“ALWAYS LOOK AT THE BRIGHT SIDE OF LIFE?”: “POSITIVE” PSYCHOLOGY, PSYCHOANALYSIS, AND PASTORAL THEOLOGY

Abstract

Psychoanalysis and pastoral theology raise serious concerns about the field termed “positive psychology” by its proponents. The field’s construction of psychoanalysis as the “negative” straw person against which it claims to have developed a strength- and virtue-based approach is refuted. Evidence is given that schools of psychoanalysis pioneered a positive focus on strengths, albeit without the dangerous splitting widespread in the field of “positive” psychology. What the field calls “positive” can have “negative” consequences for individuals and communities. The renaming of the field as “virtue psychology” is proposed. Despite its good intentions, “positive” psychology is revealed as a neocolonial psychology of empire that tends to rationalize social injustice away. Its “positive theology” is shown to be an illusory attempt to counter existential despair by playing God through an omnipotent justification-by-works mentality. Psychoanalysis could serve the field as a treasure trove for a more balanced focus on the whole spectrum of human experience.