels, which in turn predicted lower accomplishment. August 19, 202255

by fooling our brains into thinking we’re already successful, we lose motivation and energy to do what it takes to actually become successful. August 19, 202257

Chapter Four: The Wise Pursuit of Our Dreams

Think twice: Did you focus on your real obstacle? Is there another issue that feels even more critical? Dig as deep as you can and identify the critical hurdle in your path. Keep it in your mind’s eye. Then imagine encountering this obstacle. Again give your fantasies free rein. Imagine the relevant events and scenarios as vividly as you can. Keep in mind that there is no single, objectively valid, “correct” obstacle. You’re simply looking for the obstacle in you that feels the most pertinent in the moment, and that gets you past any and all excuses you might make for yourself. When you hit on it, you’ll know, because you’ll experience a sense of insight or energized calmness, maybe even an epiphany. August 19, 202264

we achieved measurable results in our studies using an exercise that took between five and twenty minutes to complete (in everyday life, it will usually take even less time, as we shall see). Imagine what might happen if you got in the habit of performing quick mental contrasting exercises daily for all sorts of wishes, concerns, and anxieties, August 19, 202289

Charlie found comfort in mental contrasting, particularly its ability to confront him with the insecurities and other internal issues that were preventing him from coping. “It was like ripping the Band-Aid off right away, having to confront something that you spend a lot of time trying to keep at bay.” August 19, 202290

Chapter Five: Engaging Our Nonconscious Minds

Mental contrasting forged a link between the future and the reality, but it was specifically in this order: first future and then reality. Mental contrasting almost instantaneously brings the reality to mind when the future is called up—a process that is beyond our conscious ability to notice and control. August 19, 202299

Chapter Six: The Magic of WOOP

During the 1990s, as I was experimenting with mental contrasting, my husband, Peter M. Gollwitzer, was pursuing fascinating research of his own in a related area. He was studying a concept that he called “implementation intentions,”6 the forging of explicit intentions about how to achieve a wish. If you break down the process by which people pursue wishes, you can distinguish two phases: an initial phase in which you weigh your options and decide to commit to a goal, and a second phase in which you plan how to take action to attain the wish. Decades of research had shown that strongly intending to pursue a wish can improve the chances that the wish will be realized. August 20, 2022124

Peter and his collaborator, Veronika Brandstätter, found that once we’ve firmly committed to achieving a goal, explicitly formulating a plan for attaining that goal could help people take action and overcome obstacles. August 20, 2022125

Peter conducted more studies, he came to realize that forming a plan for how to attain a certain goal—what he termed the “implementation intention”—had a more powerful effect if it took on the particular form of an “if-then” statement: “If situation x arises, then I will perform response y .” August 20, 2022125

Statistical analysis of almost one hundred of these studies found that implementation intentions had a “medium-to-large” impact on actual behavior, significantly increasing the likelihood that people would achieve their goals. August 20, 2022126

“whether getting started was an issue of remembering to act, seizing good opportunities, or overcoming initial reluctance.” It also helped people protect against distractions, overcome counterproductive but habitual behaviors, and retain the energy to tackle new goals August 20, 2022126

Performing mental contrasting and implementation intentions together—what we at first somewhat inelegantly termed MCII—could make selecting and attaining wishes easier and more effective by maximizing the work your mind does without your conscious effort. August 20, 2022127

I realized that we needed a better name than “MCII.” The name WOOP—Wish, Outcome, Obstacle, Plan—came to us almost by accident in the course of fielding a study. August 20, 2022130

WOOP is different from other exercises you may have tried in that it involves free thoughts and images rather than rational or effortful thinking. August 20, 2022131

What is it in you that holds you back? What is it really ? Find the most critical, internal obstacle that prevents you from fulfilling your wish or solving your concern. What thoughts or behaviors might play a role? How about habits or preconceived notions? When thinking about obstacles, people often look to the external world, naming circumstances or individuals they feel are blocking them. August 20, 2022132

The point of this exercise is to help us prevent ourselves from getting in the way of realizing our own dreams. In selecting an internal obstacle, it’s also important to dig deep enough to make sure you are addressing one that’s critical for you. August 20, 2022132

The obstacle could be a behavior, an emotion, an obsessive thought, an impulse, a bad habit, assumptions you jump to, or just a silly, vain behavior. August 20, 2022132

By finding your obstacle, you’ll gain what in German is called Durchblick , loosely translated as a new, clearer vista on your wish or concern August 20, 2022132

Chapter Seven: WOOP Your Life

In one study of high school and middle school students lead by Angela L. Duckworth, we found that WOOP helped students complete 60 percent more PSAT practice questions over their summer break than those in a control group.27 hitting the big names August 20, 2022153

The more areas we explore in our studies, the more complete our understanding will be of the applicability and benefits of WOOP. since we got our hammer so far everything we’ve looked at has turned out to be a nail August 20, 2022154

WOOP is by no means a cure-all, so what are the weaknesses? woop could be brittle if some unexpected obstacle comes up not in the if-then August 20, 2022155

Chapter Eight: Your Friend for Life

We also get caught up in our perception of our wishes, locking ourselves into obsessive thoughts—what in French are called idées fixes. We think, “I have to do X” or “I need to finish Y before I can tackle Z” or “It’s not proper for me to do W.” Then along comes WOOP, our furry little friend. WOOP isn’t emotionally or ideologically invested in W, X, Y, or Z. WOOP isn’t invested in any particular solution or outcome. It’s a process for helping you find your path. August 20, 2022157

you can consistently rely on it to show you the way and help you make decisions. consistently, 100%? August 20, 2022157

If you are inclined to go as deep as possible in identifying the obstacle, then be honest with yourself. What really does stand in your way? You don’t need to tell anyone the real answer—just tell yourself. The obstacle might not be flattering. It might entail a hit to your ego. It might be a truth about yourself that you’ve long avoided facing. That’s fine. Now is the time to look at it. Announce it to yourself as part of the WOOP exercise. August 20, 2022166